Networking

Cyber Monday shopping slowing down the company network?!

Will Cyber Monday holiday shoppers hog all the bandwidth?

A recent Maritz Poll showed that expected Cyber Monday shopping is up from 20% last year to 26% this year.

According to the National Retail Federation’s eHoliday Survey, 84% of online retailers will have special Cyber Monday sales, up from last year’s 72%. Shopping dollars will undoubtedly be wisely spent this season, and retailers everywhere are competing for the sale.

With the online deals presumably drawing in more shoppers, will company networks feel the stress? Nearly 56% of workers plan on shopping online while in the office this year. According to a BIGresearch survey, 70% of people between the ages of 18-34 with Internet access will shop from work, with men being the ones most likely to shop (60% of men vs. 51% of women).

But will people really wait until Monday to start their online shopping forays? More households have high-speed Internet connections, eliminating the need to use office network connections on Monday. The online deals, however, may be the reason people hold off — so a spike in Web traffic over company networks is likely to occur.

America fails - miserably - to capture Internet equality medal

Here’s a shocker: Broadband in the U.S. isn’t up to snuff and because of that our children will fall behind the rest of the world.

So we learn from a new report by speedmatters.org, er, the Communication Workers of America, er, the AFL-CIO.

According to the report, the U.S. is lagging far behind other developed countries in broadband speed. Median download speed for the nation is a measly 2.3 mbps. Compare that to Japan, where the median download speed is apparently 63 mbps. France, for a European example, pulls 17 mbps. Our neighbors to the north aren’t great – 7.6 mbps – but still, that’s better.

Data in the report was compiled by cataloging the results of voluntary upload/download speed tests by users nationwide. The report breaks it down by state. Rhode Island comes out the best, pulling a 6.8 mbps download median. Puerto Rico finishes dead last at a .5 mbps download median. Behind that is Alaska with a .8 mbps median.

The results favor densely populated areas, with rural counties and states dragging the numbers down. This could explain why Japan has done so well.

So take report statements like “At this rate, it will take the United States more than 100 years to catch up with current Internet speeds in Japan” with a block of salt.

Still, it’s hard to argue with what speedmatters.org/CWA/AFL-CIO stands for here: Universal Internet access and an end to the digital divide.

The deck has always been stacked in America. That “haves” and “have-nots” thing is no joke. The Internet is a must-have for any meaningful economic success. Failing to provide quality access to rural and poor children, who have few powerful advocates, will only serve to exacerbate the shameful disenfranchisement.

Meanwhile, our president tells Bob Costas that “I don’t see America having problems” and we’re all supposed to sit back and smile because we’re ahead in the medal count.