Understanding Where the Internet Isn’t Good Enough Yet

The global Internet performance varies greatly across geographies, with some regions experiencing slow speeds and high latency due to factors such as ISP concentration and routing inefficiencies. In the United States, for example, median download speeds range from 142 Mbps in New York City to just 36 Mbps in San Francisco. France has a more even distribution of performance across its cities, with Paris having the highest speed at 107 Mbps and Marseille having the lowest speed at 85 Mbps. Brazil's median download speeds range from 24 Mbps in Campinas to just 3 Mbps in some parts of the Amazon region. South Africa has a similar distribution, with Johannesburg having the highest speed at 106 Mbps and Siyancuma having the lowest speed at 5 Mbps. In Alabama, USA, there is a strong positive correlation between more competition among ISPs and faster performance. Additionally, poor routing or "tromboning" can contribute to inefficiency and drive up the cost of Internet access. To improve global Internet performance, initiatives that promote more competition among ISPs and encourage more networks to interconnect in more places are needed. Reference(s): https://www.cloudflare.com/learning/network-layer/what-is-an-isp/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_infrastructure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tromboning_(computing) https://ripe79.ripe.net/presentations/143-RISATLAS_20200518.pdf https://www.cloudflare.com/blog/project-pangea/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_infrastructure#Interconnection_hubs ```