Broadband Service Rare for Rural Net Users

[SOURCE: Dallas Morning News, AUTHOR: Terry Maxon]
High-speed Internet service is still just a dream for many Americans who live in rural areas and find themselves beyond the reach of DSL or cable broadband lines. However, in a report released Sunday, the Pew Internet Project says that the broadband gap ­ although still significant ­ is narrowing between rural dwellers and those who live in urban and suburban areas. In 2003, only 9 percent of rural residents had home broadband service. Their city counterparts were more than twice as likely to have service ­ 21 percent for urban dwellers and 23 percent for suburban dwellers. By the end of 2005, the percentage of rural residents with broadband had more than doubled, to 24 percent. Urban and suburban penetration had gone up somewhat less, to 38 percent and 40 percent respectively, an increase of two thirds or less. Even so, in absolute terms, suburban and urban penetration made the most gains in percentage points. This underlies the fact that America has a long way to go to give rural areas the same access to high-speed service that many urbanized areas enjoy. "Rural broadband users are no different than home high-speed users elsewhere; they go online more often and do more online activities than dial-up users," said the report's principal author, John B. Horrigan, Pew Internet Project associate director. "But with a lower proportion of broadband users in rural America than elsewhere, the result is that rural Americans, in aggregate, have a more distant relationship with the Internet than urban and suburban Americans," Mr. Horrigan said.
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/022706...

* Home Broadband Adoption in Rural America
http://www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/176/report_display.asp

* Survey: Rural broadband users closing gap
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/technology/13970095.htm