Verizon’s Stringle cooks the broadband statistics books!

I recall a lecture of a math professor that created a working algebraic proof for the idea that two plus two equals five. The point is, if done skilfully you can prove anything - true or not. Unfortunately for Verizon, their chief pitch man’s proofs are not so convincing. In a speech at NXTcomm, Verzion VP and COO Stringle made some wild claims backed by questionable stats that remind me of the old Joe Isuzu commercials. For starters, he wants us to believe a choice of two providers is competition and that densely populated US cities have broadband on par with places like Korea. He goes further to claims that satellite is a viable competitor to urban fixed line service as proof fo a highly competitive marketplace.

Om Malik of GigaOm provides a superbly constructed rebuttal to Stringle’s utter nonsense:

Average broadband speeds in South Korea and Japan are 49.5 megabits per second and 63.6 megabits per second, respectively. The average U.S. speed is about 4.9 megabits per second, making it the 14th-fastest country in the world. The average price in South Korea and Japan is about 83 cents per megabit. In the U.S, it’s about $2.83.

But since it would be unfair to use average U.S. stats, I went with Verizon’s prices, the ones it’s going to offer in Massachusetts and New Jersey. On Verizon’s FiOS network, a 50 Mbps connection costs $140 a month — or about $2.80 a megabit. In fact, if you went with Verizon’s 20 Mbps service, you would be paying $3.25 per megabit. (To be fair, Verizon’s price-per-megabit is still cheaper than the $5.25 Qwest charges for its 20 Mbps connection, which costs $105 a month.)

In other words, not until Verizon starts selling a 50 Mbps connection for $41.50 a month and 20 Mbps fiber connection for $16.60 a month can Strigl get away with comparing U.S. broadband with that of the rest of the world. (GigaOm)