Internet around the world: Japan and Singapore

“The Internet should be like air, always” - the motto of the Japanese provider OCN reflects the vector of development of Japan and Singapore. Both countries in a short time passed the thorny path, having performed a great economic miracle, each in its own way. The development of the Internet in these countries is quite different from those about which we wrote earlier. The example of Japan and Singapore shows what heights a country can achieve and its technological development, if at the helm there will be experts in their field and real managers. The programs that were created by the ministries and governments of Japan and Singapore are spelled out in as detailed as possible, and the result of the implementation of the programs speaks for itself. Let's try to figure out how these countries managed to make such an impressive breakthrough.

Japan

It is now Japan - one of the leading technology countries, but relatively recently, before the great economic miracle, with the development of technology and the Internet, everything was not so smooth. Back in 2000, the Internet in people's homes was only by modem or telephone network, and some providers even offered a free connection for downloading an application that showed ads in the corner of the screen. Communication breaks, long file uploads for transmission, high telephone rates are typical problems of the time. Mobile Internet has already appeared, but it was very expensive, the traffic was limited, the speed was small. But why has everything changed so quickly?

ADSL

The Ministry of Communications realized the gravity of the situation and rather quickly developed a plan for developing an Internet connection for the house. The main condition of the plan was to provide all residents of the country with high-speed Internet at an affordable price. The state company NTT became the pioneer of the transition from dialup (56 kbps) and ISDN (64 kbps) to a home fiber optic network. In 2001, ADSL (1.5 Mbit / s) appeared on the market. Then he scored about 20 thousand users, and in 2003 at a speed of 24 Mbit / s - already 10 million. So Japan managed to even overtake the USA and South Korea by the number of users of high-speed Internet.

Then, in the late nineties, cable television operators began offering broadband services, but at that time it was too expensive — and users very quickly found cheaper alternatives. In 2001, SoftBank offered its subscribers a connection to ADSL (12 Mbit / s) for $ 30, while competitors had the same package at twice the price. This was the beginning of the price war, which led to a decrease in the price of the service package and an increase in the speed of the Internet connection. The race ended with the fact that in 2004 Japan had the lowest cost of ADSL Internet access services in the world: only $ 35.

The same race was the beginning of the expansion of the fiber optic network.

FTTH

In 2002, NTT offered a new service: Fiber To The Home (FTTH). The company was laying fiber for free; all they wanted from the owners was permission for these actions. Moreover, two months of using the network were free! Strong competition NTT was the company Tepco, which launched a real war for the consumer, reducing the cost of connection and increasing its speed. 100 Mb / s without limits for $ 60 per month, and 1 Gb / s - for $ 80. This made it possible to abandon the telephone network. By 2004, 52.1% of households had Internet access, more than half of them used broadband.

In Japan, there is a unique model for deploying a fiber-optic network: the last kilometer is built in an aerial manner on supports that are divided between operators. This technology allows you to reduce construction costs and increase resistance to earthquakes.

A source

VDSL

Due to the popularity of fiber-optic networks, ADSL technology has degenerated into broadband VDSL. Its use has greatly reduced the price, the connection was made via a free modem. Companies offered free connection for up to six months, for this it was necessary only to leave your address and sign a contract. Due to the abundance of companies providing this service, the Japanese managed, without spending a single yen, to use the Internet for up to five years.

PHS

So far, Japan has been successfully fulfilling its plan and occupying a leading position on various criteria, in 2005 the mobile Internet still left much to be desired. The fact is that the network of the operator Willcom was a network of PHS , the simplest standard radiotelephone with the ability to switch the bases of connection and modem connection up to 64 Kbps. This standard is considered to be cellular for the poor. But they could not refuse him: the number of subscribers grew at an incredible rate, the service package expanded to Internet connection and telephone calls without restrictions, and the coverage area covered 95% of the country. Yes, and Wi-Fi was found only in some places and at major public transport stations. Back in 2003, there were 1,624 points of wireless Internet access in the country — and by April 2004 their number had grown to 5,350. In 2005, all the major railway stations and hotels in Japan had access to wireless high-speed communications.

Long-awaited 3G

Japanese communicator EM-One based on Windows Mobile 5.0

But in 2007, ice got under way and the EM-MOBILE and a new 3G network appeared on the market of cellular operators, but on special conditions: only in the three largest cities; communication at the level of data transmission; without voice calls due to the lack of a telephone license from the new operator. But the operator offered the new EM-One communicator, superior in functionality to Nokia and Apple, with the ability to connect to high-speed Internet (3.5 Mbit / s in the coverage area without any restrictions). But, attention, without the function of the phone. But with such an Internet, this problem did not seem so acute.

The fastest internet in the world

In 2013, the Japanese Internet provider So-net Entertainment launched the fastest Internet. The new Nuro network was based on fiber optic technology, which provided download speeds of up to 2 Gbps, and download speeds of 1 Gbps. The price for this pleasure was 51 dollars per month. But here is one nuance: signing a contract with a provider for two years and connection cost $ 535.

Currently, according to the OpenSignal report , 3G / 4G mobile Internet coverage in Japan is 94.52% - and this is the second result in the world, the country is second only to South Korea. The average speed of the mobile Internet is 21.25 Mbit / s (the ninth in the world).

5G - a network of new generation

The pilot version of the 5G network will be used in South Korea during the 2018 Winter Olympics. This network will precede 5G standardization. And already standardized commercial 5G-network will appear in Japan for the Summer Olympics in 2020.

The phenomenon of modern Japan - “Internet refugees”

Internet cafes in Japan are very atypical. They can sometimes stay overnight, and the “working poor” live there for years. And not at all because the Japanese are too much involved in digital life (although this is also true). In recent years, the unemployment rate in Japan has been falling , but in 2010 it was at the level of 6%. Despite the fact that now, by Western standards, this figure is small - 3%, the problem remains very acute. Most often, if a wave of layoffs passes, then a large company can say goodbye to tens of thousands of employees.

A source

But a small percentage of the unemployed is not the main reason for the emergence of “Internet refugees”. Due to the high cost of real estate, even working citizens cannot afford to rent housing and give more than half of their salary for it. And one-two meter rooms at an Internet café cost about $ 25 per night and $ 600 per month. The price includes a computer rental with internet connection, the ability to view multiple movie discs and access to a large number of comic books. One shower for 25-30 rooms, you have to pay about 3 dollars for it. Internet cafes can provide regular visitors with long-term housing and even official registration.

The Japanese government became very interested in the social phenomenon of “Internet refugees” and began an extensive investigation of the problem with the help of nongovernmental social organizations and the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare.

Suicide problem

Not the news that the Japanese nation each year ranks first in the world in the number of suicides. With the development of the Internet, new ways of organizing them have emerged. Thus, the phenomenon of suicides has arisen by agreement: strangers find each other on the net and agree on joint suicide or simultaneous suicide in different places. In 2005, for example, the world went around the news about the suicide of seven people.

Fight against piracy

Japan is one of the world leaders in the fight for property rights on the Internet. In October 2010, a rather radical law appeared in the country, according to which any user must pay a fine (25 thousand dollars) or serve a sentence in prison (two years) if he downloaded any content protected by copyright. And if a person has downloaded a file from his PC illegally, then the penalty rises to 130 thousand dollars, and the term of imprisonment is up to ten years.

Thus, in February 2016, the seventh series of arrests for downloading and distributing pirated content took place. In two days, 44 people were arrested in 29 prefectures of the country.

Perfect dark

But this does not interfere with the existence of Perfect Dark , the Japanese peering file-sharing client for Microsoft Windows.

The anonymity of the Perfect Dark network is based on the rejection of the use of direct connections between end-users, on the unknown IP addresses and on the full encryption of everything that is possible. More specifically, on the mixnet system: the direction of traffic is subject to a known probability, and the distributed file storage (unity) does not have a specific structure, which complicates attempts to prove the illegality of file sharing. Data is stored and transmitted by encrypted blocks, separate from the keys used to encrypt the blocks.

Internet censorship

After the earthquake and the accident at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, the Japanese authorities set up a special commission that was responsible for removing any information related to the history of the nuclear crisis. Authorities strongly pressed on providers of mobile communications, the Internet and cable television to stop the transfer of information about the situation at the Fukushima nuclear power plant - on the grounds that this information is detrimental to public order and morality. As a result, the country's population has become less trust in the government and the media.

Also in 2012–2013, a series of laws were introduced prohibiting insulting the Korean and Chinese people on the Internet due to territorial disputes.

Singapore

Singapore is the pearl of Southeast Asia, a country of high technology. Cellular connectivity here has excellent coverage and impeccable signal strength. Wi-Fi is available in all hotels, and in the cities you can find a lot of pay phones and an internet cafe.

The beginning of the Singapore Internet

Before the global spread of the Internet, Singapore was the first country to launch an interactive information service for the public transmitting images: Teleview . It was developed jointly by the Singapore Telecommunications Authority (TAS) and the British company GEC-Marconi.

At the end of 1987, service testing began with the help of specially designed terminals. Two years later, the network has expanded, and the growing popularity of PCs has led to the addition of them. The first providers of Teleview services were the Singapore Press Union, the Housing and Development Council and the Singapore Stock Exchange. They showed real-time general news, business and real estate news, stock prices.

Subscribers connected to Teleview using 1200–2400-bit modems, and then 9600–14400-kilobit modems. At first the service was free, but then they introduced payment for the use of telephone lines.

Later, Teleview developed a text terminal, an interface for interacting with the Internet. Pine was used to work with e-mail, and web browsing was possible with Lynx. Later, the SingNet provider began offering a SLIP / PPP internet connection via modem.

According to the OpenSignal report , 3G / 4G mobile Internet coverage in Singapore is 94.42%: the fifth result in the world. The average speed of the mobile Internet is 32.19 Mbit / s, this is the second world indicator after South Korea.

Project Wireless @ SG

In December 2006, the Singapore Telecommunications Development Department (Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore, IDA) presented the Wireless @ SG program as part of the Intelligent Nation 2015 project. The goal of the program is to provide free wireless Internet access for everyone in dense areas of people: in the central business district, near major shopping centers, in residential urban centers. The access speed increased to 1 Mbit / s on September 1, 2009, and to 2 Mbit / s in April 2013. The system works free of charge until March 31, 2017.

Next Gen NBN

In early September 2010, Singapore’s Internet service providers shared their plans for creating a new generation broadband network - Next Gen NBN. This is a nationwide ultra-high-speed fiber optic network. It offers broadband access at speeds up to 1 Gbps at competitive prices for ADSL and cable connections. Already in August 2011, network coverage reached 75% across the country, in mid-2012 - 95%.

In March 2015, the ViewQwest provider launched a 2 Gbps fiber-optic network service, which made it the fastest home broadband Internet in the world along with Japanese. Cable and ADSL services were gradually phased out in June 2016.

Intelligent Nation 2015

A source

Intelligent Nation 2015 is a ten-year program for the development of the country's telecommunications network, launched by the Singapore government.

Objectives of the program:

Take a leading position in the world to strengthen the influence of telecommunications networks on the economic and social systems.
Twice to increase the added value of the telecom industry to 26 billion Singapore dollars.
Three-fold increase in revenues from exports in the telecom industry to 60 billion Singapore dollars.
Create 80 thousand jobs.
Bring home broadband coverage to 90%.
Ensure the availability of a computer in every family where there are schoolchildren.

Integration of technology in various areas of society

Interaction with government agencies

Government services are people-oriented, and every citizen can evaluate the quality of services and at any time provide the government with feedback on any initiatives.

Training

Developed telecommunications network opens up opportunities for deeper integration of learning into everyday life, allowing you to get better information in museums and zoos, as well as outside the walls of educational institutions.

Students and teachers have access to a wide range of digital educational resources. Teachers monitor the progress of students outside the school with the help of special services, set and verify tasks, communicating with students in various communities.

Health care

All medical facilities, laboratories and homes of patients, networked, in a timely manner provide the necessary information to doctors. Such an infrastructure turns individual biomedical research into a more individualized process of ensuring the health of each patient.

Economy

The infrastructure of the new generation has led to the use of exclusively electronic and mobile means of payment.

The goals that Japan and Singapore set for themselves (to provide high-speed Internet access to every home and every resident) are very similar. But at the stage of implementing these ideas, each country faced its own peculiarities. What is easy to implement in small Singapore cannot be applied in “unstable” Japan, where fiber optic cables are laid in a special way, given the constant danger of earthquakes. But in one these countries are similar: occupying the Olympus of the technological world, they are not going to stop there.

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Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/402351/

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