BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow

Subject: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 12:19 PM

For Idaho and the Internet, Life in the Slow Lane - NY Times 9/14/2011

"And, according to a new study, they are among the problems that have earned Idaho an unfortunate distinction: it had the slowest Internet speeds in the country earlier this year for residential customers who were downloading things like games — a "dismal" average of 318 kilobytes per second.

"Translation: In Idaho, it would take you 9.42 seconds to download a standard music file compared with 3.36 seconds in Rhode Island, the state with the fastest average speeds, at 894 kilobytes per second.

"The slowest city, by the way, was also in Idaho: In Pocatello, it would take nearly 12 seconds to download that music file, according to the study by Pando Networks, a company that helps consumers accelerate downloads. In the nation's fastest city, Andover, Mass., a Boston suburb, it would take just over one second."

Do (certain) Pocatellans compensate with their blade speed, instead?

~ Becky in Long Beach

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: gnu
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 12:27 PM

12 seconds? Whaddya gonna do to occupy that kinda time?

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 12:29 PM

Pocatello, Idaho.....Slowly I turned...(for those old enough to recall burlesque skits)

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Amos
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 01:22 PM

Raparee substitutes muzzle velocity, and it seems to satisfy him all right.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 03:17 PM

Why, it's so s-l-o-w they call the town Po-tel just to enter it in email. They never even discuss Schenectady, which can't BE abbreviated.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 06:46 PM

Can't even, in many cases, be spelled out

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Janie
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 09:20 PM

I knew there was some logical explanation for that fellow's rich fantasy life.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Rapparee
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 10:31 PM

I did a test from home (cable TV connection). Outgoing was 3.29 mbps, uploading was 302 kbps. Check your speed here.

Of course, it's faster at the Legion Hovel. They've got their own dedicated satellite in geosynchronous orbit, including the necessary uplink/downlink equipment, and all they do there is play games and look at porn dachshund sites.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Desert Dancer
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 10:47 PM

On my DSL in Arizona, it took too long for the speed test page to load... LOL! (Download speed is 557 kbps, upload 556 kbps this evening.)

~ Becky in Tucson

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Amos
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 10:49 PM

Mine were 28.31 megabits per second DL and 974 kilobits/sec UL. So Pocatello is kinda slow. WOnder where the nearest backbone segment is?


A

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 14 Sep 11 - 11:42 PM

Wow, Rhode Island made out well in this comparison. We residents are used to having our state compared to bad things, as in "An oil slick the size of Rhode Island."

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 10:26 AM

Well, the county I live in is bigger than Rhode Island, but so is everything else.

Let's see -- Idaho State University and Idaho National Laboratory and the Accelerator Labs have Internet. It's 15 hops from my house to the Mudcat servers, and 20 hops in 165 microseconds to the servers of BBC World News.

The nearest backbone seems to be the Class A 15.0.0.0-15.0.0.255 (at least for one trace route), which is a direct assignment to Hewlett Packard, and that, of course, means simply that a node with one of the octets is out there. I have heard that a second-level backbone passed right through town because of INL and ISU, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Amos
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 11:36 AM

Being retired means having enough time to dick around looking things up on the Internet!! :D Don't I sound just a little jealous?? :D

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 12:17 PM

6.63mbs
3.42mbs
The 1st internet connection I had was 14,400 baud...16 years ago. I have all the speed I 'need'. I can watch YouTube or hear streaming music,,etc.

I'm not sure my brain is wired for any faster.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 02:30 PM

MY first Internet connection, over 26 years ago, was a tight string with tin cans for modems. You had to enter things into the computer using a manual typewriter, in binary format. And we didn't have ones and zeroes; we had to us lower case ell's and upper case oh's. We made our own electricity by walking as fast as we could on a treadmill sort of thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Rapparee
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 08:59 PM

And it all was input in binary ASCII. The word "the", for instance, would have been like this (I'm using lower case oh's so you can see them more clearly):

ollloloo ollolooo olloolol

Which if you sing it is really kinda musical, so this thread can now move above the salt.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Sep 11 - 09:19 PM

Yeah... and some here remember MY Win 3 machine, run by gerbils...

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 09:40 AM

===Pocatello, Idaho.....Slowly I turned...(for those old enough to recall burlesque skits)===

Don't recall that one, Dick. But I remember it was where Judy Garland's supposed character was "born in a trunk in the Princes theater"!!!

~Michael~

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 09:43 AM

Ref above, for the young in years as well as in ♥, is to "A ❂ Is Born"!

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: Rapparee
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 10:01 AM

And it's "Princess Theater" -- burned down years back.

Judy, however, was born Frances Ethel Gumm in Grand Rapids, Minnesota in 1922. Her family called her Ethel, and she changed her name for professional reasons, just as Marion Morrison and Lester Franklin Sly did.

Subject: RE: BS: Pocatello is slowest of the slow
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Sep 11 - 10:10 AM

Yes, thanks, Rap. & for the info re the theatre's name, about which I have often wondered. Google the song "Born in a Trunk", and you will find both versions indexed: the videos all seem to go with 'Princes', but the lyric sheets and wiki entry with 'Princess'. I am happy that it really was the name of a theatre in Pocatello Id!

I knew about Ethel Gumm. Nowadays they would probably think it smarter to go with original name ~~ think of Carrie Snodgress and Jo Rowbotham! I also know who Marion Morrison was, with his True Grit.

A bit of drift, btw: Robin is always a man's name here in UK [till recent US influence, anyhow], Marion a woman's. Your variants on this don't half mess up the Robin Hood legend!.

~Michael~