Web connections

When it comes to broadband, we Americans are a bit like Maverick and Goose in Top Gun. We feel the need for speed -- download speed, that is. We cringe at reports that show average U.S. download speeds lagging behind those of other countries. Representative Rick Boucher [D-Va.], chairman of the House Communications, Technology & Internet Subcommittee, says that within the next five years, 80 percent of Americans should have access to broadband speeds that are more than ten times what we have today.

Increased access to high-speed Internet connections helps create jobs, though it doesn't always result in higher wages, according to a new research report from the Public Policy Institute of California.

Herman Heunis isn't your typical social-media startup founder. He's 50 years old, was raised on a sheep farm in Namibia, and is a veteran of the South African Navy. Little surprise that the company he built is no garden-variety social network either.

President Nicolas Sarkozy's governing party rejoiced when it muscled one of his pet projects through the French parliament: an unprecedented law to cut the Internet connections of people who repeatedly download music and movies illegally.

Sarkozy's victory last week, however, has not won France leadership in Europe's fight against Internet piracy. The government controls needed to enforce the law have unnerved other European nations while legal challenges at home and opposition in the European Parliament could derail it.

A move by AT&T to eliminate 4 percent of its workforce may only be the beginning of a torrent of staff reductions and spending cutbacks in the $1 trillion telecom industry.

AT&T, the largest U.S. telecom services provider, said on Dec. 4 that it will slash 12,000 jobs, citing a shrinking economy and consumer spending reductions. AT&T is also considering a reduction in the amount it spends on network upgrades next year. Verizon Communications cut 2,700 employees in the third quarter, and Sprint Nextel has laid off 4,000 people.

Fewer Telecom Purchases