KEY POINTS:
A survey of 28 cities in Asia Pacific has Auckland in 10th place when it comes to ranking the best "broadband communities".
If you're surprised that a New Zealand city would make it into the top ten given the woeful state of our broadband, you'll be interested to know the survey, by telecommunications journal CommsDay, doesn't measure the cities on broadband penetration, but on a series of factors such as:
* No of wi fi hotspots within 5 miles of city centre
* Presence of HSDPA/EVDO networks
* Mobile penetration
* Programmes to promote school internet use
* E-government
* Subsidised wireless or wired broadband
* Internet penetration
Hong Kong came out on top. But where was Wellington, with its extensive CafeNet wireless network, the inner-city fibre of CityLink and the residential cable network of TelstraClear?
"One of the distinguishing features of the Hong Kong broadband landscape is not only the competition among access providers, but the range of competing technologies that are available to consumers. There is robust competition between fixed network and cable operators, while mobile op erators are all moving to the latest 3G data services such as HSDPA," CommsDay said of Hong Kong.
The interesting thing is that cities across the region are competing fiercely to have the best broadband infrastructure so as to attract investment, particularly of the hi-tech variety.
On that basis, Auckland is looking pretty good coming in just behind Sydney.
The full rankings are as follow:
BEST BROADBAND COMMUNITIES IN ASIA PACIFIC:
1 Hong Kong
2 Singapore
3 Taipei
4 Tokyo
5 Seoul
6 (equal) Osaka, Busan
8 Melbourne
9 Sydney
10 Auckland
11 Kuala Lumpur
12 Macau
13 Penang
14 (equal) Bangkok, Beijing, Shenzhen
17 (equal) Shanghai, Guangzhou
19 Manila
20 (equal) Brunei, Bangalore
22 (equal) Delhi, Mumbai, Jakarta, Saigon, Hanoi
27 Phnom Penh
28 Vientiane
