>The first claim seems unlikely, unless that’s 30 minutes at the speed of sound.

It doesn't have to be a physical or technical limitation at all. It's a limitation of the cable monopolies not seeing profit in putting fiber or cable lines out there and there's no competition so if they don't, no one will.

As for everything else you've said... I would like to introduce you to the concept of the tyranny of the majority. If the richest country in the world says to its citizens "sorry your school isn't big enough to afford books, have fun in the job market" something is seriously fucked up.

Yes, yes it is a shock that rural populations are treated like shit. I grew up in it, and the fact that it's getting worse not better is still shocking every single day.

I don't have a solid citation, apologies. But remember 4 of the top 10 cities are in the, landwise, mostly uninhabited Texas and Arizona. It's not a stretch to drive out of the city and lose access to broadband. I'm in a top 30 city and absolutely driving 30 minutes away takes broadband off the plate...depending on direction(south and west do, north and east dont).

That’s fair enough on the citation. I would point out that as you say, Texas and Arizona are heavily urbanized, and outside of that, very sparsely inhabited. TX having ~84% urban population, and AZ nearly 90%, that’s going to be hard to cover the other small percentage with broadband. Texas, despite being one of the “Big 8” ranks 32nd for average population density.

In other words rural TX and AZ are atypical.

I live in Central Kansas. We have 6Mbps top speed available. ~15 minutes away, they have 40Mbps, with gigabit coming in. ~15 minutes the other direction, you have satellite, or...... satellite. Cell service is too poor to use it for general purpose internet, DSL doesn't go that far from town, and the Pixius tower (10Mbps) is just out of range. And there are people who live there too.

Derp. I should've actually read what I was replying to. We definitely aren't thirty minutes from a top 10 city... Just a small town to most of you city dwellers. :)

I'm in Canada, but I live rural/exurban in the greater Toronto/Hamilton area, less than 8km from town and less than 20km from two major cities and there's no broadband because it's not profitable to run DSL or cable to my road. Telcos/Cable companies just won't do it. The next road over has it, through some fluke.