More truthiness about Finland's broadband-for-all policy

There are days I love this gig. Today is one of those days. Yesterday, I wrote Would you accept increased taxes to give broadband to every citizen? about the new Finnish plan to make broadband a right in Finland.

I sourced some of the information from the BBC and apparently, the BBC only got it partially right, at least according to a ZDNet reader in Finland.

I think it's so cool that there are so many knowledgeable (OK, and a few certifiably crazy) readers visiting ZDNet and when we take on a topic like this, we can dig in and explore it deeper by getting input from people on the ground and in the know, like Erkki Mattila.

Here's what Erkki had to say:

While you raise quite nice points in a humorous way in your writing of July 1st, they have been written due to erroneous information from BBC.

The law isn't really about free access to the Internet, but of improving existing telecommunications infrastructure, so that every household in Finland can purchase a broadband connection with a downstream rate of at least 1 Mbit/s from their local ISP.

While the law doesn't concern the connections itself, it is named the "broadband support law" and yes, it is about giving financial support to designated companies which build the infrastructure.

If you're interested, I recommend reading followings links: Press release from the Finnish Ministry of Transport & Communications

And the law itself, translated (ugh) by Google.

Summery cheers, Erkki Mattila

PS, I apologize for any serious errors in my language, I haven't really produced any long texts after my military service.

There you go. More Finnish goodness. Have a great weekend!