I know almost nothing else about Finland except that I’m suddenly filled with love for it. The US Pirate Party, on whose mailing list I first heard this, has the details.

I find it interesting that they declared the minimum speed to be 1 megabit per second (Mbps). That makes dial-up (typically billed as 56k or .056 Mbps) is, by Finland’s standards, a human rights violation. Although I don’t know the first thing about Finland or their legal system, I am curious how it affects any dial-up providers that may still exist there. Will there be follow-up legislation banning the sale of dial-up? Will the infrastructure surrounding dial-up become contraband, or a useful backup in case of emergency?

This prompted me to wonder about my own connectivity speed. You may view the results if you’re curious. Then in 10 years when everybody’s using fiber optic or whatever bests it, we can all look at this and laugh and wonder how we lived with such slow connectivity.