13.21 Gbps    OC-255
10 Gbps       OC-192
4.976 Gbps    OC-96
2.488 Gbps    OC-48, STS-48
1.866 Gbps    OC-36
1.244 Gbps    OC-24
933.12 Mbps   OC-18
622.08 Mbps   OC-12, STS-12
466.56 Mbps   OC-9
155.52 Mbps   OC-3, STS-3
100 Mbps      CDDI, FDDI, Fast Ethernet, Category 5 cable
51.84 Mbps    OC-1, STS-1
44.736 Mbps   T-3, DS-3 North America
34.368 Mbps   E-3 Europe
20 Mbps       Category 4 cable
16 Mbps       Fast Token Ring LANs
10 Mbps       Thin Ethernet, category 3 cable, cable modem
8.448 Mbps    E-2 Europe
6.312 Mbps    T-2, DS-2 North America
6.144 Mbps    Standard ADSL downstream
4 Mbps        Token Ring LANs
3.152 Mbps    DS-1c
2.048 Mbps    E-1, DS-1 Europe
1.544 Mbps    ADSL, T-1, DS-1 North America
128 Kbps      ISDN
64 Kbps       DS-0, pulse code modulation
56 Kbps       56flex, U.S. Robotics x2 modems,
33.6 Kbps     56flex, x2 modem communications rate
28.8 Kbps     V.34, Rockwell V.Fast Class modems
20 Kbps       Level 1 cable, minimum cable data speed
14.4 Kbps     V.32bis modem, V.17 fax
9600 bps      modem speed circa early 1990s
2400 bps      modem speed circa 1980s  

Units of Measurement
bit   = smallest unit of digital information, i.e. ones & zeros
byte  = a set of bits
bps   = bits per second
Kbps  = kilobits per second =1000 bits per second
Mbps  = Million bits per second =1,000,000 bits per second
Gbps  = Gigabits per second = 1,000,000,000 (one billion) bits per second
Tbps  = Terabits per second = 1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion) bits per second
(Network speed is mesured in 1000 units, memory and storage space in 1024 units)

This is a list of different internet access connection speeds over a variety of different types of material. OC stands for Optical Carrier or in other words fiber connections. The method for communicating over fiber is called SONET (Synchronous optical networking). The connections listed above that do not start with OC are over traditional copper, twisted pair (Cat5) ethernet or coaxial cabeling.

The future of Internet radio is in immediate danger. Royalty rates for webcasters have been drastically increased by a recent ruling and are due to go into effect on July 15 (retroactive to Jan 1, 2006!). Today was a day of radio silence to encourage people to take action.

So that is what I did. I am calling everyone I know to get them to contact their congressional representatives. I will urge them to call everyone they know. Hopefully we can start a chain reaction.

Here is what you can do.

Send an email:

http://www.capwiz.com/thenation/issues/alert/?alertid=9796036

Call Congress:

You will need to know your complete zip code which you can lookup using the USPS site.

Lookup Representative:
http://www.house.gov/

Lookup Senator:
http://www.senate.gov/

Text to follow when you call:

Talking Points:
1) I am a constituent and I’m calling to ask you to save Internet radio by co-sponsoring the Internet Radio Equality Act.
2) The Copyright Royalty Board’s decision to increase royalty rates for webcasters is going to turn off my Internet radio and I do NOT want that to happen. Please co-sponsor the Internet Radio Equality Act.
3) I believe that artists should be fairly compensated for the music they make, but putting my webcasters out of business will only hurt artists more. They depend on Internet radio to get their music out to fans and build new audiences. When the webcasters go off the air, so do artists. Please co-sponsor the Internet Radio Equality Act.
4) Internet radio is one of the only bright spots for independent music and diversity. We NEED Internet radio. Don’t turn it off. Co-sponsor the Internet Radio Equality Act.
5) (If you are an artist) Internet radio enables artists like myself to reach fans throughout the country and enjoy exposure and airplay that we may otherwise have not received. I’m asking you to co-sponsor the Internet Radio Equality Act.

Don’t forget to sign the other petitions to make a difference.

Check out Desktop Tower Defense if you haven’t tried it already. It is quite fun and addicting. It is a flash puzzle game whose goal is to stop the enemies (creeps) from getting to the other side of the board by building mazes with different types of towers.

Two places to find it online. The website Kongregate.com has more of a multiplayer aspect to it, because you can chat with other people on the website after signing up for an account. The other place is the author’s home page, handdrawngames.com.

If you do try it out and get a decent score playing at least the Medium difficulty you can save your score to a group of other people. My friends and I have been saving our scores under the group name “llbbl”. Feel free to add your scores to that group. You can see our group and other group scores here.