One of the reasons
shanghai slow internet test (when accessing sites outside of China) is that there are only three
main gateways that connect China’s “local” internet to the rest of the
world – one in the north, around Beijing, one in the center, in
Shanghai, and the third in the south, in Guangzhou. As traffic passes
through these gateways, packets are “mirrored” and monitored by
government computers, which could further slow the process.[check out
James Fallows’ article on the Great Firewall for more: “The Connection
Has Been Reset”]
China’s internet infrastructure is also just relatively undeveloped. China’s size is comparable to the US (i.e. it’s a big country) so it’s
difficult and costly to build such systems at that scale, especially
when many of China’s areas are still underdeveloped in many other ways.
Also, while China’s demand for internet is certainly growing, the
government’s interest in satisfying that demand is still low, so it’s
not in their interest to invest in making access to information even
easier for its citizens (the government being the ones that control
telecoms in China).
