[renw0rp]

In the peripherial Europe, like the United Kingdom, fiber optic became available only in the last couple of years, definitely not early 2000s. There are still places within 80KM from London, near main train lines, where you can't get more than 50Mbps, so while probably most of the population of Europe has access to fast Internet, your statements are not entirely true. In 2012 average internet speed in the UK was 7Mbps and now it's probably around 75Mbps.

[rsynnott]

The UK has a particularly weird history with fibre; in particular it's one of the few places where G.Fast (ie super-VDSL; 500Mbit-1Gbit/sec over copper telephone line) saw significant rollout.

The UK's finally rolling out FTTH with fairly universal targets, but it did have an unusually messy journey there, arguably partially due to BT refusing to let FTTC die.

[madeofpalk]

On the otherhand, fibre is now a requirement for any new dewllings in the UK. I have a friend outside of London who just upgraded to 2.5Gbps fibre today.