According to the DSL Forum, DSL is the number one broadband access technology for users around the world—and by a wide margin. In an announcement last week, the group claimed that DSL was used by three times more people than cable modems, and that it accounted for 66 percent of the broadband access market at the end of 2006.

Worldwide, 281 million people subscribed to some form of broadband service by the end of last year. 185 million of those people used DSL to connect to the Internet, 62 million used cable modems, and 29 million used some form of fiber optic connection. What about satellite? It accounted for only .28 percent of the total market, or less than one million subscribers.

The US remains the largest broadband market in the world, with 57 million users, but China is close behind at 52 million. When it comes to DSL use, however, China has taken the first spot with 12 million more DSL subscribers than the US. 13 countries now have more than 3 million DSL subscribers each, and three more (the Netherlands, Turkey, and Mexico) each have more than 2.7 million.

The data, which was provided by industry analyst Point Topic, shows that broadband use continues to surge. The sharp growth in DSL use (it grew by more than 30 percent last year) is helped by the ubiquity of telephone lines around the globe, but what's most interesting about the numbers is that fiber optic connections now account for just over 10 percent of the market. While such connections are still difficult to come by in the US unless you happen to be one of the chosen few who can take advantage of Verizon's FiOS, they are increasingly common in Europe and Asia, and now account for half as many connections as cable lines.