Broadband comparison site Broadband Savvy has tried to find the best UK cities for geeks.
Edinburgh, Geek Native’s HQ, is a poor 40th, but I argue Broadband Savvy has low-balled the number of conventions held here. The official title goes to Liverpool.
Okay, so we know conventions were one factor. What are the others?
- Internet download speeds. This was used to gauge fast broadband in the city.
- Collectables/trading card stores per square mile. Broadband Savvy tallied the number of trading cards, collectable figures, and pop culture stores in each city.
- Comic book stores per square mile. Broadband Savvy tallied comic book shops in each city.
- Anime/Comicon conventions each year. Broadband Savvy counted anime and Comicon conventions in each city over the past year.
- Live action role-play (LARP) groups. Broadband Savvy studied every LARP organisation within an hour’s drive of each city’s centre.
- Science museums. Broadband Savvy counted science and technology museums in each location, including large museums with devoted sections.
- Average cost of rent. Broadband Savvy utilised Numbeo’s average cost of renting a one-bedroom in the city centre to estimate the cost of living.
- Tech jobs per person. Indeed.co.uk was used to compute tech jobs per inhabitant in each location. As many geeks work in IT, a town or city must have these occupations.
| Rank | City | Average Download Speed | Collectable stores per square mile | Comic book stores per square mile | Anime/Comicon conventions each year | Live action role playing groups | Science museums | Cost of rent (one bed apartment) | Tech jobs per 1000 people | SCORE |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Liverpool | 77 | 0.21 | 0.14 | 2 | 1 | 3 | £700.73 | 0.2662 | 67.68 |
| 2 | Portsmouth | 113 | 0.06 | 0.26 | 2 | 1 | 0 | £602.50 | 1.2053 | 64.66 |
| 3 | Bournemouth | 93 | 0.11 | 0.28 | 1 | 0 | 0 | £862.50 | 0.599 | 62.53 |
| 4 | Kingston upon Hull | 162 | 0.14 | 0.11 | 1 | 1 | 0 | £527.50 | 0.2006 | 60.50 |
| 5 | Bristol | 99 | 0.13 | 0.13 | 2 | 4 | 1 | £1001.15 | 0.8327 | 59.72 |
| 6 | Glasgow | 68 | 0.06 | 0.15 | 4 | 3 | 2 | £775.00 | 0.4361 | 58.07 |
| 7 | Blackpool | 74 | 0.23 | 0.08 | 1 | 0 | 0 | £350.00 | 0.3091 | 56.26 |
| 8 | Ipswich | 63 | 0.13 | 0.2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | £691.67 | 0.4473 | 54.68 |
| 9 | Nottingham | 85 | 0.08 | 0.13 | 3 | 2 | 1 | £708.67 | 0.3343 | 54.58 |
| 10 | Birmingham | 91 | 0.04 | 0.06 | 4 | 4 | 3 | £780.02 | 0.6095 | 53.58 |
| 11 | Stoke-on-Trent | 87 | 0.03 | 0.11 | 1 | 7 | 0 | £525.00 | 0.2387 | 53.58 |
| 12 | London | 99 | 0.01 | 0.01 | 5 | 10 | 4 | £1779.31 | 0.6841 | 53.10 |
| 13 | Norwich | 67 | 0.07 | 0.2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | £837.50 | 0.4316 | 51.42 |
| 14 | Plymouth | 99 | 0.13 | 0.1 | 2 | 1 | 0 | £800.00 | 0.0807 | 50.69 |
| 15 | Doncaster | 95 | 0.12 | 0.06 | 1 | 0 | 1 | £425.00 | 2.4978 | 49.6 |
| 16 | Newcastle upon Tyne | 68 | 0.02 | 0.14 | 3 | 1 | 2 | £721.00 | 1.6893 | 49.05 |
| 17 | Oxford | 99 | 0.17 | 0.06 | 0 | 1 | 1 | £1150.00 | 2.9875 | 48.11 |
| 18 | Cardiff | 68 | 0.04 | 0.11 | 2 | 3 | 1 | £756.25 | 1.0687 | 47.07 |
| 19 | Sheffield | 62 | 0.04 | 0.06 | 3 | 2 | 3 | £693.57 | 0.588 | 46.42 |
| 20 | Milton Keynes | 49 | 0.06 | 0.12 | 2 | 2 | 2 | £1010.00 | 1.4178 | 45.86 |
| 21 | Belfast | 171 | 0.02 | 0.06 | 2 | 1 | 1 | £787.50 | 0.4586 | 45.5 |
| 22 | Leicester | 80 | 0.04 | 0.11 | 1 | 3 | 1 | £750.00 | 0.6484 | 45.28 |
| 23 | Slough | 99 | 0.09 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | £916.67 | 13.4879 | 44.76 |
| 24 | Derby | 93 | 0.03 | 0 | 1 | 7 | 0 | £500.00 | 0.9761 | 44.6 |
| 25 | Southampton | 106 | 0 | 0.14 | 2 | 0 | 1 | £754.00 | 0.987 | 44.28 |
How did all this come together? Broadband Savvy also shared their scoring methodology.
Each factor was given a weighting to calculate each city’s final score. For example, each city received 0.1 points for each megabit of average download speed recorded. Liverpool recorded an average download speed of 77 Mbps, giving it a score of 7.7 for this metric.
We used a similar method with different weightings for each metric we analysed, depending on its importance for geeks deciding on a city to live.
And yes, some places are missing, even from the more extensive spreadsheet they sent me. However;
For this study, we included the top 50 cities in the UK by population, to ensure a fair comparison. We recognise that there may be other smaller towns and cities that have a low cost of living, fast broadband and a good selection of comic book stores, that would be perfect for some geeks.
Is that the end of the story? Community contributions can be found in the comment section at the end of the page.
