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Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

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Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#171

Post by newsgremlin »

kortilla wrote: post #142
ilovecaching wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks to huge government subsidies that they squandered. They have promised time and time again to build better infra for hundreds of millions in tax payer dollars and we still have total crap. People who work for them are morally bankrupt.

Maybe unrestricted government handouts aren’t the best way to stimulate a market...

But the government doesn't own the lines, so unless they feel like nationalizing the utilities that's the only thing they can do. And I'm sure the lobbyists are making sure that doesn't happen too...

It's a dirty racket for passing a lot of money between few hands.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#172

Post by njepa »

rayiner wrote: post #137
colechristensen wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It went relatively slowly and started in sections of the city with the right customer demographics. The local government which is a big part of the equation seems to be generally a little more reasonable and less corrupt than is average. I am speculating it is capital intensive and not enormously profitable, and it is slow.

> It went relatively slowly and started in sections of the city with the right customer demographics. The local government which is a big part of the equation seems to be generally a little more reasonable and less corrupt than is average. That is also how Stockholm built out its fiber network. And, by the way, it is illegal in almost every city, because it would result in wealthier neighborhoods getting fiber first.…

> That is also how Stockholm built out its fiber network.

Stokab also had various mandates to connect or cooperate with schools, government, student housing, public(ly owned) housing and other entities. You would often get fiber in the equivalent "the projects" before someone in an affluent co-op. Without this I am not sure how well the approach would have worked.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#173

Post by sangnoir »

yingw787 wrote: post #37
yingw787 wrote: post #25

When I interned at AT&T a few years ago, I asked a manager I respected whether they were worried about Google Fiber coming in and eating their lunch. "No", he said. "We'll sue them for every mile of fiber they lay down". I can understand why they would make that play. It's kind of the only play they have. AT&T and Verizon innovate enough to remain...okay...but they're not exactly Google. The only way they would win i…

I do think the significance of this is cities realizing there is no Disney prince riding in on a white horse to save them, and taking their own futures into their own hands. I'm hoping there's enough "anchor cities/regions", like Nashville/RTP/Kansas City, that have contingency plans and referendums ready for an infrastructure push at the local level if Fiber pulls out there, to prevent all white-collar talent from d…

> I'm hoping there's enough "anchor cities/regions", like Nashville/RTP/Kansas City, that have contingency plans and referendums ready for an infrastructure push at the local level if Fiber pulls out there, to prevent all white-collar talent from drifting towards the coasts and leave a complete vacuum everywhere else.

Which is why the cable cartel is lobbying at state-level to make deny cities that option - conveniently, those cities are in red states.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#174

Post by toast0 »

scarface74 wrote: post #162
toast0 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect, now that they've started, AT&T is going to continue to build out their GPON fiber through most of their network. In a lot of areas, they do have real issues with the copper wire that's on the poles, and they've figured out how to make rewiring not too bad, at least where the residential wiring is above ground. They've got a significant advantage over Google here. Where they run DSL, they've got a customer…

My parents lives in a smallish city - 77K population and shrinking. They’ve had AT&T DSL for years. AT&T hasn’t sold DSL for years there but for some reason keep it active for their few existing customers.

Yeah... those are exactly the kinds of places I don't expect AT&T to roll out fiber to. As long as the equipment keeps working, they'll probably continue to offer the service to existing customers. But they're not likely to fix line quality issues if they don't affect voice service; and they're not likely to stop voice service if you have a strong state regulator.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#175

Post by spullara »

mike00632 wrote: post #147
fourthark wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has not been proven that you can get those speeds consistently. You typically need line of sight, no trees, even no rain for the really small bandwidths.

Literally, even walls can break the 5G connection. Hope you don't live in a home that has any of those.

This is for outside point-to-point, not for receiving indoors. Serves the same purpose as last-mile fiber, not wifi. The 5G lands service at the location and you use wifi inside to access it. Just like you would with fiber/cable/dsl.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#176

Post by scarface74 »

toast0 wrote: post #174
scarface74 wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents lives in a smallish city - 77K population and shrinking. They’ve had AT&T DSL for years. AT&T hasn’t sold DSL for years there but for some reason keep it active for their few existing customers.

Yeah... those are exactly the kinds of places I don't expect AT&T to roll out fiber to. As long as the equipment keeps working, they'll probably continue to offer the service to existing customers. But they're not likely to fix line quality issues if they don't affect voice service; and they're not likely to stop voice service if you have a strong state regulator.

They also have the cable internet. My parents wanted to keep both. She got cable internet one summer when I stayed with them and I needed to work remotely. Cable sucks about as badly. The speed and the price is about what you would expect (35/5) but the 300Gb data cap is ridiculous.

I’m surprised that AT&T doesn’t just try to transistion their few remaining DSL customers to the cable company. I’m sure that the cable company would offer a bounty for them and keeping the internet backend must cost AT&T something.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#177

Post by rayiner »

njepa wrote: post #172
rayiner wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It went relatively slowly and started in sections of the city with the right customer demographics. The local government which is a big part of the equation seems to be generally a little more reasonable and less corrupt than is average. That is also how Stockholm built out its fiber network. And, by the way, it is illegal in almost every city, because it would result in wealthier neighborhoods getting fiber first.…

> That is also how Stockholm built out its fiber network. Stokab also had various mandates to connect or cooperate with schools, government, student housing, public(ly owned) housing and other entities. You would often get fiber in the equivalent "the projects" before someone in an affluent co-op. Without this I am not sure how well the approach would have worked.

Connecting a few government-owned buildings is a far cry from requirements in the US, where typically every area above a very low population threshold must be connected.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#178

Post by spullara »

kalleboo wrote: post #169
spullara wrote: post #14

Fiber is probably a dead end and will ultimately be replaced by 5G point-to-point transmission for the last mile.

I agree that fiber rollout will probably slow to a halt in favor of wireless, but purely for cost reasons. Fiber will always be superior if you can get it, but most users don't care enough - like how people complain about bad service and small economy class seats but won't pay 10% more for another airline with better seat pitch. I know lots of people now who use wireless plans at home - they whine at the end of the m…

Exactly.

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#179

Post by njepa »

rayiner wrote: post #177
njepa wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That is also how Stockholm built out its fiber network. Stokab also had various mandates to connect or cooperate with schools, government, student housing, public(ly owned) housing and other entities. You would often get fiber in the equivalent "the projects" before someone in an affluent co-op. Without this I am not sure how well the approach would have worked.

Connecting a few government-owned buildings is a far cry from requirements in the US, where typically every area above a very low population threshold must be connected.

I wasn't a few government-owned building so much as 25% of the housing stock, around a hundred thousand apartments, which were actually owned by the city at the time. (And that is just the publicly owned housing). As far as I know it wasn't subsidized as such, but paid for by profit from rents and rent increases (these are essentially rent controlled apartments).

Re: Visible signs left after Google Fiber abandons Louisville

#180

Post by acchow »

colechristensen wrote: post #131
ilovecaching wrote: post #98

Let’s not forget that the real issue here is that American ISPs are a complete monopoly by Comcast and AT&T, companies made of pure greed. Small end sub ISPs have to claw for every strand of dark fiber. Google really shouldn’t be the answer though. We need to demand that politicians address the issue in the upcoming election before they start looking at the Silicon Valley giants.

The best ISP in the country is in Minneapolis. $70/mo for symmetric 1 Gbps https://fiber.usinternet.com/ They lay their own fiber terminating at your home and have been steadily covering the metro area.

Apartment buildings built after 1995 in San Francisco can get Webpass. Symmetric 1 Gbps for $60/mth (or $550 annually).
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