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The future of Fiber

fiber.google.com

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Re: The future of Fiber

#191

Post by nousernamesleft »

soperj wrote: post #180
nousernamesleft wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Frankly I think 4G is going to wipe out land lines in far more cases than people realise. Even if it were consistently fast and reliable (which it is neither), at $40/month for half a gig of data? Not likely.

I'm on telus. It's 60 bucks a month for 6gb of data + phone/text ect.

Yes, you can talk them into a slightly less terrible deal than their advertised rates (which is $50 for 5gb, plus your talk/text/network fee costs). That is still absolutely horrible, and essentially useless as an alternative to actual internet access. Normal people hit their 100GB monthly caps on a regular basis just from stuff like game patches, buying new games, watching TV/movies, etc.

Re: The future of Fiber

#193

Post by ensignavenger »

I wish Google would publish more technical information about their fiber project. I am quite interested in what equipment they have chosen, what types of cabling they are using, etc. (and why) Also, any other information that could be used by community internet providers looking to roll out fiber!

Re: The future of Fiber

#194

Post by _greim_ »

ohsnapman wrote: post #160
_greim_ wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would go against their strategy. By wiring up all the GF-friendly cities first, people living in GF-unfriendly cities start asking "why can't we have that, too?" Thus ratcheting up pressure on the local political systems.

This is something that works in theory, but not real life. Internet is becoming a utility, and most people only ever have experienced one utility in their life. People in the SF Bay Area choose between AT&T DSL and Comcast cable internet - two of the WORST providers, ever. Verizon FiOS eats both their lunches, yet, nobody rabble rouses to ask for fiber in that area. If people in Silicon Valley won't even pressure the…

It seems plausible that apathy would prevent people from agitating for faster internet speeds, when speeds are only slightly below the national average (http://www.speedtest.net/local/san-francisco-ca). It seems implausible to claim that such apathy will remain absolute and unchanging if/when other cities started getting major upgrades (http://www.speedtest.net/local/kansas-city-mo), and especially if the national average began pulling away. Plus, the CA regulatory environment is somewhat of an outlier in terms of its conduciveness to infrastructure progress, so it may not be the best litmus test.

Re: The future of Fiber

#195

Post by jimbokun »

chimeracoder wrote: post #117
jseliger wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I currently live in NYC, and I've lived in Raleigh Howdy neighbor: I live in NYC too. A lot of NYC already does have fiber in the form of FiOS. I'll also observe that NYC's overall Internet situation appears to be much better than many places; right now I'm paying $50 a month for 50 Mbs down / 5 Mbs up through RCN. In Tucson, where I used to live, I was paying $70 for 12 down / 1 or 2 up. Google is presumably targeti…

> right now I'm paying $50 a month for 50 Mbs down / 5 Mbs up through RCN And I'm paying $54 for 20 Mbs/down on Time Warner, which is already a "discounted rate". (I'm in Manhattan). The building next door to me has FiOS, but my landlord has no incentive to let them wire my building too. I agree that New York City isn't the best target for Google Fiber, but the Internet situation here varies very heavily based on whe…

"The building next door to me has FiOS, but my landlord has no incentive to let them wire my building too."

Is your building rent controlled?

If not, I suspect your landlord is short sighted. I am curious to see whether property values will start to diverge based on quality of internet access. With more people wanting to work from home, I think availability, speed, cost, and quality of Internet access will have an impact on property values.

(Of course, you're in Manhattan, which means landlords can do almost anything and still charge insane rents, so this may not apply to you. Sorry.)

Re: The future of Fiber

#196

Post by wmf »

gremlinsinc wrote: post #48
aetherson wrote: post #9

I guess I fundamentally do not understand what makes a city a good or bad candidate for this kind of service. Why is SF or NY not an obvious candidate? Density means that there are lots of customers for a given physical length of infrastructure rollout, they're both wealthy cities with a large proportion of techies who could use faster internet... I'm sure they're both nightmares to deal with permitting processes for…

Why couldn't they lay fiber to core areas, then setup some sort of wireless redistribution - there'd be some lack of speed due to more users using same connection, but it would mean less construction required. As they could just setup more and more access points throughout the city, and some sort of wireless login for specific users... --Might be a possible solution.

That sounds like LTE, which you can already get.

Re: The future of Fiber

#197

Post by lifeformed »

davesque wrote: post #162
27182818284 wrote: post #35

I'm really, really glad they chose Kansas City as the pilot city despite not living there. If they had just gone and chosen San Francisco, Chicago or New York, it would have been no more of an experiment than offering more cable channels to the big cities in the 1990s—It just is completely uninteresting. On a side note, If you haven't been to KC's Startup Village, the climate is electric! It feels like something real…

"Meanwhile a sleepy hacker is waking up and making breakfast in the kitchen. The climate is wonderful." ...really? It sounds more to me like that hacker in the kitchen is being overworked and feels compelled to not even go home at night. Going straight from the bed to the computer (or vice versa) is an unhealthy, unsustainable lifestyle.

Sometimes its fun. It's a different situation for everyone. As a young person with no obligations, I love working late into the night on big crunches, followed by some slower, relaxing weeks.

Re: The future of Fiber

#198

Post by Pxtl »

bhousel wrote: post #185
Pxtl wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

... dangit, I wish I knew more about electrical work. Why was that so dangerous? I mean, besides 250 volts and rotted-out insulation. The writer makes it sound like he just discovered an unexploded bomb.

Good question! AC voltage is relatively safer because it crosses the zero point 120 times a second. If it passes through your body, your muscles will spasm but you will have an opportunity to pull away. Also, AC voltage will probably not sustain an arc at such a low voltage, again, because it is constantly switching polarity. On the other hand DC voltage, once a connection has been made, will continue to flow through…

> Also, DC voltage is much better at sustaining an arc, even below 100 volts, so it can set off an explosion that can ignite whatever dust is lying around the equipment

Ahh, that's what I was missing. I assume the "painted black" part was to insulate the box and mitigate this risk when the box was closed?

Re: The future of Fiber

#199

Post by nobleach »

aetherson wrote: post #9

I guess I fundamentally do not understand what makes a city a good or bad candidate for this kind of service. Why is SF or NY not an obvious candidate? Density means that there are lots of customers for a given physical length of infrastructure rollout, they're both wealthy cities with a large proportion of techies who could use faster internet... I'm sure they're both nightmares to deal with permitting processes for…

When Google came to Provo, UT, it wasn't because of the friendly government. It was simply that it already had plenty of fiber and a bankrupt ISP that Google could buy out. There's plenty of fiber that's been buried in the ground since the 80's. Some is in use, some is not. Some has more potential. Here in Utah, we have another fiber company called Utopia... I wouldn't be surprised if Google isn't just going around buying these companies and using the existing fiber. I'm probably way off base.

Re: The future of Fiber

#200

Post by wmf »

mje__ wrote: post #157

It seems one of the biggest costs of fiber is installation; i.e. trenching. Why is it not hung from poles? It must be much cheaper and quicker, surely?

Where poles exist, fiber is run on them. Where utilities are underground, fiber is underground.
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