Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised • Hacker News Board

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#51

Post by glenstein » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:15 PM UTC

purple-again wrote: post #5

I remember the prevailing attitude at the time in message boards being that Google had no real intention of taking this serious and was instead just trying to bluff the entrenched interests to upgrade. It worked in the markets Google rolled out in...and that was it. These companies stubbornly refused to preempt Googles expansion anywhere. Maybe they called Googles bluff, maybe they were never nimble enough to even th…

I think the time you are referring to was at least a few news cycles after the start of Google fiber.

I think it genuinely was received as the Cool New Thing for a while. Then the cities applied to be Google fiber cities. Then fiber rolled out to some cities. At some point competitors responded by upgrading their service. And then with some retrospection, we collectively looked back at that series of events and said "ah, this must have been Google's plan all along."

I honestly don't doubt that Google's initial plan was insanely ambitious. And that what transpired, while falling far short of the original vision, nevertheless did advance their interests. But my recollection of the events as they unfolded in real time wasn't that this was their plan from the start, or that people felt that way, until a few news cycles passed and it was clear that it spurred other internet providers to action.

But I do agree with you that it definitely did become the prevailing wisdom, eventually.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#52

Post by alex_hitchins » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:15 PM UTC

michaelt wrote: post #29

candiodari wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to keep in mind that with enough antennas (and enough VERY high bandwidth connections between the antennas - but only has to exist on the service provider side, plus the antennas can be pretty close together and still work) there is, in theory, 2^n interference patterns, each of which is localized. Each of which can transmit data. If you use the interference patterns to transmit data instead of the signals d…

I don't understand why people keep saying that we won't be able to satisfy bandwidth demand on wireless. Is it possible, from an engineering perspective, to build a wireless network with very high bandwidth and generous transfer limits? Absolutely! You just need to increase last mile bandwidth every time you get a new subscriber, so cells never get overloaded. Is it possible, from a market incentive perspective, to b…

Am I right then that to get super fast wireless everywhere we need lots of fibre to back-haul it? That's my understanding. All the 4G super fast masts springing up are all piping that hot traffic down fibre to the next hop.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#53

Post by kosei » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:17 PM UTC

I think some people still don't realize quite how expensive it is to truly build out a national Telecom network. I remember when Clearwire raised ~$7 billion [1] and still wasn't in many markets and rural areas, ultimately selling to Sprint for pennies on the dollar. The infrastructure costs are staggering, and even a rich company like Google can't just dip their toes in hoping to succeed.

[1] https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/clearwire#section-fu...

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#54

Post by digi_owl » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:18 PM UTC

ddorian43 wrote: post #22

twelve40 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny though. No offense and I love France, and I love Europe (really do!), but FB's and GOOG's and BABA's of the world seem to be ... elsewhere? inverse correlation?

If you want huge cash-money you goto USA. For <=$100K/year EU is probably better. I think, not really sure. But first part is true.

USA seems to run on spectacle.

Europe, if one can even process such a mix of cultures as a single entity, seems to abhor spectacle.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#55

Post by walshemj » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:21 PM UTC

princekolt wrote: post #6

Feniks wrote: post #4

Not really surprising, my own country is still profiting from the massive investment in cable done by the state owned telecom operators in the 80s. Infrastructure like this is something that can only be done with government support.

I don't think that's the case. Google certainly has more disposable cash available at less bureaucratic cost than many country's governments. They just lack the interest. If there's a single company with a forever long track record of half-assing products and never finishing them, only to cancel them later with disregard to current customers, that's Google. They make so much money that nothing really matters for them…

And I suspect that getting into a business where you have mange the installation and physical plant and also provide real customer service isn't one where Google has or wants to get involved.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#56

Post by GiorgioG » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:22 PM UTC

I have fiber internet at home (US) and while I'm generally happy with it, the thing I'm most happy about it is I'm no longer giving Time Warner Cable / Spectrum any of my money. In terms of speed, yes it's fast (1gb up/down) but let's be honest, there are very few things that can make use of that bandwidth. As a test I just downloaded an Ubuntu ISO at 40 megabytes/sec (320 megabits/sec.) While it's nice, if I had to wait 4 minutes instead of 1.5 minutes with my old service, it's not really changing my world/life.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#57

Post by cdancette » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:23 PM UTC

_nalply wrote: post #27

cdancette wrote: post #17

This is why I'm happy to live in a country like France where the government takes part in deploying those infrastructures (by investing money in the deployment). They planned to equip 50% of the territory by 2017 (which was achieved), and 100% by 2022. Same goes for public service, profit-focused corporations can't provide the same quality of service.

In Switzerland there are regions with FFTH. Click on this map to see where FFTH is available: https://map.geo.admin.ch/?layers=ch.bakom.anschlussart-glasf... Thanks to this map it was easy to select the right place to move to, and we are currently in the process of moving... to an home equipped with FFTH!

That's great ! They created a similar service in france : https://observatoire.francethd.fr/

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#58

Post by digi_owl » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:23 PM UTC

Feniks wrote: post #4

Not really surprising, my own country is still profiting from the massive investment in cable done by the state owned telecom operators in the 80s. Infrastructure like this is something that can only be done with government support.

I would say "only", but it is damned harder if one do not already have some fixed installation one can exploit.

In Norway the fastest growing deployments of fiber is done by regional power companies in cooperation with a services provider (data, VOIP, IPTV etc). This because the power companies already have poles and pipes that they can run the fiber along.

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#59

Post by klibertp » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:24 PM UTC

twelve40 wrote: post #20

cdancette wrote: post #17

This is why I'm happy to live in a country like France where the government takes part in deploying those infrastructures (by investing money in the deployment). They planned to equip 50% of the territory by 2017 (which was achieved), and 100% by 2022. Same goes for public service, profit-focused corporations can't provide the same quality of service.

Funny though. No offense and I love France, and I love Europe (really do!), but FB's and GOOG's and BABA's of the world seem to be ... elsewhere? inverse correlation?

What does the existence of mentioned companies have to do with the quality of life in a country? For their employees, maybe, but I don't think FB/GOOG/MSFT employ most of the US population?

Re: Eight Years On, Google Fiber Is a Faint Echo of the Disruption Promised

#60

Post by zaarn » Mon, Mar 05, 2018, 12:24 PM UTC

alex_hitchins wrote: post #52

michaelt wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why people keep saying that we won't be able to satisfy bandwidth demand on wireless. Is it possible, from an engineering perspective, to build a wireless network with very high bandwidth and generous transfer limits? Absolutely! You just need to increase last mile bandwidth every time you get a new subscriber, so cells never get overloaded. Is it possible, from a market incentive perspective, to b…

Am I right then that to get super fast wireless everywhere we need lots of fibre to back-haul it? That's my understanding. All the 4G super fast masts springing up are all piping that hot traffic down fibre to the next hop.

All wireless internet connections meet copper and fiber eventually.

Wireless is fairly useful to provide basic coverage to a huge area at relatively low cost. The quality is lacking though. Low Cost, Coverage and Quality, pick two.