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Will Fiber-To-the-Home Create a New Digital Divide? 291

First time accepted submitter dkatana writes Having some type of fiber or high-speed cable connectivity is normal for many of us, but in most developing countries of the world and many areas of Europe, the US, and other developed countries, access to "super-fast" broadband networks is still a dream. This is creating another "digital divide." Not having the virtually unlimited bandwidth of all-fiber networks means that, for these populations, many activities are simply not possible. For example, broadband provided over all-fiber networks brings education, healthcare, and other social goods into the home through immersive, innovative applications and services that are impossible without it. Alternatives to fiber, such as cable (DOCSYS 3.0), are not enough, and they could be more expensive in the long run. The maximum speed a DOCSYS modem can achieve is 171/122 Mbit/s (using four channels), just a fraction the 273 Gbit/s (per channel) already reached on fiber.
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Will Fiber-To-the-Home Create a New Digital Divide?

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  • No. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by sexconker ( 1179573 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:07PM (#48209465)

    It won't.

    • Re:No. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by funwithBSD ( 245349 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:12PM (#48209499)

      More on that:

      Companies won't pay for infinite bandwidth, so they will throttle you eventually.

      TCP_WINDOWS_SIZE will put a maximum on how much you can download based on how far away the server is. Anything more than 20 to 30ms and it won't be much faster than what we have today.

      Anything that is encrypted is limited to the computational capacity of the CPU, unless you have an encryption acceleration chip. Around 25 to 35Mbps depending on the encryption method and how much load that crypt takes. More secure means more CPU, right now arc_four being the fastest, but least secure.

      • Re:No. (Score:5, Informative)

        by Bengie ( 1121981 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:58PM (#48209721)
        TCP_WINDOWS_SIZE can grow up to 2GB which is enough for a 10GB link with 1600ms latency. I'm not going to say that your OS will be happy about it, but that's the logical limit. As for AES 256 encryption, a modern desktop CPU can handle 100mb-300mb per core, unless you have AES-NI, then it's more like 1gb per core. OR if you're like me, you NIC supports line rate IPSEC offloading, so 4gb/s with 0% cpu overhead, assuming IPSEC and not VPN.
        • Yes, but both sides have to agree and the protocol has to support it. SCP/SFTP in particular don't, unless you are using PSC's version of SSH that fixes it.

          • http://www.psc.edu/index.php/h... [psc.edu]

            explains the issue and the fix in detail.

            Late FreeBSD 8 and up have HPN-SSH by default.

            HPN-SSH with the "NONE" encryption option is blinding fast, up to 2.5Gbit per stream on bigger servers. Filling even an OC-48 is possible with very big servers.

          • by Urkki ( 668283 )

            Sounds to me like you are arguing against future technologies and capabilities based on today's implementations. As soon as there is common need, fixed implementations or even new protocols will replace the old.

        • How do you figure TCP window size can grow up to 2GB? The protocol limit for it is 65,535 bytes. The receive buffer can grow that large with scaling but not the window size.

      • Re:No. (Score:5, Informative)

        by JMJimmy ( 2036122 ) on Thursday October 23, 2014 @01:12AM (#48210483)

        1) TCP alternatives are already being developed
        2) TCP_WINDOW_SIZE problem was solved long long ago with TCP_WINDOW_SCALING. The limit is roughly 100 Gbit/s at 80ms
        3) Not sure where you're getting your data from but reality is a very different place from where you live. 25 MBps would be an Intel Atom 230 decrypting AES-128-CBC. 5 year old mobile/low power processors were never meant to stand the test of time. Take something from around the same period, like say an Intel T5550 and all the sudden you're up to 80MBps for AES-256-CBC (or 109MBps AES-128-CBC). Even dropping down to a P4 you can get 75MBps for AES-256-CBC.

        Also, arc_four (aka RC4) is not even worth discussing as it's completely useless as encryption. RC6 is (comparatively) fast at low byte counts on specific platforms but quickly plateau with little performance increase after 128 bytes and slows by a factor of 3 if the hardware is not optimal. Rijndael, which was chosen for AES, had consistently fast speeds no matter the bytes or platform. The reality is that any chip with the AES-NI instruction set makes it a moot point, by example the i7-3960X is churning out 5.7GBps. Without it, performance does suffer, but you're still talking 250-400Mbps on a 4 core chip.

        The real question is how the heck this got posted to Slashdot. DOCSIS 3.1 bumps the limits to 10 Gbit/s down, 1 Gbit/s up and even on DOCSIS 3.0 - who says you've got to be stuck at 4 channels? 24 Channel is already actively deployed in Canada at 200-250Mbps down/15-30Mbps up, 1.5Gbps/150Mbps in the UK.

      • by Jawnn ( 445279 )

        More on that:

        Companies won't pay for infinite bandwidth, so they will throttle you eventually.

        TCP_WINDOWS_SIZE will put a maximum on how much you can download based on how far away the server is. Anything more than 20 to 30ms and it won't be much faster than what we have today.

        Anything that is encrypted is limited to the computational capacity of the CPU, unless you have an encryption acceleration chip. Around 25 to 35Mbps depending on the encryption method and how much load that crypt takes. More secure means more CPU, right now arc_four being the fastest, but least secure.

        Well, now. Those are some of the most ignorant, non-arguments for higher bandwidth that we've seen today. So I shouldn't have something many parts of the world already have because, what, TCP window size? Huh? Using encryption would make something more than my 20 Mbps cable connection economically unfeasible? WTF? The plain fact is (and has been for some time) that we are getting screwed by ineffective regulation of monopoly telecom companies who are screwing us even worse. Competition scares the shit out o

    • Re:No. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by pushing-robot ( 1037830 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:23PM (#48209563)

      Don't worry! Service providers usually aim for the lowest common denominator to maximize their market, so a divide means you won't have haves and have-nots. Just have-nots.

    • Re:No. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ArmoredDragon ( 3450605 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @10:00PM (#48209747)

      Just to elaborate...the author is extremely vague here. Let's just pick an arbitrary number, say 10mbit, which is actually quite slow (in my opinion, but the local cable co provides 150mbit connections, and just started rolling out gigabit, so maybe I'm biased.)

      Anyways what services CAN'T you obtain at 10mbit? Nothing health related comes to mind, nothing education related comes to mind, and social goods..what the FUCK does that even mean? Anyways, a 10mbit link is fully capable of streaming 1080p video, which is about the most demanding consumer grade application I can think of.

      Therefore, I have no idea what possible "divide" the author could be referring to. Furthermore, the author strikes me as being grossly uneducated about the topic because of the blatant misspelling of the acronym DOCSIS.

      If he wants to make a better case (which it sounds like he's pushing for some kind of socialist and/or social justice agenda) then he should at the very least give examples of WHAT, EXACTLY these people wouldn't have access to.

      He would have a case for a slow upstream (it's common for DSL providers to only provide less than megabit data rates) in health care if, say for example, a medical practitioner needed an HD video feed to evaluate their patient (which doesn't seem to be a likely scenario) but he didn't state that. But, that still doesn't apply to anything else he mentioned.

      • Re:No. (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Bengie ( 1121981 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @10:27PM (#48209903)
        When you kid is downloading some patches from Steam, Blizzard, and who knows what, all at the same time, while running BitTorrent to get the newest Linux ISOs, and remote backing up your computer.

        You should not notice any issues. If you do, you don't have enough bandwidth.

        Let me repeat... You should not EVER have thing think about your bandwidth or how you are using your internet connection. If you ever have to stop and think, "why is this slow", you don't have enough. You should have to micromanage what is ran and when, or who can do what at what times, etc.

        We have the technology to provide every user so much bandwidth, that it's nearly impossible for them to ever run into an issue of using it all.
        • by Dahamma ( 304068 )

          Let me repeat... You should not EVER have thing think about your bandwidth or how you are using your internet connection. If you ever have to stop and think, "why is this slow", you don't have enough. You should have to micromanage what is ran and when, or who can do what at what times, etc.

          I can't even begin to describe how much of a ridiculous "first world problem" this is, let alone how inaccurate...

          Despite what the author and many other people seem to pretend, much of the US (and other parts of the world) *does* in fact get 50Mbps+ for under $100 already without FTTH. That's enough bandwidth to stream 3 HD videos and whatever web browsing or game patches you want at the same time.

          We have the technology to provide every user so much bandwidth, that it's nearly impossible for them to ever run into an issue of using it all.

          Sure, obviously the technology exists, but why would anyone assume it should be free? We could give everyone

          • Re:No. (Score:4, Interesting)

            by TheRaven64 ( 641858 ) on Thursday October 23, 2014 @03:52AM (#48210917) Journal
            When I was a student, sharing a house with three other people, we paid extra to get the 1Mb/s connection that was the fastest that the cable company offered. The top gradually grew to 3Mb/s, 5Mb/s and then 10Mb/s. When it hit 10Mb/s (I'd moved house and was living with a different group of people, but) we still paid for it. But then I stopped caring. The 10Mb/s went from being the fastest that they offered to the slowest. Then 20Mb/s and 30Mb/s became the slowest. I'm now still on their slowest connection (although living in a different city). At work, I have a GigE connection that means that most of the time the bottleneck isn't my local connection, and I can usually get 10-20MB/s to any moderately large Internet site. I very occasionally notice the difference between the speed at home and at work, but most of the time there's no user-perceptible difference. Oh, and my ISP sent me a letter a few weeks ago saying that they don't offer 30Mb/s anymore and they'll be moving me to 50Mb/s soon. I think somewhere around 10-20Mb/s was when I stopped noticing Internet speed as a bottleneck.
      • I'm in Australia and I get 10mbit/s sync with ADSL2+ (there is a NBN fibre bolted to the side of my house, but no light in it).

        From that:
        - 4 VoIP lines
        - 2 people working from home, copious calls/video calls.
        - My 33TB NAS gets data from somewhere
        all runs from it just fine.

        I could use 100mbit or faster better than most, but realistically I start to struggle thinking about what I'd do after 20mbps or so, and any more than that is just doing silly crap with it.

    • I hate it when sociologist post irrelevant crap to justify their jobs.
  • So Who Cares (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:10PM (#48209479)

    Income inequality matters (particularly if you're trying to get elected) but how, exactly, is the difference between a cable modem and "ultra-fast broadband" going to change anyone's standard of living substantially? We're already at the point where there's very little food insecurity and housing insecurity in the US and Western Europe (and most of that is due to immigrant cultural problems). Does it really matter if your Netflix is in 4K v.s. SD?

    • Re:So Who Cares (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Wycliffe ( 116160 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:17PM (#48209523) Homepage

      I agree. There are probably a few applications (like video conferencing with your doctor) that might need a slightly
      higher bandwidth but nothing that should significantly affect a person's standard of living.
      I'm a computer programmer who works from home and I'm on a 1M/256k connection. It serves my needs just fine.
      I can't stream high quality videos but VOIP works fine as do 100% of all websites, job applications, etc...
      Internet access is quickly becoming a basic necessity for stuff like emails, applying for jobs, buying stuff online,
      and paying bills but there are no critical applications yet that require an ultra high speed connection yet.

  • I have been surprised in just the last few years how many full-time telecommuters I suddenly know, and equally surprised by how useful video-conferencing is in making my interactions with them more engaging, as opposed to just talking on the phone. So far, the experience is sub-optimal because there are frequent glitches and disconnects (whether it is the person's Internet connection, or our VPN, or Lync, I am not entirely sure). But the digital divide is no longer a notional idea for me, because I work d
    • by Tough Love ( 215404 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:21PM (#48209551)

      Video calls suck, you have to shave. At least you don't need to put on pants.

      • Yeah, there's one guy I always tease about pants because once he stood up and was only wearing shorts. Scared me for a second.

        Anyways, that's just it... there's no social pressure without eye contact. It is too tempting to websurf during a teleconference.

        So I want to have stable, low-latency, 20-way video conferencing before I hear anybody claim more bandwidth wouldn't be useful.

        (Of course even then telecommuters have to download big files often enough).

        • >> It is too tempting to websurf during a teleconference.

          I'm usually websurfing during video conferences too. You basically just need to point your camera from the monitor where you're surfing, and keep your browser near the camera to look like you're really into the topic at hand when you're really making picks for the weekend. (Also, be sure you're on mute most of the time and keep your desk - mouse and keyboard - off camera.)

          • It's not so much getting "caught," but I have realized that I have done myself no favors by just sitting through meetings quietly for years and thinking, "Yeah, no kidding! I could have said that, why does everybody listen to them!" Staying engaged in meetings doesn't come naturally to me but it is a form of valuable work and leads to other things.
        • by Tough Love ( 215404 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:59PM (#48209737)

          20 person meetings are generally a complete waste of time for the 19 who aren't monologuing.

        • by Zynder ( 2773551 )
          That's not what I heard you say you wanted. I heard you say "I want people to be forced to pay attention to me whether they want to or not."
  • Nope. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Moof123 ( 1292134 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:13PM (#48209507)

    Fiber is no panacea. It is still controlled by terrible ISP's that throttle reflexively and go cheap on the back haul. Frontier has made comments about offering much faster speeds over existing fiber connections, but only after Google started making serious noise about bringing in their own fiber option. The higher speeds were not available for purchase, so fiber gets us 20 Mb/s. It is not slow as such, but the speed offerings haven't changed in years, and to discussed 100 Mb/s is still just a press release to quell the masses. 20 Mb/s over fiber is just pretty lame as their best foot forward.

    • I learned not to believe anything Frontier says regarding their ability to serve specific locations. I was recently home shopping in one of their territories and was excited to see 24mbps service available at many of the locations I was considering. I was looking at places out in the sticks where I figured I'd be lucky to get any kind of internet beyond 1-3 meg DSL. I started getting suspicious when all but one address was eligible for fiber so I put in an address down 15 miles of dirt roads. They claim

    • Ahh, I get 150 Mb/s down, same speed up, today, on FIOS...

      Expensive, at $105 per month, but it is here now...

      I can get up to 500 down, 500 up, but it is expensive... :)

    • Speed matters less with each step up. Going from a modem to broadband is amazing, going from something like 256k DSL to 20mb cable is pretty damn huge, however going from 20mbps cable to 200mbps cable is nice, but fairly minor and going from a few hundred mbps to gbps is hardly noticeable.

      I have 150mbps cable at home, and get what I pay for. Games from GOG and Steam download at 18-19MB/sec. It is fun, I can download a new game in minutes... however outside that I notice little difference from the 30mbps con

  • google can advertise 1gbps all they want but the truth is that if you're poor, a 5-10mbps connection is more than enough to get your kids watching educational shows on netflix and youtube. and torrentfreak had an article today about google drive and dropbox and onedrive throttling people on their end because most end points cannot support their user base at 1gbps per user. all the servers are virtualized and over subscribed in the cloud, they aren't built for performance.

    i know people on 10mbps connections

    • by Bengie ( 1121981 )
      I stream Netflix via Level 3. Pegs my 50mb connection when doing 720p for a good 15 seconds. When talking to a higher up in my ISP, he said bandwidth from Level 3 is too cheap to care about OpenConnect. Not worth the management.
    • by kesuki ( 321456 )

      first of for the record, internet speeds are measured in bits per second this is also the case with video, but not everyone is a movie head. ergo a 60mbps connection is actually a 7.5mBps connection.

      http://help.encoding.com/knowledge-base/article/understanding-bitrates-in-video-files/ [encoding.com] says a typical 720p will use 2.5 mbps and a 1080p 5 mbps. this is wrong for many reasons. how many audio channels does it have if it's more than 0 it needs at a minimum 64 kbit/s per horrible lossy audio. then the problem with

  • by slaker ( 53818 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:22PM (#48209555)

    I live 40 miles southeast of Chicago. My community has access to high speed internet, but going much farther south or east, the options for faster-than-dialup services evaporate. Huge parts of the US aren't even served by 3G cell service or DSL lines, let alone cable internet. Let's solve that problem. It's far more important in the big picture than getting enough bandwidth to stream a dozen 4k streams for some theoretical 5% of the USA that has been gifted with fiber-based connectivity.

  • The maximum speed a DOCSYS modem can achieve is 171/122 Mbit/s (using four channels), just a fraction the 273 Gbit/s (per channel) already reached on fiber.

    According to this page [timewarnercable.com], the DOCSYS 3.0 ARRIS/Motorola SB6183 and Netgear C6300 can handle 300 Mbit/s.

    The SB6183 [amazon.com] uses 6 download & 4 upload channels.

  • The submitter must be addicted to technologies. I started with a 300 baud modem and I am happy with what I have today. I feel progress is catching up fast enough for my use case:

    100mps/100mps for my data center
    1.5mps/10 mps for my home connection

    Total cost: 110$/month

    Of course, give me more for the same price and I will take it but I wouldn't raise any issue with this.

  • Absolutely not (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dpokorny ( 241008 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @09:45PM (#48209661)

    My home has no POTS and has a choice of either FTTP (fiber to the premises) or cable.

    When we first moved in, I choose fiber... because it's fiber! It must be awesome.

    AT&T fiber maxes out at 18Mbps and that it at a crazy unaffordable rate. Cheaper service from Comcast is 120Mbps.

    It's not the physical medium that matters, it is the service and cost.

    I'd do LTE if that had the best bang/buck.

  • Sorry, there are many legitimate worries about digital divide stuff, and there are even more about ISP business practices. But this red herring about your education being compromised because your video link is only 1080p, that's just stupid. Why not worry that rich people's cars accelerate faster than poor people's cars? Is that causing a "kinetic divide" that we now have to worry about? The difference between the "poor" 171/122 Mbit/s connection and the gigabit connections will basically turn out to be jus
  • there was never any digital divide. just people too lazy to learn how to use computers.
    • The people I have seen who don't know how to use computers are generally very poorly educated or are just poor. Usually the two go hand in hand.

      Lots of different reasons for this. Laziness is one of the less common.

  • Pedantic (Score:5, Interesting)

    by r_naked ( 150044 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @10:04PM (#48209771) Homepage

    It is DOCSIS, not DOCSYS: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D... [wikipedia.org]

    With that said, no, it isn't going to create anymore of a divide than already exists. I have Brighthouse Cable, and I can get their 90mb plan for around $80/mo, but I am sticking with their 30mb plan that is bundled with their basic HD plan. Why? I used mrtg to monitor my usage and found that I wasn't taking advantage of the extra bandwidth. We (at least in the US) have no services that take advantage of the extra bandwidth. I can stream Netflix, Amazon, etc... in HD just fine. Granted, their idea of HD sucks, but that isn't the point. Before the MPAA found out about USENET (and I still want to find out who talked -- and beat them), I more than took advantage of the extra bandwidth, but now that USENET is gone (well, so neutered as to be useless for my purposes), I never find myself "waiting".

      Now, what we need is more UPSTREAM bandwidth. I get 5mb up, and that is usable, but having 30/30 would be REAL nice.

    With all that said, this is obviously *MY* use case scenario. I would love to hear from others in the US that need more than 30mb, and what you use it for / how you use it.

  • "cable (DOCSYS 3.0), are not enough, The maximum speed a DOCSYS modem can achieve is 171/122 Mbit/s"

    Ho-ly crap. This must have been by the most spoiled, self-centered, self-indulging, entitled little spoiled brat in California. You have no idea what life is like for 99.99% of the world, do you? Here's a clue - your housekeeper may well be a "one percenter". The other 99% (aka almost everyone) doesn't have Netflix and they don't have a computer. They have a small plot where they try to grow enough food to eat, and they have a need for shoes - not they want another $250 pair of Nikes, they have no shoes.

    If 170 mbps just isn't enough for you and you're crying about it, you're seriously in need of some perspective. Go live like an average human for two weeks. Seriously, you need to go into your dad's reading room, spin the globe, and without looking stop it and put your finger in a random place. Get a big map of that country an toss a dart at the map to hit a random place. Then go there. Not to the nearest big city that you've heard of at a charity ball, but to the exact place where dart hit. Go there and find the closest person working. Do their work with them for two hours, then ask where is the NEAREST place you can rent a room. Not the nicest place, the nearest place. Don't reject the room just because it doesn't have a toilet, you're going to live like the average human for two weeks. When you get back, 170 Mbps will be more than enough. After you live like an average person for two weeks, your life back home will be so.awesome you'll never complainabout anything again.

    • I chose your random location for you, using random.org to generate latitude and longitude. You're going to Savinki, Ukraine, where the average income is $405 / month. You'll get to meet some nice Russians while you're there. Enjoy your trip.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Interesting. The world population is about 7 billion now. 1% of that population is 70 mllion. So you think only 70 million people in the world have access to computers?

      That's very easy to show you're way the hell off. The US population is 300 million, of which 75% have internet access at home. So that's 225 million people in the US ALONE that have access to a computer and internet access.

      You also might want to update your view of the 3rd world from 50+ years ago. It's not simply a mass of people that

  • Healthcare? (Score:4, Informative)

    by TubeSteak ( 669689 ) on Wednesday October 22, 2014 @10:13PM (#48209831) Journal

    Not having the virtually unlimited bandwidth of all-fiber networks means that, for these populations, many activities are simply not possible. For example, broadband provided over all-fiber networks brings education, healthcare, and other social goods into the home through immersive, innovative applications and services that are impossible without it.

    I think this point requires further explaining.
    Why exactly do I need Gbit service to bring healthcare into my home?

    Alternatives to fiber, such as cable (DOCSYS 3.0), are not enough, and they could be more expensive in the long run. The maximum speed a DOCSYS modem can achieve is 171/122 Mbit/s (using four channels), just a fraction the 273 Gbit/s (per channel) already reached on fiber.

    Huh?

    DOCSIS 3.0 does not have a maximum limit on the number of channels that can be bonded.
    The initial hardware would only bond up to 8 channels (~304 Mbit/s), but 16 channel (608 Mbit/s) hardware is already being rolled out by Comcast in the form of rebadged Cisco DPC3939 Gateways.

    2015/2016 we might see 24 channel (912 Mbit/s) and 32 channel (1.2 Gbit/s) hardware.
    2016/2017 is most likely, in the form of DOCSIS 3.1 modems, which use completely different modulation, but will have 24/32 channel DOCSIS 3.0 baked into them so that the ISPs can seamlessly upgrade from DOCSIS 3.0 to 3.1.

    Cable's game plan is to use DOCSIS 3.1 to put off pulling fiber to the home, which keeps their costs low and will allow them to offer (multi)gigabit speeds using a hybrid fiber/co-ax infrastructure. [wikipedia.org]

    • by Zebai ( 979227 )

      Was just about to mention he has numbers off when i saw your post. Also would like to point out they aren't avoiding fiber to the home in all areas, I am aware of a few communities that have negotiated for fiber the home for comcast so its not like such an event is not impossible if there's strong enough community demand for it. I personally don't see the need for the cost of it, I'm personally satisfied with my 50mbps as most places I connect to do not saturate what I already have and likely will no

  • What speeds are really needed? I'd guess it depends on what a household uses Internet for and how many folks in the house will use it simultaneously. It seems to me we need to make it a national priority to get some kind of reasonable Internet speed in rural areas. Whether some areas have fiber to the home or some other technology that gives symmetrical Gigabit per second, in many areas dial up is the only thing available. Of course satellite or using a cell phone as a hot spot are possible but high cost an
  • Guys, do we really need 273 Gbit/s to the home that fiber provides. Isn't this just a bandwidth pissing match. My neighborhood has more bandwidth than yours.

    I, for one, would be happy with 1GigE connection. Extra bandwidth would just bring diminishing returns. What education, what healthcare and social good needs that kind of bandwidth? So now you get your Youtube videos a millisecond faster.

    Think of all the children that grew up using 28.8k modems. Oh, the humanity.
  • I, for one, am certain that the only thing standing between Africa and prosperity is 4k cat videos. And/or pornography. Support the diaspora of your neocolonialist hegemony today!

  • I get 40 Mbps down on my cable connection, and that's enough that each of my four family members can watch a different Netflix HD movie at the same time. I could pay more to get 100 Mbps. How is cable not fast enough?

  • If you think that fiber to the home is really important, move to an area where you can get it. Other people think that low housing costs, clean air, a nice job, wildlife, or other factors are more important.

  • Any nice thing happens and some asshat comes along to say "but we won't all have it at the same time instantly!"... Seriously?

    Can you just be happy someone has something nice? And eventually it will get around to everyone. It is better that someone has something then that no one has it. This envy based value system is really getting old.

  • Digital Divide was always largely myth. No one ever got a basic education from technology. The powers that be lied to you. Digital divide was just good copy to write about. The Real divide was class and wealth, always was. Still is. Private school or a public school in rich area, educated parents that help with vocab and homework, safe environment, tutors, etc.

    If anything tech heavy schools hurt more because of a magic blend of

    A. the tech funds rush to the worse schools where it is the last thing th

  • I always ask myself how I could possibly survive with only 1.2MB/s down (basic DSL). Then I turn my Internet TV on and notice that it works just fine.

    Sure I can get fiber but why would I? I'd have to pay more for no benefit other then that I can download a 20-40GB game quicker.

  • I live in a third-world country.

    Talk of high speed internet for education, medical applications and small business empowerment is all very noble.

    But all I read in the news about your first-world high speed 'ternet is how you complain about streaming TV restrictions.

    The real world is not so pragmatic.

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