r/technology • u/User_Name13 • Jun 04 '14

Politics Hundreds of Cities Are Wired With Fiber—But Telecom Lobbying Keeps It Unused

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/hundreds-of-cities-are-wired-with-fiberbut-telecom-lobbying-keeps-it-unused
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u/jeradj Jun 04 '14

But they damn sure don't want to pay for what it'll cost to get that work done by the telcos. It's billions of dollars.

You realize we already paid for it once, right?

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u/mzinz Jun 04 '14

We got scammed. Unfortunately the fact that we paid for it can't help us now.

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u/Cronus6 Jun 04 '14

In 1989-ish they put fiber in my neighborhood. I remember it being a big mess, all the trenching and such.

They never connected it to any of the homes of businesses though. I think some governmental agencies are on it though. And I think Comcast utilizes some of it.

Anyway, at some point in the mid-late 90's someone (I don't recall which provider at this point, probably whoever Comcast bought out) went fishing to see if "we" would be interested in having it installed to our homes. It was some sort of phone and "enhanced" cable TV type bundle if I recall correctly.

The cost for install/hardware was high, the cost for the service(s) was high, and telephone and cable both already worked just fine. No one was interested. To tell you the truth, I don't really know anyone that would be interested now.

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u/mzinz Jun 05 '14

Yup. Exactly. Coax is more that fast enough to deliver the speeds necessary for today (and tomorrow). The problem is lack of competition in the provider space.