June 20, 2008 9:40 AM
Hey Mr. Obama - What About Fiber?
Earlier this week I wrote about how the next president has to be the first broadband president, followed by a brief analysis that showed why my vote is going to Barack Obama, though almost by default given McCain's utter lack of awareness about broadband.
In that post, though, I criticized Obama for not being vocal enough about broadband. Well, he must've been listening as he just said something about it in a speech at Kettering University. Let's take a look at the key line:
"So as president, I will set a simple goal: Every American should have the highest-speed broadband access, no matter where you live or how much money you have. We need to connect libraries and schools and hospitals."
There's endless debate about how much bandwidth do we really need, how much capacity can we squeeze into copper or over the airwaves, and how important competition is between multiple pipes.
But there is one thing that is absolutely and totally undeniable: if your goal is to "have the highest-speed broadband access" then the means of getting there has to be fiber.
You can argue that copper and wireless will be able to realize tremendous speeds that will support all of our demand. But there's no arguing the fact that nothing has as much capacity as fiber. And it's not really not even close.
Copper and wireless are touting their ability to hit 100Mbps. Fiber's already topping 100Gbps, or a thousand times more capacity.
So Mr. Obama, if you're going to call for "the highest-speed broadband access" can you please stop pussyfooting around like just about everyone else and start acknowledging that that means getting a fiber strand strung to every building in America?
Comments (1)
I consider myself to be a major push for community owned networks in Vermont and Fiber is the only way to go.
100 gig to the home - I would love to see any one come out with a way to top that.
Community owned, will make sure no one is left out.
Location discrimination by the big telcos must stop.
Aside from putting us far behind in communications They are hurting our future education, health, and overall well being.
Community owned will make sure the playing field is equal to all including the private sector with no limits on bandwidth or content.
Support Community owned networks - Its a local thing
Posted by Mike on June 23, 2008 3:24 PM