Probably the coolest discussion I had on VoIP was with my taxicab driver on the way to VON Canada 2004. Wearing a smart sport jacket and Bolle sunglasses, he expounded his advanced telecommunications theories to me as he navigated the streets of North York.
“I see a lot of Bell trucks everywhere,” he said. “Are they doing network expansion?” I pointed out that it could just be regular maintenance, although Bell is currently deploying OPI-DSLAMs to grab more ADSL customers. He shook his head. “No, they must be laying fibre. The future is in fibre.” He concluded that “Bell Canada sold BCE Emergis to get the money to expand their network before anybody else does.” He also pointed out that there was no longer any money in phone services, while waving his tiny cellphone at me. “Bell wants to expand into Voice over IP, and video!”
When I asked him how he learned about all this stuff, he proudly proclaimed, “I listen to 680 News on the radio, all day!”
Fibre certainly has more potential than xDSL, what’s holding them back from FTTH? I see Expertech trucks around residential areas of Toronto often… Is it closer than we think?
What’s holding them back? FTTH is expensive. FTTC, or fibre to the curb, is much more manageable. That’s why the RDSLAMs are being rolled out. When the time comes when ADSL and even ADSL2+ and VDSL become obsolete, then maybe FTTH will be a reality.
Hey if it’s FTTC, and close enough, might as well run Eth to every home.
Think of a tree. If you wanted to cut it at its trunk, you only have to saw once. But if you want to prune the branches, it takes much more cuts. And if you wanted to clip the leaves off those branches, it takes much, much, much more cuts.
FTTH is an exponentially more task and cost intensive undertaking vs. FTTC!
It’ll happen one day, but right now it’s cheaper to pipe ADSL and VDSL signaling through the existing buried copper wire.
P.S. Ethernet’s range is typically only 100 feet.