From: Ian Sparkes <ian.sparkes@t-online.de>
Date: Thu, 9 Oct 1997 01:31:26 +0800
To: trei@process.com
Subject: Re: Internet Via Electric Lines
Message-ID: <3.0.2.32.19971008185347.006ca108@q9f47.dmst02.telekom.de>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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At 12:06 08.10.97 -6, Peter Trei wrote:
>> Ian Sparkes <ian.sparkes@t-online.de>
>
>> Peter wrote:
>> >[...] Putting a few optical
>> >fibers into a power line is cheap, easy, and widely done.
>> 
>> But much cheaper and easier is using the signalling gulleys that 
run 
>> along the side of the railways - no High Tension precautions, no 
>> scaling pylons. This, incidently is the reason that a number of 
>> telecomms consortia (in europe, at least) include a railway 
element - 
>> they provide the long-haul backbone.
>
>It looks like we're seeing different parts of the problem. You're 
>worried about the long-haul backbone. I'm trying to see ways to
>get a 10Gbps fibre into my living room.
>
>The backbone cost is a tiny fraction of the cost of getting fiber
>into every house in the country. 
> 

Maybe in retrospect I was just tugging your leash a bit, for which I 
apologise.

I agree, in principle there are few entities which are more aptly 
placed than the power utilities to provide a roots to leaves high-
capacity network into your home. Telephone companies could do it, 
although the very final stage in the link (twisted copper) is a 
capacitive load, and therefore not very well suited to high 
frequencies. Power wires, on the other hand, would exhibit better 
properties and are universally installed. The solution, however, must 
be a fibre/copper hybrid. The trick will be getting the bridges 
between fibre/copper and copper/copper (across the step-downs) cheap 
and reliable enough. This is probably the breakthrough.

The post from Judith Lewis seems to hint at about 0.5MB/s. Good 
enough for your average Joe.
 
Sorry for the obtuseness of my reply.

Ian
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