Telecom Providers and 100MBps - Diamonds are Forever

No man of woman born,

Coward or brave, can shun his destiny

Homer, Illiad, VI (Bryant’s Translation)

The coming of 100MBps Broadband Internet to Jamaica is a sign and wonder indeed. I just still cannot stop talking - or for that matter thinking - about it. I mean, Jamaica barely has 17% Broadband Internet penetration, based on the article about the interview with Triple Play Provider FLOW Marketing Director, Sharon Roper as stated in the article “Internet penetration lagging Broadband speed”, published Wednesday, September 22, 2010 by CAMILO THAME Business co-ordinator, The Jamaica Observer.

Now Telecom Provider CLARO has joined the crazy circus by announcing plans to go LTE (Long Term Evolution) as per the article “Game on!” published Friday October 22, 2010 by Mark Titus, The Jamaica Gleaner.

So now that I have debated and found the reason in full as to why Triple Play Provider FLOW decided to go the full hog of 100MBps as per my blog article entitled “LIME vs Digicel - The Truth About Charlie”, the question now begs: “What is that kind of speed good for?”. I might as well be asking what the reason is for War, but you get the picture.

Even Google, a Silicon Valley Company, was so intrigued by this question that they decided to do what is effectively an experiment to determine what uses and applications one could have for 100MBps speed as stated in the article “Google subsidizing ultrafast Broadband test”, published February 10, 2010 8:58 AM PST, by Stephen Shankland, CNET News - Deep Tech.

FCC (Federal Communications Commission) Chairman Julius Genachowski desires all Americans to have 100MBps speed by 2020AD as part of his National Broadband Plans stated in the article “100MBps Broadband may be closer than you think”, published March 8, 2010 4:00 AM PST by Marguerite Reardon, CNET News - Signal Strength.

With Basic Broadband being enshrined as a basic right, much as is the case in Finland as stated in the article “You gotta fight for your right to Broadband”, published Tuesday July 1 2010 by Christopher Null, Yahoo! News.

Well, here are a couple of my ideas as to what uses one could conceivably have for 100MBps Broadband Internet, be it Wired or Wireless, aside from the obvious downloading, which if you were thinking was the ONLY use 100MBps Broadband Internet has, would make you a rather shortsighted individual indeed.

The first use 100MBps has, straight off the bat for a single, is Video. Video Calling via your smart phone over LTE, effectively Wi-Fi Calling as CNET Senior Editor Bonnie Cha calls it or as I call it Mesh Network Calling as stated in the article “Wi-Fi calling coming to T-Mobile Android Phones”, published October 6, 2010 6:02 AM PDT by Bonnie Cha, CNET News - CTIA 2010 is one example.

Streaming TV and possibly Video Calling on your Apple iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tablet via a Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) router from Telecom Provider Verizon FIOS service as stated in the article “Verizon shows off iPad TV app and more”, published August 18, 2010 3:21 PM PDT by Marguerite Reardon, CNET News - Signal Strength and in the article “Verizon want to stream FIOS to iPad, other Tablets”, published Wednesday August 18, 2010 5:14 pm ET by Adam Dickter, Newsfactor, Yahoo! News. respectively is another.

3-D HD Video would be possible, which is only possible over such super fast Broadband Networks, as rendering 3-D in real time over a Broadband connection, be it Wired or Wireless requires transmission speeds in the 100MBps range minimum and super fast terminating equipment at either end. Imagine thus Video Conferencing or even more obvious a Movie Theatre being able to simulcast a movie to several theatres securely. Great news for owners of a Microsoft Xbox 360 with a Kinect 3-D Motion Capture Controller!

An Island wide MMORPG (Massive Multi-Player Online Role Playing Games) Service (we techies call this a frag fest!) would use thus up. Ditto for a WAN (Wide Area Network) based Supercomputer for Research Purposes using GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) between our local Universities e.g. University of Technology, University of the West Indies and Northern Caribbean University.

GPU’s are the “next big thing” in super computing with the People’s Republic of China’s supercomputer aptly named “Tianhe-1A” being a game changer in this regard, if the prognostications of NCSA (National Center for Supercomputing Applications) Director Thom Dunning as stated in the article “NCSA Director: GPU is future of supercomputing”, published October 29, 2010 4:31 PM PDT by Brooke Crothers, CNET News Nanotech - The Circuits Blog are to be believed.

Nvidia’s GPU’s maybe the ultimate beneficiary as their chips become useful in Cray Supercomputing next big Supercomputer project as stated in the article “Cray taps Nvidia chips for large supercomputer”, published September 21, 2010 10:33 AM PDT by Brooke Crothers, CNET News Nanotech - The Circuits Blog. Look out for an article about supercomputers on Administrator Kirk’s Geezam blog.

The next ball to push to cover drive for a six would be Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Networks. Already two such Networks, Wayne Chen and Lee’s owned Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Networks Dekal Wireless [a Droid] as stated  in the article “Wayne Chen, Lees enter Wireless Broadband Market”, published Friday July 30^th 2010 by Mark Titus, Business Reporter, The Jamaica Gleaner.

Also the cocky upstart Nubian-1 Tech Services Ltd [Princess Amidala’s Royal starship] as stated in the article “Another small player emerges in the wireless Broadband market”, published Friday August 2 2010 by Mark Titus, gleaner Writer, The Jamaica Gleaner. BOTH capable of offering speeds of up to 10MBps best effort are capable of provisioning speeds of up to 300MBps theoretical.

Using their 100MBps service, both Triple Play Provider FLOW  and Telecom Provider CLARO can provide Business Customers with Enterprise ready solutions to set up their own Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Network to resell Internet Access to passers-by or casual smart phone, Netbook, Laptop or Tablet users, thus creating the equivalent of a Cottage Industry for start-up for small scale Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Network.

This is of course, after certifying themselves ISO9001 and guaranteeing QoS, as very few Business Customers trust Wireless Services, especially as the possibility, albeit slim, exists to intercept and decode LTE signals and the general consensus is that anything other than Wired Broadband e.g. Telecom Provider LIME ADSL (Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line), Metro Net Services Frame Relay or Triple Play Provider Cable DSL and Fiber Optic Services, is deemed unreliable and unsecured by Business Customers. Possibly look for the sale of Wireless CPE (Customer Premises Equipment) to create a layer of QoS that would bring Wireless Broadband into the mainstream of acceptability.

The two types of Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Networks that can be provisioned are Static (fixed Remote Base Stations or Node B’s) such as hosted atop buildings, Micro-cells in the case of Triple Play Provider akin to Telecom Provider AT&T in the United States of America and their usage of Broadband to provide coverage indoors or as CPE (Customer Premises Equipment) for Residential and Business Customers, as is the case with Dekal Wireless and Nubian-1 Tech Services Limited.

Dynamic (Moving Remote Base Stations or Node B’s), also called Rolling Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Networks, is the other option which involves Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Node B’s mounted inside of Taxis, JUTC Buses, Individual Motor Cars powered using lightweight Lithium-Ion Battery packs and an Inverter with Solar Power Supply as a recharger when parked.

In this case, Telecom Provider CLARO pays the owner of the vehicle for the hosting of the Node B inside of their motor vehicle, with advertisements being placed on the vehicle to indicate that it provides a Rolling Municipal Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n) Network Service from Telecom Provider CLARO.

Aside from the necessary upgrading of the Microwave Radios to be able to handle the increased traffic, albeit Fiber Optic is better and more reliably guarantees QoS in all weather conditions.  There will also be a need for Alternative Energy in the form of Solar Generators as described in my blog article entitled “Alternative Energy and the Solar Generator - Pitch Black”.

Wind Turbines mounted on the Mobile Towers will be needed to power the new equipment installed, as JPS Co. (Jamaica Public Service Company), Jamaica’s sole Power Utility Company, provides power that is far too noisy and unreliable to even begin to guarantee QoS (Quality of Service)

Additionally, Copyright Infringing content would have to be blocked using IP Address Blocking as an alternative to capping Data Usage and throttling download speeds of certain downloads thus allowing users the full unlimited speed, much in the same way Amazing PC in Bargain Village, May Pen, Clarendon blocks the IP Addresses of websites that can be used for downloading of Copyright Infringing content e.g. Pirate Bay.

Curiously enough, 100MBps is not all that good for downloading, as albeit the speed at your end may be the 100MBps as per the requirement of ITU (International Telecommunications Union), the UN (United Nations) Telecom watchdog, the actual time for a download does not decrease significantly for downloading the same file from the same IP Address under the same exact downloading conditions i.e. same computer, same file being downloaded from the same IP Address.

In fact, a graph of Download Time vs. Broadband Speeds begins to level off after 10MBps and remains flat up to 100MBps, the Download Time only increasing at Broadband speeds below 1.5MBps. Diamonds are Forever (1971) as per the James Bond Movie.