Verizon announced today that it would begin offering Fios Internet at speeds of up to 20 mbs both up and down. The new service, dubbed 20/20 Fios will be immediately available for $65 a month in parts of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. There’s no firm launch date for the service here in North Texas.
Why would anyone need that much speed? Verizon explains in a press release:
Using a 20 Mbps upstream broadband connection, a consumer could upload a 250
megabyte (MB) file of 200 photos in about 90 seconds, compared with about 47
minutes over a 768 kilobits per second (kbps) upstream connection. A 500 MB
file, such as 400 digital photos or a medical imaging data set, could upload
in less than four minutes, compared with about 90 minutes over a 768 kbps
connection. A 3 gigabyte (GB) file, such as a one-hour family video shot
with a high-definition video camera, can be uploaded in around 20 minutes,
compared with more than nine hours with 768 kbps upstream.The equally fast upload and download speed of the new symmetrical FiOS
service also enhances interactive services like video conferencing, online
multi-player gaming, telemedicine, electronic home monitoring, online work
collaboration, data backups and more.
I’ll add another reason: high-definition video streaming. Yes, I know. Most of you think you’re perfectly satisfied with networks and local affiliates and schedules and all that, but the Internet will offer much, much more and it will deliver content much more efficiently.
The cable companies are already working to bring their response to market, a system that allows for downloads of about 100 mbs. Yes, you read that right: 100 mbs or about 2,000 times the speed of that dial-up connection you once had.
The real issue is whether companies will actually let customers tap into all that power or whether they will use the big numbers for marketing while they restrict what their customers can actually do with their service — a la the evil cable company Comcast.
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