Apple's new hardware

[KC0KEK]

Our broadband service in this country is abysmal

I hear that lament all the time, but when consumers have 50 Mbps or 100 Mbps available in their area, they rarely upgrade to it because 1) they don't want to spend an extra $50 or more 2) their current speed is fast enough for what they do or 3) both. In the Google fiber thread, I cited the example of Time Warner in NYC, where they have about a half-million broadband subs but only about 2,000 on the 50 Mbps tier.

Telcos, CLECs, MSOs, etc. will remain hesitant to roll out faster services until they see wider adoption of the 50 Mbps and 100 Mbps services -- theirs or their competitors'. Even if Google rolls out 1 Gbps at $60, $100 or whatever, the incumbent service providers won't necessarily jump to match that speed and price unless they have a business model that can support the CapEx and OpEx.

[bobbyhawks]

Telcos, CLECs, MSOs, etc. will remain hesitant to roll out faster services until they see wider adoption of the 50 Mbps and 100 Mbps services -- theirs or their competitors'. Even if Google rolls out 1 Gbps at $60, $100 or whatever, the incumbent service providers won't necessarily jump to match that speed and price unless they have a business model that can support the CapEx and OpEx.

Those will just be sunk costs, though if they lose customers in droves to another service.  If they have already put the infrastructure in place for 50 or 100 Mbps, the only way they can benefit from those investments is to offer that speed at a competitive price.  Currently, there is no competition, and they have a great deal of incentive, not unlike the cell companies do, to prevent their highest traffic users from hogging bandwidth (through pricing and through throttling).  This and lack of competition are some of the main reasons it is as expensive as it is.  Many of the current market conditions you noted above exist due to lack of competition.  Most Americans have one choice when it comes to reliable, terrestrial 3 Mbps+ Internet.  I think we are underestimating how many people would love to give someone other than their cable company money for fast internet. 

The ISPs have created a price point that is a sweet spot, enticing most to upgrade from DSL or dial-up, but not too expensive that they consider enduring slower speeds to save money.  Asking customers for anything on top of that, along with asking them to pay for cable and telephone, customers do not feel they are getting value from paying twice as much for 5x the speed (compared to cell plans where you pay around 15% extra for 5x the speed).  If Google came in with 100x, (mind you, not 5x faster, 100!), at anything competitive with what people pay today, the cable companies will be in big trouble if they just try to maintain.  I remember when people thought that a 20 GB hard drive was way bigger than they would ever need, but technology filled the gaps, and the hard drives, once enough people got it.  The entire point of having this ultra high speed in an entire metro is that everyone will have access to this speed at once.  Not some 10 block area on the upper East side with a price point designed to make people into suckers, everyone.

[KC0KEK]

I think we are underestimating how many people would love to give someone other than their cable company money for fast internet. 

That's not what surveys by In-Stat and other analyst firms are finding. Sure, they might like to switch providers, but they also generally are unwilling to pay more than $40-$45 even for significantly faster service, regardless of whether it's from an MSO or a telco.

[bobbyhawks]

That's not what surveys by In-Stat and other analyst firms are finding. Sure, they might like to switch providers, but they also generally are unwilling to pay more than $40-$45 even for significantly faster service, regardless of whether it's from an MSO or a telco.

In the current environment, perhaps.  I still don't buy that a near 100% premium for a 400% increase in speed is equatable to a similar 100% premium (assuming it is even that expensive) for a 9,900% increase in speed.  As a rate of increase, that is almost 25 times the value.  Its like choosing between upgrading your K-Mart bike to a Trek or a BMW 3-Series for the same price.  Even if you were happy with the K-Mart bike, the BMW looks a lot more enticing when you look at the value you add by upgrading.

A few years ago, similar research would have told you that people wouldn't buy a tablet PC, let alone one for $500+.  If Google brings the price below $80 to the $50-$60 range, it will still be pretty enticing.  If they bring the price down to the current broadband range of around $40, it is really no contest who you are going to turn to unless the cable cos bring down their prices.

[TheBigChuckbowski]

Right now, 95% of people don't need a 100Mb or 1Gb connection. If all you're doing is checking facebook and sending some e-mails, paying more for internet would be a waste of money. Most people only use the internet for that non-broadband heavy stuff now because that's where the technology is at.

If most of the country had access to a 100 Mb-1Gb connection, technology and the web would rapidly move towards taking advantage of that extra bandwidth. I'm talking Netflix in Blu-Ray quality, live television programming in HD, etc. If companies start producing content that can really only be used or accessed with a 100 Mb connection, then it is suddenly worth spending 2-3x the money or more.

[bobbyhawks]

Right now, 95% of people don't need a 100Mb or 1Gb connection. If all you're doing is checking facebook and sending some e-mails, paying more for internet would be a waste of money. Most people only use the internet for that non-broadband heavy stuff now because that's where the technology is at.

If most of the country had access to a 100 Mb-1Gb connection, technology and the web would rapidly move towards taking advantage of that extra bandwidth. I'm talking Netflix in Blu-Ray quality, live television programming in HD, etc. If companies start producing content that can really only be used or accessed with a 100 Mb connection, then it is suddenly worth spending 2-3x the money or more.

Agreed, though I think many would say that their current service is not always sufficient and that it would be nice to get existing content to always stream instantly and in top quality.  My TWC connection is generally around 10-12 Mbps down, which should be fine for most HD streaming, but it frequently has issues with certain traffic, and Netflix can't always grab the HD stream.  It appears that a combination of my neighborhood traffic and throttling are preventing me from enjoying the benefits of this speed, so I have little incentive to believe that paying more money will solve my problem when I am not even currently getting what I pay for.  Being able to instantly stream at 1080p apple movie trailers, Netflix/Hulu 1080p, Youtube 720p, without peaks and valleys in the day when that doesn't always work flawlessly, would be a nice addition for many people.  As far as basic browsing, sure, most people couldn't care less at the present.

My hope is that, since KC will be an entire market with this product, I would think pilot programs from companies like Netflix could make their way to us.  So, as an intended but not linked consequence of our speed capabililties, we may have opportunities that others in the nation won't have for a few more years.  I would think that Skype (now MS), Netflix, Apple, Google Betas, other huge names/initiatives, and numerous startups will want to offer first run services and technologies here.  So, from that perspective, the chance to be at the forefront of technology could also be a big motivating factor in getting customers to switch.  Just as the lack of having to wait for a webpage to load sold a lot of broadband subscriptions over dial-up, I think that video quality will drive a lot of subscriptions for Google fiber, esp once people see how instantaneous multiple 1080p videos in multiple parts of the home can load with that speed.

[KC0KEK]

For a couple of years, I've been able to get 50 Mbps service but have never upgraded from 20 Mbps even though I work from home and thus write off whatever the cost is. I just don't need the bandwidth. Now if Google or one of its partners came to me with an over-the-top video service where I could pay just for the half-dozen cable channels I actually watch, then I'd be interested in 1 Gbps.

[bobbyhawks]

No new hardware today, but a few fairly big releases for Apple.

-Not sure really what to think of OS X Lion.  Sounds like some nice upgrades to an already smooth OS.

-iCloud - Basically dropbox style integration with certain apps.  Could be nice, but I'm not sure how much I will really ever use many of these features.  Apple finally realized that charging people for MobileMe was idiotic, and iCloud services are free.

-iOS 5 - Some really nice upgrades, finally allowing for untethered syncs with iCloud, music, photos, calendar, etc.  Much remains to be seen, but it will be interesting if this finally enables downloading attachments and various file types for sharing across multiple devices.  That would remedy a portion of the file management woes which have become the biggest limitation of iOS.  Expect to see twice as many twitter posts from articles, etc., since everyone with an iphone, ipad, or ipod touch will now tweet everything they read.

-iTunes Match - I am still skeptical of this and will need to really read the fine print.  It sounds too good to be true initially and that normally means it is too good to be true.  There are way too many ways on the surface to trick this service into upgrading dummy files, and it is unclear what Apple will do with the scan data.  They did pay a great deal of money to the industry for this program, so it is possible that was the payoff for not trying to sift through customer data.

[KC0KEK]

-Not sure really what to think of OS X Lion.  Sounds like some nice upgrades to an already smooth OS.

I'm not sure what to think, either. I'm not interested in iOS features on my PC. Lion looks like Snow Leopard in the sense that it's a big "meh."

[Roanoker]

This may or may not be of interest to anyone. It was certainly a big deal to me.

Short backstory: I used a MacBook G4 that started with Tiger and got upgraded with Leopard. My husband had and still has a cheap, Acer PC laptop. We had a wireless network with a rather old Linksys router. My husband has never been able to see YouTube videos on his laptop. I could see them on my Mac, but they never worked very well, always stopping and starting and loading forever.

Because Internet connectivity kept dropping and we were constantly having to reset the router, I decided to get a new router. I got a rather expensive Cisco-Linksys E4200 Maximum Performance Simultaneous Dual-Band Wireless-N Router from Amazon. It arrived, but I left it in the box until I got a new MacBook Pro, the most expensive of the 15-inch versions, with the extra power oomph, anti-glare screen and 750GB hard drive. Then I installed the router. Very easy, although I had to use my husband's cheap Acer to do it. It didn't like my pricey Mac.

Anyway, Internet access is now lightening fast. My husband can view YouTube videos with no trouble, and so can I. I cannot believe the difference. Of course, I have to get upgrades for must-have software (Photoshop, MS Office and probably others), because certain programs run only on Power PCs. My new Mac is Intel only, and it uses Lion. My Epson Artisan 835 printer--on its own--figured out that I had a new network and a new Mac and performed beautifully.

For what it's worth.

[bobbyhawks]

So... 30th anniversary of 1984, and of the Macintosh... I've read that Apple has an ad in the Superbowl. Any ideas about what they will do to match that? On the safe side, they could just release another sappy ipad commercial about how their products enrich our lives, or rehash the old ad in some modern way. Those are the things that take very little in the way of imagination. Among the major updates that could be announced would be a next gen Apple TV device with added functionality (essentially an Apple TV that layers on top of your cable interface with Google-Fiber-TV-box-like networking functionality). The Superbowl is a natural place to announce a TV-related device. If that is the case, Apple would have an opportunity to tie their device to freedom and the old cable box to "Big Brother" (though Apple is as controlling as any cable co. in my opinion).

[swid]

If you haven't been there already, Apple has a Thirty Years of Mac page with a video that I wouldn't be shocked to see a reworked version air during the Super Bowl.

The timeline and "My First Mac" sections are interesting to scroll through.