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Comment by vladvasiliu | Hacker News Reader

> Right now, as part of the 5G push is the idea of wireless home internet, which is basically just a wifi AP that connects to the internet via the wireless network, [...] in hopes of luring customers away from the cable cos and telcos or other wired providers.

I'm not saying they're not trying to create new demand, but this particular argument may be dependent on local context.

Over here in France, there's also a strong campaign for 5G. But in the consumer market, wired internet providers are the same companies that provide cell phone service. This may help in low-density areas, although there's also a big push from government to deploy fiber even in rural areas.

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You make an interesting point because here Verizon and ATT are local telcos as well so they can potentially cannibalize some of their own customer based in their serving areas, but both have had wired broadband service options in their serving areas which as stalled in terms of growth over the past few years. So I think they are looking at wireless, which is a cash cow for them, and probably figure they may win more customers from the cableco in their serving areas with a wireless option that does not require any installation or retrofit work at their homes. Bringing fiber into the home can be expensive, and DSL (copper) will not get you the speeds people are looking for these days for broadband service.

You are right, this is all a very U.S. skewed view of things. I do not know the European market but my guess is those providers are probably also looking for some revenue boost from 5G.

> DSL (copper) will not get you the speeds people are looking for these days for broadband service

The German Telekom (same company running T-Mobile, coincidentally) has been surprisingly good at milking their existing crappy copper lines using vectoring. They run fiber up to the distribution boxes on the side of the road (up to a few hundred meters away from houses) and vector their way from there with speeds of up to 250 Mbit/s (which is great for German standards and honestly I'm okay with less).

Maybe they'll be able to increase the rates with 5G or save on distribution cost, but I'm not so sure about either. The distribution boxes are quite large and power hungry with serious cooling nowadays, but they're probably still below the complexity and cost of a 5G tower.

Is that rural areas?

My parents live in a rural-ish town, and have FTTH. The connection from the distribution box up the road is made on an ad-hoc basis. The technician pulls the fiber on the posts used for electricity delivery. It's only been available for less than two years, though.

Sure, if you have no posts and have to dig up the sidewalk or something, it would be different.

But the major advantage of this approach is that distribution boxes are passive, just connectors, so they should be pretty cheap to install and operate.

Here in Japan, FTTH coverage is pretty good but there are many condos that can't sign up any FTTH due to its facility, but provide own crappy internet. Major telco companies are going to deploy 5G to provide better service to such condos.

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