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Comment by ashwinaj | Hacker News Reader

Contrarian opinion: What exactly is the point of "fast" internet?

Most people use the internet for entertainment, people can survive watching Netflix at 1080p/720p, it isn't debilitating. If I'm wrong in my assessment, give me use cases where you require fast internet in a rural area.

If the question is cost, I don't see how laying fiber and equipment for hundreds, if not, thousands of miles is a solution to reducing cost (unless it's subsidized by the government).

Spending billions on mostly "entertainment" is a waste.

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> Most people use the internet for entertainment, people can survive watching Netflix at 1080p/720p, it isn't debilitating. If I'm wrong in my assessment, give me use cases where you require fast internet in a rural area.

Lots of desire for more automation and data surrounding agriculture, for starters.

More generally, people work through internet applications. If you want to check your email, type up a document, have Zoom calls, etc., you need to do so through the internet. If you don't have fast internet, you can count on being less productive.

None of those things you listed require internet faster than required to stream Netflix at 1080p.

That still would be faster than dialup, older generations of satellite internet, and some tiers of DSL service can provide, and there are still areas where those are the options.

Working from home when you're a doctor:

https://bbcmag.com/chattanooga-doctor-becomes-worlds-first-1...

1. Chattanooga, TN isn't exactly "rural"

2. How large is each "diagnostic medical image"? I can't imagine this being in the order of TB

    a. An existing 5G/LTE or satellite internet is perfectly serviceable for even GBs of medical images

    b. Let's assume the images are in the order of TBs, does this justify spending billions for one person (or tens) in a "rural" area?

(I accidentally replied to the parent comment, reposting here)

A single high-resolution pathology slide can be 20 GB. A busy pathologist can read up to 300 slides per day. That's 6 TB a day to download.

If you're next question is why would a busy pathologist live in a rural area, I have no idea.

A single high-resolution pathology slide can be 20 GB. A busy pathologist can read up to 300 slides per day. That's 6 TB a day to download.

People were perfectly fine with 56k when most of the Internet was just text. Stalling the internet at that speed could have been argued for by saying anyone who wants DSL/Cable at home just wants it for Napster.

Fast Internet speeds allow for unthought of innovations. If we get up to terabyte speeds, maybe nobody cares about watching Netflix if we can now have holodecks that become fully immersible experiences that allow for educational training and, to your chagrin, entertainment as well. Maybe LLMs are basically free because everyone can just have all of human content constantly updated.

Letting speeds stall stifles innovation and let's Netflix just continually up their prices for the same 720p content you refer to.

> maybe nobody cares about watching Netflix if we can now have holodecks that become fully immersible experiences that allow for educational training and, to your chagrin, entertainment as well

I don't see why billions of dollars should be spent, for say, less than a low single digit percentage of the rural population who want to stick a machine to their head for educational training.

It's infinitely cheaper, a more sane and healthier decision to move to the location where they can sit in front of the instructor, if they value this education.

So just stop being poor. Got it.

If we're going full reductio ad absurdum and taking snipes instead of conversation, then maybe the appropriate response is: You can be poor all you want, but don't expect someone else to subsidize your life.

> You can be poor all you want, but don't expect someone else to subsidize your life.

The rich and wealthy have their lifestyles heavily, heavily subsidized, so why not the poor as well?

My comment isn't really that absurd in the context of this whole thread and its insistence that decent quality internet service is something only the wealthy and/or those who live in urban areas should have access to.

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