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Comment by utopiah | Hacker News Reader

Yep... was on the countryside for the Summer in places so small they didn't even have a bakery, which in France matters.

What did they have though? Optic fiber, high bandwidth, low latency, reliable and for a very low price.

Honestly I think ADSL was already enough for most people, I mean non professionals, but now I think France has the infrastructure for a good enough Internet for the next few decades. I can't fathom normal usages that would need higher bandwidth and lower latency.

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The "sad" thing is that it is generally not advantageous for people to have both a phone data plan and an internet box plan if the latter is not shared so a lot of people have a fiber connection on their wall but still use their phone as hotspot since bigger data plan < reasonnable data plan + internet box plan

It's not the end of the world but it feels like a wasted effort. I don't know what the solution is.

It's not really a big issue. Connecting the last meters of fiber is cheap, either done by default in new constructions, or on demand for older houses. ISP's hardware to run PON is cheap.

Once street level fiber deployment is done, whether market penetration follows or not isn't a huge deal.

I am clearly not talking about the last meter issue, I am talking about when the fiber is already in the home and sits unused. That seems like a pity (yes not a huge deal)

But maybe I misunderstood your point ?

Where do you think is the last meter if not in the home?

You wrote last meterS and re-reading your comment you obviously mean the connection between the street source and the home.

Which is unrelated to the point I was making

> Connecting the last meters of fiber is cheap

Check the France map. This is cheap in densely populated areas, like cities. It isn't in mountainous areas with just small groups of houses like in the middle of the country.

Pretty irrelevant to the last meter, and most ISPs do it for free when you subscribe as they can re-use conduits and sheaths for the legacy copper line, otherwise it's typically a few hours of work.

Bakeries are long gone in small villages which are out of main roads. You better be prepared to have a car to get your bread or to make it at home.

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