"Light" and "electricity" only travel at the same speed in a vacuum. Neither fibre nor copper wire could reasonably be considered a vacuum; they have different propagation speeds.
Also, we are far removed from "gen 1 of fibre", which was developed in 1970, i.e. 43 years ago. If anything, we're currently developing "fifth gen" fibre optics communications.
Everything else you said is spot on, though.
But what happens when you close a circuit of a conductor across a potential difference is an electric field is set up surrounding the conductor. This electric field accelerates all the electrons in the conductor at once. This is why even though the drift velocity of an electron in a conductor is very low, when you switch on a light switch the bulb lights immediately.
The propagation of the electric field is at the speed of light (its electromagnetism). So "electrons" move slowly but "electricity" moves at the speed of light.
Update: found a wikipedia page on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_electricity