chrishacken

Google loves doing stuff like this. At my last company, before we sold it, I had to reverify our Google Business page about once a week because it would constantly just remove the verification for seemingly no reason.

It’s this way because of how regulated everything is. You have to jump through hoops to get permission to do anything here in the U.S. in other countries you just do it.

How do you plan for these things to get into buildings? Sewer, water, and power utilities are anywhere from 20’ deep to 2’ deep, so unless you want these robots aimlessly digging into utilities, you still need to disturb the ground above. Subway tunnels are generally very deep... 40’+ And verrrrry expensive.

To be fair, microtrenching sucks. It’s extremely difficult to dig around lines that have even micro trenched without damaging them. Our “micro trenches” are still 16” deep, but we stopped doing that. Our new stuff is a minimum of 24”, generally 36” deep. I know people who were doing it between 4-8” and I think that’s just plain stupid.

Well you need conduit to run fiber generally; so you would be doing both.

Are you in Hartford County, MD by chance?

Generally looking at around $200,000 for one of those. They work great in certain areas. If you’re doing urban work like we are they’re not so great because there’s a utility every 10 feet.

The problem with this is you can name a “kickback” by anything else, like “rent”, and that makes it legal.

I'd love to know where you can get a fiber circuit for $500/m. (And even if you can, then you probably can't compete with whoever's selling you that circuit anyway.) When we started we haggled considerably.. (had to sign a 20 year deal) and managed to get a 2G/10G circuit for $1,500/m. (A 1G circuit would have been $1200/m)

We're a profitable company doing over a quarter million a year ATM. We aren't running fiber on a whim.

I’m already well aware there’s fiber on poles here. The difference is, their network isn’t built to support FTTH, it’s built to support a few larger enterprises that are willing to pay $3,000/m for a circuit. Name one person that doesn’t want fiber internet. Saying there isn’t a big enough market for service when literally every single household and business purchases internet is ridiculous.

We already have 60% of the street we just cut up signed up for service.

I think the key difference is that infrastructure is more of a long term investment. We can return 10x’s but it’ll likely take a little longer than a software company would. However, i can make the case that we have a higher guarantee of delivering than a software company can.

Both. Our latency is better than cable in most cases.

That it is.

Fixed the grammar :p

You would think that. Unfortunately many/most people care more about their precious roads than they do about infrastructure.

So Mimosa, one of the hardware vendors we use, does actually have this built-in to their firmware. The issue is, from what I've seen, is that it hops around too much. It also moves to congested channels sometimes. I'm sure there's a way to perfect it, we just don't have the time at the moment (I also don't believe they provide full API access yet, so I'm not even sure if we can change it without creating an automated UI tool that clicks around on a browser.)

This is why we're starting to run fiber. 5G and tree's don't mix well.

Understanding an algorithm or concept is not a world-class talent.

Hence.. the "not everyone can" bit still applies.. but not everyone will. So that's not even relevant.

Given enough time and training, anyone who puts their all into learning it, is capable of understanding that.

It may take them 20 years to learn math from the ground up, but they can do it. Saying someone can't do something is bullshit. That's sheep mentality.

You're completely missing the point. Being an asshole is a choice. My point is that anyone can be a consultant that puts their all into it. Being an asshole isn't in your DNA.

A Drill Instructor being a dickhead is also a choice. It doesn't make him any less able to be a leader. My point was, joining the Marine Corps turns weak individuals into respectable men that can command dignity and respect into people. What they choose to do with that transformation is up to them.

Personalities are built; you're not born an introvert. Anyone can be built into a leader; go join the Marine Corps if you don't believe me.

Not everyone can; but anyone can.

Based on what he wrote, it seems like he's just guessing and doesn't actually know where this stuff is hosted.

I was thinking more along the lines of solo-founders. Obviously if you can afford to pay employees, you can afford a 401k. Which brings me back to the fact that you probably still need money to pay employees; which generally means you still need funding unless you're profitable very early on.

We're entirely bootstrapped, but we provide a recurring service and it's taken me 2 years to hire our first employee. I don't think most companies can wait 2 years after launching to hire an employee (We couldn't even.. I had to bring in short-term help on numerous occasions).

Does anyone running a startup actually put money in a 401k? (Serious question.) I do not, nor do I know anyone else who does.

I also don't see how that's enough money to tip the scale.

Maybe I'm missing something. I don't see how that would reduce anyones need to fundraise. No one can wait around 10 years for others in their class to become liquid to fund their company.

I thought you need to legally disclose it in the article if you're paying for the exposure.

I know, I was just agreeing with you.