[citation][nom]jn77[/nom]China steals tech from the US and then actually develops it....... Broadband providers need to get their greedy heads out of their **** in the US Most countries have higher speed broadband than the US and the internet started in the US.[/citation]
they don't necessarily steal it as american R&D is outsourced there due to cost/profit margins. i'm sure intel has a 4TB CPU but they are just sitting on it and milking the crowd rather than just producing and selling it
fiber went main stream back in the 90's with sprint yet there is a ton of people still paying for wire transmission. unless there is a profit margin sustained by a demand, corporate executives see no reason to implement new tech. i believe streaming will change that structure thanks in part to HD signal transmission here in the states as it's already having a huge affect on the structure of the flow of money in the money tree. HD has already killed a huge part of the audience for t.v. media networks and thus affects the advertising sales while streaming is nothing but a boom of growth and revenue in all sectors. every telecom has it's eyes on google fiber, they already know what will happen, but shareholders control their actions and when shareholders start bailing telecoms for companies doing what google is doing, then they will act, it will probably be too late if they don't have the revenue, and i am sure the big telecoms are just waiting for that before they start. there's got to be alot of consolidation for telecoms to jump on this, like the too big to fail in the banking industry.
the only thing that would change the power of innovation at this point would be regulations or deregulations by governments like how pot smoker slippery willy clintons democratic crew removed anti predatory regulations on the banking industry right after putting the entire banking industry on steroids on unqualified loan guarantees backed up by the government and FDIC. a scheme like that to increase demand and allow double/triple/quadruple dipping for any telecom such as was done for the banking industry would stagnate any change in the telecoms with out huge investment stakes by newer companies like google that grow based on demand/profit allow. netflix, hulu if they would follow googles example could become the new cable companies down the road if they would adopt and implement new tech like cable companies did back in the 70's and 80's.
fiber is more expensive than wire in almost every way, but the rewards have to be worth more than the investment before it can be implemented and that takes demand. streaming is helping to create that demand and it will be interesting to see if CBS or FOX or NBC or ABC follow googles example or go the way of the dodo as their power/cash structure collapses around them as it is doing for the last few years.