Does the UK need high-speed rail or high-speed internet?

[jon0844]

The first line being;

To address the key question above; both, is probably the rational answer.

Which is fair, but also made it quite hard to see much point in reading anything more!

http://www.techradar.com/news/inter...gh-speed-rail-or-high-speed-internet--1249881

 

[NotATrainspott]

By the time HS2 comes around you'll be able to use both at the same time because the trains undoubtedly have permanent 5 or 6G internet connections available to passengers.

 

[Oswyntail]

The answer to both is "Not really, but....."
Do we really need to download that document in 5 seconds rather than 5 minutes? Do we really need to get to Leeds 30 minutes earlier? The genuine answer is no. We simply need to plan our lives a bit better, whether at work or at play.
But, if we as UK are seen to lag behind in these things, we risk being seen as a backward looking country, and fail to attract the business and leaisure customes we need.

 

[HSTEd]

Wel both have major economic benefits.

For instance if we were to spend £20-30bn on absolutely universal Point to Point Fibre broadband for every house and commercial property in Britain then they would all have gigabit range internet connections.

TV broadcasting could be turned off which would save many hundreds of millions of pounds from the licence fee and for commercial operators.
It would also usher in numerous changes that would build a truly electronic society.

 

[DownSouth]

Proper high-speed internet should reduce the demand on the public transport network by allowing better teleconferencing instead of the ridiculously inefficient practice of having people travel all over the country for meetings.

 

[HSTEd]

Any benefits from teleconferencing would likely be swamped by the general increase in travel in a more affluent society.

 

[NSEFAN]

I can think of several ways of "upgrading what we already have" for our internet infrastructure, namely using better protocols (i.e. not using whole words to describe parts of web pages!) and making greater use of distributed file sharing systems like torrenting to spread the load. The computing sector has an advantage over the railway sector in that a lot of changes can be made with little or no inconveniece to the user, whereas trains have to stop so better signalling can be fitted and tested.

 

[jon0844]

TV broadcasting could be turned off which would save many hundreds of millions of pounds from the licence fee and for commercial operators.
It would also usher in numerous changes that would build a truly electronic society.

That's quite a scary thought. Imagine how future generations will gain knowledge if they can get everything on demand and decide what to watch/read based on social media.

I read a survey not that long ago that users who have Netflix watch programmes and films they've seen many times before. Often people want to watch old classics, or the shows they grew up with. New stuff isn't as popular as it's an unknown. Likewise for Spotify, where the idea that people who have free music will spend it seeking out new music is mostly false; it's to listen to music you've already heard and know.

I do fear we'll gradually move towards having everything on demand, and people will skip things that would be interesting but they don't know would be interesting - unlike seeing it on TV or reading it in a newspaper where it's harder to skip a story than ignore a link.

Great news for advertisers and the likes of the Daily Mail/Buzzfeed in the web space, enticing people to click on dumbed down clickbait stories.

I actually hope we'll always have some form of trusted, reliable broadcasting services in the future. As well as newspapers and magazines.

Proper high-speed internet should reduce the demand on the public transport network by allowing better teleconferencing instead of the ridiculously inefficient practice of having people travel all over the country for meetings.

Companies already use this. We use it. But it doesn't mean that I can stay at home and work forever. For one, people want face to face contact and many business deals end up being signed off from such meetings, not a Skype call.

People will always need, and want, to travel.

That's why I think it's mad to even have the question asked about whether we want better transport connections, or faster Internet. We want both. We need both!

 

[Emyr]

I can think of several ways of "upgrading what we already have" for our internet infrastructure, namely using better protocols (i.e. not using whole words to describe parts of web pages!)

Browsers already support GZip-compressed HTTP, so it's up to sysadmins to enable it on the servers. If you really want faster browsing, speed up the handshake, as in SPDY.

and making greater use of distributed file sharing systems like torrenting to spread the load.

Solution looking for a problem.

The computing sector has an advantage over the railway sector in that a lot of changes can be made with little or no inconveniece to the user, whereas trains have to stop so better signalling can be fitted and tested.

Why did it take IE6 so long to bloody die then? You can lead a user to new technologies but you can't make them adopt it.

 

[NSEFAN]

Browsers already support GZip-compressed HTTP, so it's up to sysadmins to enable it on the servers. If you really want faster browsing, speed up the handshake, as in SPDY.

Exactly! We should be encouraging the usage of better protocols by default.

Solution looking for a problem.

A huge part of the web is used for the consumption of videos and media content. If everyone tries to get these files from a small handful of locations, it's no wonder we have bottlenecks. As I understand it, this is why torrenting is generally faster for downloading large files, provided they are well seeded and your ISP isn't artificially throttling them!

Why did it take IE6 so long to bloody die then? You can lead a user to new technologies but you can't make them adopt it.

Passengers on a train are much less involved in the running of their train service compared to the maintenance of their computer. If a user refuses to update their system then that's their problem.

 

[Emyr]

A huge part of the web is used for the consumption of videos and media content. If everyone tries to get these files from a small handful of locations, it's no wonder we have bottlenecks. As I understand it, this is why torrenting is generally faster for downloading large files, provided they are well seeded and your ISP isn't artificially throttling them!

Localised CDNs and specialized distribution networks.

BitTorrent is not an efficient file transfer protocol, the overheads are pretty hefty. You're better off using a 3rd party CDN and Multicast, but DRM requirements tend to scupper the latter.

 

[HSTEd]

I actually hope we'll always have some form of trusted, reliable broadcasting services in the future. As well as newspapers and magazines.

There is no particular reason why they would cease to exist - but there is no particular reason for 'BBC 1' or 'BBC 2' to exist as anything but a playlist of programming that has been produced for the schedule.
If you can think of an alternative funding mechanism for a post TV BBC there is little reason it cannot turn out content much as it does before.

News would obviously have to be done as a live stream.
There is little reason it has to come over the aerial on the roof rather than through the fibre coming up your garden path.


And as to improving protocols and newer codecs to squeeze more into less - while there have been significant improvements (especially with H.265 cutting bit rates for video rather drastically) they are hopelessly mismatched against the amount of data that we consume these days.
And compressing HTML seems rather pointless since I can't remember the last I used a website where human readable HTML was the majority of the downloaded data.

Investing in the fibre infrastrucutre might seem expensive but once a point to point fibre connection is put in it can be used for almost absurd data rates by only exchanging the terminal equipment which isf ar cheaper than relaying the cable.
It allows us to prepare for the day when gigabit connections are the norm and we think Blu Rays are the sort of low grade rubbish video that people think 240p Youtube videos are today.

The era of 8K UHDTV and 2160p Digital cinema streams with 40 bit colour and several dozen megabits per second.

Major content providers like BBC and Sky could also use local servers to distribute content so tht it only actually travels a couple of miles down the cables rather than loading everything onto central locations.
Disc space and a stack of blades are surprisingly cheap these days.

 

[gordonthemoron]

Teleconferencing is awful, working from home on the other hand...........

 

[Tio Terry]

You cant send very many Ships Containers down a fibre optic cable.

OK, HS2 wont be carrying Freight but by re-routing passenger services on to it there are additional freight paths on the classic - WCML, MML, ECML - lines. There is a considerable and growing need to transport more freight on our railways and there are a number of schemes in progress to support this. By far the most important is HS2.

In terms of passenger growth versus Teleconferencing, it quite simply is not happening, every year more and more people want to travel - you can see the statistics and predictions on the ORR website - so people still want that face to face contact.

 

[455driver]

You cant send very many Ships Containers down a fibre optic cable.

OK, HS2 wont be carrying Freight but by re-routing passenger services on to it there are additional freight paths on the classic - WCML, MML, ECML - lines. There is a considerable and growing need to transport more freight on our railways and there are a number of schemes in progress to support this. By far the most important is HS2.

Please dont bring facts into threads like this!
Everyone knows that the only advantage of building HS2 is so people in London can go and see their aunty Gladys in Birmingham 5 minutes quicker!

 

[jon0844]

Only MPs and rich bankers that is.

 

[Geezertronic]

Teleconferencing and Live Meeting (and alternative) technology has its place but is no replacement for face to face meetings. Anyone who thinks that phone/video conferencing will solve the countries transport problems is in serious need of a reality check.

And actually, HS2 will allow the population of Birmingham (of which I am one) to get to London 20 minutes quicker... I joke of course but wanted to get my own non-fact in

 

[Haydn1971]

Teleconferencing doesn't help me make site visits either - I travel at least twice a week to regular clients in Yorkshire, the North West, sometimes Scotland and London, often involves getting out on street looking at particular issues, meeting residents, elected members, the police - there's always something that isn't on Google Street View

 

[Oswyntail]

Teleconferencing has its place, but it is not really the technology that is letting it down (now - 15 years ago it was a mess). The people using it have not yet got used to reading the different body language, and still feel suspicious. Early morning trains from Leeds are chocker with poor sods needlessly dragged down to London.

 

[quantinghome]

Proper high-speed internet should reduce the demand on the public transport network by allowing better teleconferencing instead of the ridiculously inefficient practice of having people travel all over the country for meetings.

Unfortunately even a decent teleconference connection is no substitute for face to face. I've tried it. I'd like it to work. It would mean less traipsing round the country. But it doesn't. No level of bandwidth can make remote meetings work as well as direct interaction.