It has been nearly 50 years since fiber optics were first deployed to transmit commercial data. In the early years of the internet, before the World Wide Web, the technology was largely confined to government agencies, the military, and major research universities. End-user connection speeds were painfully slow, with many systems running at 300 bps. Today, the median fixed download speed in the United States is roughly 300 Mbps. That is a million-fold increase, but most of th
