[ih] Better-than-Best Effort: Lower latency

[John Gilmore]

Jack Haverty via Internet-history <internet-history at elists.isoc.org> wrote:
> Latency is possibly more important now than bandwidth, since while
> fiber can provide lots of bandwidth but no one has yet figured out how
> to move data faster than the speed of light.

Just when you thought some trope was likely to be true, more facts
intrude...

  https://www.nojitter.com/enterprise-networking/hollow-fiber-new-option-low-latency

Turns out that microwave links are "faster than the speed of light
in fiber", but air-filled hollow fiber is apparently even faster.  See
also:

  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spread_Networks

And then there's going to low-earth orbit and back on straight lines,
via Starlink, rather than going "around" the globe on a great-circle
fiber route.  This is claimed to be able to reduce NY/London latency,
even when there are no working inter-satellite laser links (and thus
multiple hops between orbit and ground stations are required):

  https://circleid.com/posts/20191230_starlink_simulation_low_latency_without_intersatellite_laser_links/

It appears that there are lots of ways to skin the latency cat despite
the speed of light.

	John