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Can an email go 500 miles in 2025?

(flak.tedunangst.com)
303 points zdw | 9 comments | 04 Jul 25 16:49 UTC | HN request time: 0.002s | source | bottom
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renrutal ◴[08 Jul 25 14:34 UTC] No.44500376[source]▶
I clicked the story wondering if the speed of light has changed since the late 90s.

Apparently not.

replies(1): >>44500431 #
1. SV_BubbleTime ◴[08 Jul 25 14:40 UTC] No.44500431[source]▶
It’s still speed of light in a medium, which is not speed of light. Electricity over copper it is 2/3 iirc.
replies(3): >>44500595 #>>44500642 #>>44500891 #
2. deadbabe ◴[08 Jul 25 14:57 UTC] No.44500595[source]▶
HFT firms have entire infrastructure that runs very close to the speed of light, beating the competition that runs on antiquated copper.
replies(1): >>44501038 #
3. ta1243 ◴[08 Jul 25 15:01 UTC] No.44500642[source]▶
speed of packets over copper I think is actually faster than fibre
replies(1): >>44501247 #
4. connicpu ◴[08 Jul 25 15:23 UTC] No.44500891[source]▶
~200,000km/s is the speed of light in fiber optics. Electromagnetic propagation in copper is more like 99% c.
replies(1): >>44501212 #
5. hhmc ◴[08 Jul 25 15:38 UTC] No.44501038[source]▶
There's no competition that's running on copper -- even competitors without latency sensitivity with still be running over fibre because that's just the baseline infrastructure in datacentres, transatlantic etc.

Of course, yes, the HFT firms will be using also the standard tricks of microwave towers, shortwave radio, weather balloon etc, to beat the fibre route.

replies(1): >>44501331 #
6. layer8 ◴[08 Jul 25 15:58 UTC] No.44501212[source]▶
The insulating material significantly decreases the propagation speed: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velocity_factor#Typical_veloci...
7. layer8 ◴[08 Jul 25 16:00 UTC] No.44501247[source]▶
It seems to depend on the cable type: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Velocity_factor#Typical_veloci...
8. deadbabe ◴[08 Jul 25 16:08 UTC] No.44501331{3}[source]▶
There’s always competition running on copper, shitty little traders that think they can beat the big firms.
replies(1): >>44501531 #
9. hhmc ◴[08 Jul 25 16:23 UTC] No.44501531{4}[source]▶
I don't think the switches connecting to any real exchanges support this