Gigawhat? | 3 things you should learn about gigabit technology

Don’t worry, you’re not the only person who has wondered, “What does gigabit mean and why should I care?” Let’s break it down so you can see why this word has a lot of really useful applications.

What is it?

Let’s start with defining “bit.” A bit is basically a piece of something; in our magical world of technology, a bit is a binary unit with a value of 0 or 1.

These binary units are basically units of information. All information is sent over specific network message encoders. If you’ve ever used wi-fi (which I’m sure you have), it sends bits of information using radio signals. Or, if you’ve just signed up for Google Fiber, that uses light pulses to transmit bit information.

Now let’s talk about the “giga” part. By numerical definition, a gigabit = 1,000,000,000 bits.

When we talk about gigabit, we’re talking about the rate of transfer of information.

Why does it make a difference?

Now you might be thinking, “So what?” I’m going to use a simple story to illustrate my point.

You live in the pre-gigabit world. You’ve just come back from vacation and you know that you took tons of photos. You want to upload them to a public photo album. You pick about 100 of the best pictures and click “upload” and wait, but little do you know that another family member is trying to download Frozen in HD and another is streaming Netflix.

Courtesy of Pexels and the Walt Disney Company

You keep waiting. It’s a day later and the files are still uploading…

I think you get where I’m going with this. I was on the tail end of the generation that had to wait hours to load a movie trailer or download just a few songs.

Imagine opening your laptop right now in our gigabit world…

You upload those 100 pictures in less than 3 seconds.

Your family member downloads Frozen in HD in 6–8 seconds.

And your other family member’s Netflix stream is uninterrupted.

Are you feeling excited yet? Good. It’s fun to have butterflies. What this basically means is that technology is improving so rapidly that we’re capable of fast rates of information transfer, which can have a rippling effect in many ways.

What’s next?

With emerging technologies like Virtual Reality (VR) that need a ton of juice to get going, it’s very important that our foundational infrastructure be able to support them, which is where gigabit technology comes in — especially if VR technology will potentially be used in schools, hospitals, or for entertainment in our immediate future.

Beyond that, we’re still crafting what our future communities and technology needs are going to be. But let the exploration begin with finding the next generation of apps. A few organizations have dedicated their efforts to supporting this pioneering search.

Quick plug: U.S. Ignite and the National Science Foundation have partnered with local governments and groups to elevate this work. U.S. Ignite believes that the communities most likely to become the first smart communities are those with widespread, open, and flexible advanced networks.

They supported a GigaTECH app competition in partnership with the City of Austin where local entrepreneurs were challenged to think about how they could leverage the emerging technology. I was honored to be a Judge for this event, it so great to see all the creativity bubbling.

Courtesy of the City of Austin — I’m rocking my Polka dots

Another plug: Mozilla Foundation is another organization doing some amazing work around this. They actually have a Mozilla Gigabit Community Fund (WHOA!). Their goal is to increase participation in technology innovation in support of a healthy Internet where all people are empowered, safe, and independent online. I feel that the video below sums up their whole objective nicely, so I’ll stop here and let them do the talking:

Basically what I’m getting at is there are a TON of ways to get tuned in to what’s coming next.

If there is a local event near you, I encourage all of you to participate and get involved with what is certainly coming down the pipeline. Even if it’s just volunteering to serve drinks at a future gigabit event, I guarantee that you will learn something new and perhaps be inspired with your own idea of how to improve the community using the many wonders this technology has to offer.

By now, I hope that you have an understanding of what a gigabit is and how the technology will impact your life in positive way. I know I’m excited to see what comes from this in my lifetime. Please don’t be shy! Now is the time to ask and to discover how this round of next generation applications will improve our lives and communities, and your input can make a huge difference!