[gnarbarian]

not just the developing world. there are large swaths of the US without decent broadband either. Also large areas with no internet whatsoever beyond satellite. (and I mean really shitty really expensive satellite)

ubiquitous internet will make remote weather stations, drones and a multitude of other things far more cost effective or possible. (especially here in Alaska)

[walrus01]

ACS and GCI have recently spent a great deal of (partly subsidized) money to build high capacity point to point microwave to reach a number of fly-in type communities:

https://www.adn.com/business-economy/2017/03/19/with-federal...

https://www.adn.com/features/business-economy/2017/03/18/for...

The goal for these is to build network bridges to alaskan terrestrial fiber, getting to Fairbanks and/or Anchorage, from where connections are possible into Alaska's subsea fiber cables to WA state and the Seattle area.

Implemented properly this can be significantly faster than satellite, bringing a 1 to 2 Gbps full duplex connection to each town with licensed microwave bands. From the perspective of ACS and GCI and similar operators, it can pay for itself pretty quickly because they can stop paying monthly-recurring geostationary satellite transponder kHz leases.