Google Fiber is fast. Wickedly fast. With claims of a coefficient of 100 when compared to today’s average broadband speeds,[i] Fiber could open the door to an entirely new level of efficiency in the legal world. While the Confrontation Clause may mean there is a limit on what type of hearings can be held via telecommunication, civil cases proceeding entirely through the use of live video feeds could become a reality in the near future. Taking the commute to and from the courthouse out of the equation decreases the cost of litigation while still maintaining appearances that include a visual component. Clients save money, and attorneys save time that can be spent attending to other matters.
Not everything about Fiber is a positive for the legal profession though. Blazing internet speeds like those available on Fiber open the door to an increase in torrenting. In other words, those who participate in online piracy could have a field day with a Fiber connection. For example, Reddit user btlyger described having the capability to download a “10GB blu-ray quality” file in less than ten minutes using a connection speed similar to the speeds provided by Fiber.[ii]
Potentially compounding the problem is one of the more amazing things about Fiber: the increase in upload speed as compared to download speed. Reddit user Rawtashk posted a screenshot of a test of download and upload speeds using Fiber.[iii] The result? A download speed of 835.62 Mbps and an upload speed of 918.17 Mbps (as compared to the download speed of 50.18 Mbps and upload speed of 22.66 Mbps available in the Lawyers Club at the University of Michigan Law School).
While the download speed on a Fiber connection in Kansas City is 16 times faster than the speed at the Lawyers Club, the upload speed on the Fiber connection comes in at an outrageous 40 times the speed of the Club connection. Not only will online pirates be able to pirate more materials, but they will also be able to provide more material to be pirated. While there has been recent success in shutting down torrent sites like Demonoid,[iv] a sudden jump in torrent capabilities could wreak havoc on an area of the law where enforcement is already difficult, perhaps making any type of effective enforcement a pipedream.
Fortunately, there has also been some good news on the torrent front. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings recently claimed that Bittorrent traffic in Canada has dropped by 50 per cent since the Netflix launch three years ago.[v] With an increased availability of high quality content and the capability to view that content instantly with no worries of buffering or other issues commonly associated with slow internet connections, it is possible that the “need” to torrent will begin to disappear. If that happens, the question may ultimately become whether the decrease in recreational piracy due will outweigh the inevitable increase in piracy by those who pirate simply for the sake of pirating or filling terabytes of hard drives.
The growth of Fiber will make for an interesting set of developments in the legal realm. At least we will have the connection speeds to keep track of it all.