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We've gotten very used to a world of wireless electronics,

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but did you know that most of the global internet

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still depends on running cables

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over really, really long distances?

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There are so many undersea internet cables

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sitting on the ocean floor

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that the map of them kind of looks like a plate of spaghetti,

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whether you're looking off the Cape of Good Hope

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or off the northern coast of Russia,

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where there's a cable that's aptly called the Polar Express.

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And it turns out that undersea communications cables

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aren't even anything new.

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In fact, the first commercial cable was laid

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all the way back in 1850, connecting England and France.

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Though, of course, that cable was intended for Telegraph,

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as they weren't exactly discussing

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Victorian affairs of state over Twitter.

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Now, unfortunately, some fishers actually cut that cable

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a few short weeks later, but you can't stop progress,

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and more submarine cables started popping up,

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with the first transatlantic cable

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becoming operational in 1858.

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Though, it took around

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two minutes to transmit just one character

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between the continents.

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Of course, it didn't stay that slow for long.

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As our understanding of the way electricity works

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over long distances increased,

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we got to the point where we could carry full-on voice calls

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under the ocean with copper coaxial cables by the 1950s.

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Though, unsurprisingly, those don't provide

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the necessary bandwidth to carry global internet traffic.

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Enter fiber optic technology,

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which powers every undersea cable

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that's still operating.

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Fiber optics work by converting information into light waves,

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but because this light attenuates at distance,

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similarly to how a flashlight becomes impossible to see

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when you get far enough away from it,

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repeaters need to be installed at intervals

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along these cables to amplify the light

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and ensure that it gets all the way down the pipe.

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And although fiber at home is still a luxury for many,

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undersea fiber started appearing in the late 80s.

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Originally, it also mostly carried voice calls,

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but now that fiber forms the backbone of the global internet.

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Improvements in the materials

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that we use to construct these cables

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have resulted in them getting literally

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a million times faster since that time.

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We've gone from the original TAT-8 cable

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carrying 280 megabits per second

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to the new Grace Hopper cable laid in September, 2021,

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carrying 352 terabits per second.

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That is over 350,000 times faster

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than the old home gigabit connection.

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And we'll tell you more right after we thank monday.com

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for sponsoring this video.

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Their real-time engine allows hundreds of people

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and it even supports embedding live objects.

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Now, the question is,

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how do we keep undersea cables from failing all the time?

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I mean,

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undersea floor is a far cry

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from the secured climate-controlled data centers

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that we're used to thinking of

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when we hear the words internet infrastructure.

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Well, the cables are wrapped up

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and insulated quite securely against any number of hazards.

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At the very center of the cable are the optical fibers

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that carry the actual data

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and copper tubing that provides power.

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These guts of the cable are wrapped up in plastic

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and aluminum to prevent water ingress.

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But the cable still needs to be toughened up

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to withstand other physical damage,

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physical hazards.

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Nylon and tar can provide additional protection,

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and thick steel wires serve as armor

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against fishing boats, anchors,

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and even the occasional shark bite.

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And yes, sharks have been observed nibbling on these cables

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every now and then.

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But that doesn't make the cables invincible.

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They do still sustain damage

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and even break completely sometimes,

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causing slowdowns like we saw in South Africa in 2020.

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Fortunately, the internet works in such a way

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that data can simply

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take another route to its destination

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while the cable is being fixed,

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which typically involves a repair ship

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dragging the two broken ends of the cable

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up from the sea floor and splicing them back together.

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But hold on a second.

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With all the satellites

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that we have floating around in space

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and services like Starlink being released,

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are these cables in danger of being replaced

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by wireless solutions?

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Not anytime soon.

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Even though wireless data transfer over distances

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is much better than it used to be,

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cables are still much faster, much lower latency,

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and way cheaper.

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It's kind of like Ethernet versus Wi-Fi,

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but on a way larger scale.

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In fact, several of the fastest cables

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aren't even owned by old school telecom companies.

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They were instead laid by newer companies

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like Microsoft, Google, and Facebook

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to improve efficiency in their cloud data centers.

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So the undersea cables look like they're here to stay,

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at least until the fish that we eat

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learn to use garden shears and exact revenge on all of us.

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Thanks for watching, guys.

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Like the video or dislike if you didn't like it so much.

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Check out our other videos if you did like it

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and comment with a video suggestion

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if you have a future concept you'd like to see us cover.