Obligatory link to the absolutely brilliant Neal Stephenson article about a very long fiber optic cable. "Mother Earth Mother Board" <a href="http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html</a>
Obligatory link to a fascinating (because it is so mundane) photograph of the East Coast terminus of a fiber link<p>The photographer, Taryn Simon, has a fascinating book of images of places that are not accessible to the public ("An American Index of the Hidden and Unfamiliar")<p>> My favourite is the Transatlantic Submarine Cables Reaching Land (VSNL International, Avon, NJ). It is really scary to realize that something that looks so fragile and mundane as those orange cables holds the key to all the virtuality that has come to almost constitute the essence of my life.<p><a href="http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/wow/0aaechellle.jpg" rel="nofollow">http://www.we-make-money-not-art.com/wow/0aaechellle.jpg</a><p><a href="http://tarynsimon.com/tarynsimon1_cryonics.html" rel="nofollow">http://tarynsimon.com/tarynsimon1_cryonics.html</a>
The best part of the article is this quote:<p>This is the cable-splicing machine used on board the Ile de Batz--one of the most delicate and precise pieces of equipment on a ship laden with very heavyweight gear.<p>Next to it is shown a picture of a fiber optic cable split in half, and a roll of electrical tape.