Chapter 324 Broadband Technology Liu Hongmin received an invitation from a professor of computer science at Peking University and joined the Peking University online community. The Peking University online community is actually an on-campus forum. With the development of computer technology, on-campus forums have just emerged and lack many functions. Liu Hongmin was also curious and browsed the forum, and found that there were many people spreading rumors. This made him curious about the current number of Internet users in the country, so he asked someone to investigate and found that the number of Internet users in the country may exceed 10. This includes teachers and students of computer science from universities across the country, who have set up on-campus forums. In addition, there are computer talents from departments and units, who are basically graduates of computer science from universities. The rest are people like Liu Hongmin who have personal computers for work purposes. In addition to communicating on the forum, these people also use email to communicate. Since email can send attachments, Liu Hongmin sent his manuscripts to Richard online. The development of the domestic Internet has already started, so the development of the foreign Internet should have matured. Sure enough, according to the information sent by Feng Kan, there are at least 300 million Internet users in the United States. Looking at the information in his hand, Liu Hongmin felt that the pace of Internet development could be accelerated. The current Internet is still in the dial-up stage, but the next stage of broadband Internet technology has already appeared, but it is not yet very mature. Therefore, if broadband technology matures, it will greatly increase the number of people surfing the Internet. After all, broadband technology is much more convenient than dial-up Internet access.
Liu Hongmin is not too worried about hardware. Although computers are still very primitive, they can already run stand-alone games. Whether computers can play games is a very obvious turning point. Before we could play games, the development of computers was very slow, after all, they were used for work. But after we could play games, the development of computers became significantly faster. Laziness drives social development, while entertainment promotes technological upgrades. The first computer appeared in 1946, but the first computer game was born in 1952. Moreover, this is still on record, and unrecorded computer games may have appeared earlier. Of course, the first computer games were very simple and did not have a very obvious impact on the development of computers. But as the playability of computer games improved, their impact on the development of computers became more and more obvious. Especially after the improvement of computer graphics and sound effects, the playability of computer games has been greatly improved. In 1989, an adventure game "Prince of Persia" sold 200 million copies, indicating that modern stand-alone computer games are gradually beginning to compete with console games and arcade games. With the emergence of online games, it is predicted that computer games will gradually become the mainstream of games. Console games will become a niche, and arcade games will decline. The patent for broadband technology was in the hands of Bell Communications Research Laboratories. Liu Hongmin asked Feng Kan to set up a team, raise $100 million in funds, and jointly develop broadband technology with Bell Communications Research Laboratories. Bell Communications Research Institute was very interested in this. Although they knew that this technology had a good prospect, they did lack funds. They had too many projects to research, and the entire institute had projects in many fields. In the field of electronic devices, Bell Communications Research Institute invented the transistor, which made electronic devices miniaturized and efficient. The emergence of transistors promoted the miniaturization of computers and made it possible for the emergence of mobile phones in the future. In the field of energy, Bell Communications Research Institute developed the first solar cell with practical application value, which laid the foundation for mankind to utilize solar energy as a clean energy. In the field of optics, Bell Communications Research Institute proposed the laser theory, and in the subsequent research and development, many achievements in the field of optics were promoted. In terms of optical fiber communication, the achievements of Bell Labs have helped people achieve long-distance, large-capacity, and high-speed communication transmission. Compared with traditional cables, optical fiber has a qualitative leap in bandwidth, anti-interference, loss and other performance. Among them, in visual optical equipment, Bell Communications Research Institute invented the charge-coupled device (CCD), which provides the necessary photosensitive components for current barcode scanners, cameras, scanners and other equipment, greatly promoting the advancement of optical technologies such as image capture and recognition. In addition, the upgrading of equipment such as modern security cameras and digital cameras has benefited from the basic invention of CCD and has moved towards miniaturization and high-pixel quality development. In the computer field, Bell Communications Research Institute developed the UNIX system and C language, which was later supplemented and developed into C++ language. The Unix system is the world's first truly multi-user, multi-tasking operating system. It provides the theoretical and practical roots for the open source development of modern operating systems, especially Unix-like systems. Systems such as the Linux system largely have Unix genes. C and C++ languages have become enduring programming languages in the field of software development, and are widely used in areas ranging from system software development, embedded system programming to various application software writing. For example, C language contributed to the writing of the Windows operating system kernel, and the underlying layer and application development of the Android operating system involve C++. A large number of computer software are supported by these two programming languages. Too many projects have consumed the funds of Bell Communications Research Institute. Now someone can provide funding for research on broadband technology, they would welcome it! However, when Feng Kan proposed sharing broadband technology, they still hesitated. However, when they learned that Feng Kan had established a broadband technology alliance specifically for promoting broadband technology, they agreed decisively. The original intention of inventing broadband technology was to increase Internet speed. Now some people want to promote this technology, so it is okay for them to charge less patent fees. The Broadband Technology Alliance was soon established, and Feng Kan brought in more than a dozen well-known computer companies, including Apple, which makes hardware, and Microsoft, which makes software. Once broadband technology matures and is applied to thousands of households, they will all benefit. Apple can sell more computers, and Microsoft can sell more software. On the contrary, Liu Hongmin's company made the least profit, which puzzled other companies in the alliance.
But when has Liu Hongmin ever suffered a loss? He is now just waiting for broadband technology to mature, and then developing the software of future Internet giants in advance. He can build a unicorn with a market value of hundreds of billions of dollars by relying on any software. Of course, all this needs to be done slowly. Find more American companies to cooperate with, otherwise you may not make any money, and your company may be confiscated by the Americans. (End of this chapter)