High speed broadband, DSL, cable modems, Gigabit, fiber to the home, metro Ethernet, DS3 and T1, even LTG and 4G are just network transport. Yet that is all the advertising is about, right? Why?
Because the most important thing today is access to the network. (Granted, the network in most cases is The Internet.) The network matters more today than ever before.
No one really cares about the network - until it doesn't work. What they really care about is the packets on that network. Customers care about what the network lets them do.
We wouldn't have cloud services today if we didn't have ubiquitous access to the network through wireline broadband, fixed wireless, 4G, 3G, 2.5G, LTE, WiMax coupled with laptops, tablets and smartphones. In some cases, people are buying the smartphones for what they can do with this connected device.
The value of the network is in the connection.
Next time you are talking about the network, ask what they are doing with it.