Will USB become a universal telecom/power/network protocol someday?

I think eventually the standard connection will be fiber optic. Or none at all.

Well, fiber optic beats the others as a signal transmission medium. But it lacks the ability to transmit power, which is a strong benefit of USB that USB devices are powered directly from the network without having a separate power wire with yet ANOTHER bulky transformer thingy to plug in somewhere…

Now, maybe if you combine fiber and power in the same cable so it looks to the user like one cable is providing both signal and power, then that might be it!

“But it lacks the ability to transmit power”
Forgot about that. :-)

“one cable is providing both signal and power”
Ingenious!

I’m not sure. How well does USB hold up over long distances? Many systems work in short distances, but fail horribly over long ones, just because the transmission system isn’t capable of dealing with it. Take AC/DC power. Many of our devices use DC, like computers, hence the big block transformers we need to plug in. But DC is very bad at transmitting power long distance, it loses power much faster then an AC current, and has other issues like resistance.

Speaking of that, USB probably also is a DC power source, so I don’t know if it could work with AC. Then it would fail as a long-distance carrier. Then again, I’m not sure though.

I have to agree with @ChazMaz, I think. Fiber optic seems the best so far for signal transmission, and with an electronic infrastructure already in place, I’d be surprised if it was supplanted any time soon.

It already is being made with power…I just went to a conference today and saw it (NAMM show)...here’s a company that makes fibre optic data cable (x4) that is shielded and 4 copper conductors added:

http://www.neutrik.com/fl/en/dataconnectors/204_379483440/opticalCON_QUAD_Cables_productlist.aspx

Bring your pocketbook!