You can get a gigabit/second through a Cat5e cable. That requires only a single, low-cost IC and a single package of isolation transformers for termination. For a fiber, you need expensive transmitter and receiver modules to drive and terminate the fiber. Since you can already get a GBPS over cheap copper, there's really not much point to bringing a fiber to the desktop--a gigabit is already major overkill for 99+% of the applications out there. You can get all the bandwidth you need with copper, and it costs a whole lot less. So people use copper.
[This message has been edited by SolarPowered (edited 02-01-2005).]
