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A few counterpoints:

- While infrastructure does vary, "tens of thousands" of pairs hasn't been a common scenario in a long time thanks to multiplexing. Drag the pairs from each household back to a box with a few SLC96s, send it out the back on a few T1s running over a few pairs, or just one — framed over HDSL. Or multiplexed onto a DS1 signal that is in turn a channel on some much larger TDM aggregate over fibre, like an OC-3 or 12.

- EM interference is still occasionally an issue with copper, but only on the lastest of the last mile. Otherwise, overall local loop transmission has been digital for a long time.

Nothing goes back to the central office as an analog signal, at least not in environments that the telecom industry considers "metro" (90% of the country).

There is some truth to what you say, but there's a lot of 80s-type telephone folklore mixed in as well. :-)




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