Really, almost everything. But mainly, speed. Copper cables were designed to conduct voice calls via electrical pulses. Fiber-optic cables, by contrast, do not conduct electricity. They use thin bundles of optical glass fibers to transmit data, using pulses of infrared light. Since light is much faster than electrical pulses, the speed of data transmission is much higher in fiber than copper.
Since copper cables conduct electricity, they can be susceptible to outside factors such as electromagnetic interference, humidity, and even temperature fluctuations. Finally, fiber-optic cables are more secure, because they are very difficult to splice.
One “blended” solution that many companies have used is sometimes called “Fiber to the curb” or more commonly “Fiber to the neighborhood” (FTTN). In this arrangement, the company builds a fiber network to a central hub in a neighborhood, then uses the existing copper network to distribute the signal from there. It’s faster and more reliable than an entirely copper network, but it obviously still has the disadvantage of using copper for the last bit of the transmission.
Some companies (like Metronet) have invested heavily in 'Fiber to the Home' or FTTH. This is what we have built in our multi-state network - data transmission over fiber, all the way from us to you. This is by far the best option for both sides, allowing us the ability to remotely troubleshoot on our end, while allowing you access to unprecedented speeds and reliability.
While copper is the technology of the past, fiber is forward-looking. Using some equipment, speeds of up to 10 Gigabytes per second are possible. This means that whatever the future of the internet looks like, fiber (and Metronet) will be ready to deliver it.