Google Fiber

[ttldomination]

So Google Fiber is starting up in Kansas City, and I've legitimately never been so jealous. I guess you can say it's another iteration in providing internet to the world.

Awesome presentation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uZVqPuq81c

If you want a quick summary, this article sums it up pretty well:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-574...ogle-fiber-tv/

Sunny G.

[plnyyanks]

Never before have I wanted to pick up and move to Kansas this badly

[rachelholladay]

Thank you very much for sharing this video.

One hour later...I WANNA GO TO KC.

(..and I saw that FIRST team in there..)

[treffk]

Yes it is exciting that it is in Kansas City but in reality at the moment in time it still is meaningless. To qualify you have to be in one of their predetermined "Fiberhoods" but even that isn't enough. The Fiberhood that gets the most people to pre-register gets the internet and free internet for their school district first. Then they will slowly expand over time.

This is my $0.02 from living in Kansas City currently and being excluded from pre-registering and trying to get the internet for my school which would benefit our team. To elaborate on why I'm excluded do not live in one of the fiberhoods. I live more on the rural side of one of them and was hoping to be able to get it due to build being at my house. The internet is a issue for us because where we live we are only able to get slightly better than dial-up.

Hearing this reminded me of this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=re0VRK6ouwI

Google is the master of more than one kind of fiber

I love seeing news like this. New technology is always fun, but finding a revolutionary technology in speed created by none other than the legendary Google makes me feel all jittery inside. I want Google Fiber!

[avanboekel]

If nothing else, skip to 53:02 and watch for a few seconds.

[ttldomination]

Originally Posted by treffk

Yes it is exciting that it is in Kansas City but in reality at the moment in time it still is meaningless. To qualify you have to be in one of their predetermined "Fiberhoods" but even that isn't enough. The Fiberhood that gets the most people to pre-register gets the internet and free internet for their school district first. Then they will slowly expand over time.

Right, it appears to be a very tedious roll out process, but I applaud the effort and the vision. Ultimately, my hope is that the "rally" in KC is successful and Google can dedicate even more resources towards making this happen on a much larger scale.

- Sunny G.

[treffk]

Originally Posted by ttldomination

Right, it appears to be a very tedious roll out process, but I applaud the effort and the vision. Ultimately, my hope is that the "rally" in KC is successful and Google can dedicate even more resources towards making this happen on a much larger scale.

- Sunny G.

Yes it is a great vision all of us are looking forward to it. There is still just so little information released at this time but we have more information now that we did in 2010 when it was announced. I think Google made a great choice by making this almost into a competition for us as a community. It is really going show how many people are truly interested.

I kept checking the percentages yesterday after it was announced to see how many people from each neighborhood were already pre-registered. Right now there is already 3 Fiberhoods that have met their quota to get it installed and only 1 day has passed. Another mentor and I were talking about it last night and he joked about going door to door and offering to reimburse anyone who pre-registers the $10 it costs as soon as he see's the conformation sheet that they did to help boost the numbers for our school district. We still need 155 more people to hit our goal of 25%.

[dsherw00d]

A Vermont company - VTel - is doing the same build to almost 20k residents. VTel is running strands of fiber to all 20k homes and giving each 1Gbps full duplex. This takes a ton of money which is why Google is perfect. Fiber is 25-50k per mile to run which is much more expensive then the switches/routers needed to aggregate the fibers. To make this work, the density has to be great enough per mile run to recoup over time - usually 10-20 years.

Google as an ISP - that's huge when combined with all their other assets. They are going to rule the cloud!!

[Lil' Lavery]

The same company that runs a majority of the internet services that an average consumer uses now providing internet connectivity? What could possibly go wrong?

[Cuog]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

The same company that runs a majority of the internet services that an average consumer uses now providing internet connectivity? What could possibly go wrong?

I guess AOL really was the best example of the internet.

Seriously though while the google fiber idea is cool, its not really what we need right now. It's just more faster and faster connections being put into select areas, while there are still far too many areas of the country with no alternative to dialup. I'd much rather see a broadband initiative to bring basic 1mb+ connections to all those folks left in the dark of the internet, than to provide a few people these fancy new toy connections.

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by Cuog

Seriously though while the google fiber idea is cool, its not really what we need right now. It's just more faster and faster connections being put into select areas, while there are still far too many areas of the country with no alternative to dialup. I'd much rather see a broadband initiative to bring basic 1mb+ connections to all those folks left in the dark of the internet, than to provide a few people these fancy new toy connections.

Not that I disagree with your general premise, I'll play devil's advocate here.

Higher speed connections lead towards progressing internet consumer technology to higher and higher levels. Just as broadband led towards streaming media and online HD media, faster internet connections will hopefully spearhead the next generation of internet technology development. The obvious evolution is the advancement of true cloud computing, as opposed to just throwing the word "cloud" in front of everything. Things like being able to utilize advanced CAD and FEM packages from a netbook could be enabled by cloud computing on a ridiculously fast connection.

Additionally, the United States sorely lacks competition in the ISP market. A massive portion of the country does not really have viable alternatives to their ISP. Hopefully another broadband contender entering the arena can change this.

[ttldomination]

Originally Posted by Cuog

Seriously though while the google fiber idea is cool, its not really what we need right now. It's just more faster and faster connections being put into select areas, while there are still far too many areas of the country with no alternative to dialup. I'd much rather see a broadband initiative to bring basic 1mb+ connections to all those folks left in the dark of the internet, than to provide a few people these fancy new toy connections.

One could also argue that this is a first step to get internet penetration into those areas. Whether it'll be ISPs desperate to reach more customers or Google just expanding because it feels like it, I think that this represents more of a solution than anything.

- Sunny G.

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by ttldomination

One could also argue that this is a first step to get internet penetration into those areas. Whether it'll be ISPs desperate to reach more customers or Google just expanding because it feels like it, I think that this represents more of a solution than anything.

- Sunny G.

Google is only prioritizing areas with high demand (and thus dense population), as proven by their pre-registration process. What about that suggests that they will encourage growth into areas without broadband penetration in any more of a timely fashion than other ISPs?

[Cuog]

Originally Posted by ttldomination

One could also argue that this is a first step to get internet penetration into those areas. Whether it'll be ISPs desperate to reach more customers or Google just expanding because it feels like it, I think that this represents more of a solution than anything.

- Sunny G.

One could argue a lot of things.

Most of the internet is advancing as fast as it can, no matter how many people are left behind on dialup.

Competition in the US is very regional. Some large cities have lots of broadband competition because there's lots of money in it while there isn't nearly enough money in getting any broadband providers out to rural areas. These rural areas ARE demanding broadband because it is necessary to use the web as it is NOW, but no one is moving out to service them.

Once companies start moving out to the little guy I'll be cheering on their efforts to advance broadband, but this is not it, not even close.