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Google Fiber Unveiled in Kansas City
Google Fiber is unveiled. And it sucks to be Time Warner Cable right now. But they already knew that.
Google is offering 3 packages in Kansas City - a gigabit Internet connection for $70/month, a TV + Gigabit Internet connection for $120/month, and a free Internet tier of 5/1Mbps (subject to a one time $300 connect cost). The first two packages also have the $300 connect fee but it is waived with a contract.
The details are available via DSL Reports and The Verge. There are several interesting enticements along with the connectivity.
Plans and pricing is here. I'm surprised at the number of television channels that are available on that package. Notable channels missing include Disney and ESPN, probably because ABC was trying to rake Google over the coals on pricing.
Neighborhoods will be competing to get enough presubscriptions to get connected (at $10 per potential subscriber). It will be interesting to see how this goes - the approach makes sense from a business perspective but could result in a patchwork of neighborhoods lacking access.
In short, this will be interesting to watch. How will Time Warner Cable respond? How enthusiastic will ordinary people be? Google's marketing talent is considerably more advanced than that of the local governments and small companies (Sonic.net) that first blazed this trail. Speaking of which, I have not yet seen how other service providers will be able to use this network, if at all.
The free 5/1 connection is interesting. For a massive company like Google, providing hundreds or thousands of 5/1 connections essentially has zero cost. This is also true of Comcast and CenturyLink, which is why they are profitable on those $10/month low-income packages.
This is not a Google experiment. Those running this project are expected to earn a profit.
In short, this will be interesting to watch. How will Time Warner Cable respond? How enthusiastic will ordinary people be? Google's marketing talent is considerably more advanced than that of the local governments and small companies (Sonic.net) that first blazed this trail. Speaking of which, I have not yet seen how other service providers will be able to use this network, if at all.
The free 5/1 connection is interesting. For a massive company like Google, providing hundreds or thousands of 5/1 connections essentially has zero cost. This is also true of Comcast and CenturyLink, which is why they are profitable on those $10/month low-income packages.
This is not a Google experiment. Those running this project are expected to earn a profit.Spirit AeroSystems Chooses Chanute
We told you how Chanute, Kansas, was using their community network to serve local businesses. Now we want to share a story about how the community network helped bring a new business to Chanute.
Chanute, who is named after Octave Chanute an aviation pioneer, adopts the motto "A Tadition of Innovation." Chanute has proven that they are serious about that mantra with the expansion of their community network. They boast free Wi-Fi in all green spaces and parks, schools that are connected with fiber and wireless, several fiber loops throughout the city, plans for a smart grid, and are even exploring FTTH capability.
Spirit AeroSystems, the world's largest supplier of commercial airplane assemblies and components, just opened a new manufacturing facility in Chanute. The plant is expected to create up to 150 new jobs in the southeastern Kansas community and will include a health clinic on site for employees.
As Spirit was approaching different communities, it had a variety of requirements that included reliable electricity and reliable broadband. Nothing exorbitant -- they weren't asking for a gig or even 100Mbps. But they needed reliability. And Chanute was poised to deliver. Publicly owned networks do not exist in a vacuum; they are often one piece of a well-run community.
If Chanute only had a slow DSL and absentee-owned cable company offering broadband, maybe Spirit still would have chosen them and maybe that would have been the tipping point for a different community. We don't know for sure.
What we do know is that Chanute is getting more jobs and that owning their own network helped.
Chanute, Kansas, Publicly Owned Fiber-Optic Network Serves Area Businesses
I continue to find it odd that more communities with publicly owned networks do not create official videos or other promotional material that is readily accessible on the Internet. Videos discussing fiber-optic investments continue to be the exception to the rule.
But it was a video promoting Chanute's fiber-to-the-business network that I stumbled across in a search for something else. It turns out that Chanute has built a network with a variety of current and planned uses: