Google 'Toilet ISP' Gag Not Without Precedent

1sockchuck writes "Yesterday, Google's annual April Fools' joke featured Google TiSP, a free home wireless broadband service that connected via a 'commode-based router' and runs fiber cabling through the sewer system. This is actually not without precedent. Back in the dot-com boom, delivering broadband through sewers was the focus of CityNet Telecom, which raised $375 million in funding from major VC and private equity firms in 2000 and 2001. The company used remote-controlled robots to lay fiber through sewer lines and actually created sewer-based networks in Albuquerque and Indianapolis before merging with Universal Access in 2003."

Comments

Re:What?

[arivanov]

The investigation into these technologies happened mostly because many city councils got pissed off by the non-stop digging to lay fiber during dot-bomb and started threatening to introduce limits on how many times you can dig up a road as well as license fees on digging. The number discussed in the UK were once per 5 years and something in the tens of thousands of pounds per linear meter of dig licensing fee if you have to re-dig before this expires.

The dot bomb ended and the surviving telecom operators successfully fought it off. The licensing regime as not introduced.

Otherwise, fiber through sewerage is a viable tech. The only reason it is not being done more often is that most of the water utilities who control the sewers live in the 17th century (or would like to) and it is nearly impossible to negotiate a sensible access deal with them.