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Is Google Planning To Fibre Britain?

Posted by timothy on from the you're-fibred! dept.

Barence writes with this excerpt from PC Pro: "Google has emerged as a surprise contender to invest in Britain's fibre broadband network. The search giant yesterday announced plans to build a gigabit fibre broadband network in the US. The test network will see Google deliver fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) connections to up to half a million US homes. The move raises the possibility that Google is behind the Conservative Party's ambitious plans to deliver nationwide 100Mbits/sec connections by 2017. Parliamentary sources have told PC Pro that the Tories' plans were based on foreign investment in the UK broadband network."

18 of 184 comments (clear)

  1. They've tried this before by crimperman · · Score: 3, Funny

    Google have tried network infrastructure before - they even made it free to use: http://www.google.com/tisp/

  2. all your base are belong to us by jabjoe · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Great, kick the ISPs with some heavy competition.
    But I'm getting a little scared of Google.....To many fingers in to many pies. We are meant to use a Google Thin Client, to access Google Services, over Google Fibre....

    They make their money by gathering data about us from our data. Shouldn't that make us question them owning so much of our data? They could have us by the short and curlies. Maybe "don't be evil" makes that safe for now, but who knows what the future holds? Even if Google can for ever be trusted, and don't give the data to those who can't be trusted, it's them who decide who to trust! We can not trust the markets to resolve this. Consumers will just blindly sleep walk into this if it makes for a easy life now. Which they might with Windows being so bad for malware, virus etc etc (because of the nature of Windows and it's users). "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." Benjamin Franklin - 1775

    1. Re:all your base are belong to us by benz001 · · Score: 4, Funny

      .....To many fingers in to many pies. We are meant to use a Google Thin Client, to access Google Services, over Google Fibre....

      Which is looking more and more like their undoing - like all big companies they start off well then spread themselves too thin. Search is great, Analytics is good, Gmail is ok, Docs is still just docs, Wave is just a ripple, Buzz is seriously lacking anything like caffeine and gears has lost a sprocket.

    2. Re:all your base are belong to us by Burb · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You know, while I appreciate the sentiment about Google, here, I'm getting heartily fed up of the over-use of the Ben Franklin quote on slashdot. It's thought-provoking and makes a good rhetorical point, but it fails any attempt at decent analysis. All people deserve liberty and safety, in a "we hold the following truths to be self-evident" sort of way, so no one should be said not to deserve it. And by its wording it strongly implies that "liberty"==="essential liberty" i.e. all degrees of liberty are equally essential, and somehow denigrates the concept of "temporary safety".

      Yeah, I'm probably quoting Mr F out of context, and I'm not a political philosopher, so I'm sure my argument isn't watertight. So sue me. But I do feel that in some quarters the quote is designed to appeal the claque in here, in much the same way that "think of the children" - that much-mocked phrase - is used to appeal to the reactionary corner of society. It actually stops people from analysing the problem in hand by triggering some kind of American/Liberal hindbrain reflex.

      Can we think about it a little more, that's all I'm asking.

      --

  3. It Depends... by mrpacmanjel · · Score: 4, Insightful

    So at every juncture Google will be connected to everything?

    Potentially access the interner via a Goggle ISP, accessing Google DNS, using Google search, communicating via Google email, using Goole chat and Google Buzz with my friends.

    Am I being paranoid or will my privacy become a moot point?

    I do use Google search and gmail on a regular basis and it's also free of charge. In return they use my data - cannot complain about that.

    If it really bothered me I can use alternatives.

    I think it is commendable that Google are willing to roll-out fibre (in the USA only at the moment) and improve the technology.

    But "holy crap" that is an expensive undertaking!
    I read about this somewhere else and I think Google were going to charge a "competitive" fee for access.

    Broadband in the UK now largely sucks arse because the cost of improving/replacing existing lines is very expensive. No company is willing to take the risk so Google stepping forward ideally is a "good thing".

    However, if they can guarantee the same rights some other ISPs in the UK then great and I am willing to pay for it. If Google want to analyse all my packets of data and use it to advertise stuff to me then I'm not so sure I will like this development.

    Entities like Phorm, BT, Virgin & Tiscali (Talk Talk) are more than happy to follow the UK Government's / music industry's lead on intrusive surveillance. That's why I refuse to use thier services.

    If Google want to lay down infrastructure then that's fine - as long as I have a choice to do otherwise.

    This is mainly due to Eric Schmidt's comments on your expected privacy.

    I still want the freedom to choose while I have it.

  4. fuck off, Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    You still haven't delivered the algorithms you promised to open 12 years ago. Your top executives believe that no-one online is entitled to privacy (unless he is a top Google exec, who will deny press information to journalists who publish information about him). You require NSA clearance for any significant technical positions.

    Only an idiot today would think you "do no evil". You're just like any nasty group in its early years - start off promising the world, slowly reneging on promises which matter, and one by one revealing your true intentions. You give people the sense of security they'll so easily swallow until it's too late to clamour for alternatives.

    We don't want you in the UK. BT is a heap of steaming shit, but at least their gross incompetence limits their ability to cooperate effectively with the Crown Estate of Mandelson.

    1. Re:fuck off, Google by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      You still haven't delivered the algorithms you promised to open 12 years ago.

      Which algorithms and promises were those ? (honest question).

      Your top executives believe that no-one online is entitled to privacy (unless he is a top Google exec, who will deny press information to journalists who publish information about him).

      No, he said that if you do something and get it on record, there's a chance a law enforcement agency will request said record with a judge signature on top and Google (or whatever company they're requesting it to) will have to comply.

      You require NSA clearance for any significant technical positions.

      Care to point an example of this ?

      Bla, bla, bla...

  5. Re:Well someone has to. by neoprint · · Score: 3, Informative

    The main problem in NZ isn't between the home and the backbone, it's the international link and the pathetic download quotas our ISP's give us. Every single person in NZ could have fibre, and the net could actually slow down as everyone now tries to access overseas sites, saturating the southern cross cable

  6. Re:Is Google Planning To Fibre Britain? by Joce640k · · Score: 4, Funny

    Came here to see an American complain about spelling/grammar and am leaving satisfied.

    --
    No sig today...
  7. Language abuse by TrumpetPower! · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Please stop verbing nouns.

    That corporate whores enjoy fucking with language is no good reason for us to bend over and spread ’em.

    Cheers,

    b&

    --
    All but God can prove this sentence true.
    1. Re:Language abuse by IBBoard · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Quick, someone with mod points mod this "+1 ironic" for matching the "corporate whores" by turning the noun "verb" into a verb ;)

    2. Re:Language abuse by anaesthetica · · Score: 3, Informative

      You fail it. (It is: getting the Calvin and Hobbes reference.)

      --
      The Rise and Fall of Online Community
    3. Re:Language abuse by jc42 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Verbing nouns has been with us forever, ...

      One of the fun things I learned while taking some linguistics courses in college was the actual grammar of English. Several of the profs had fun assigning an analysis of English grammar late in their course, after the students had learned something about linguistic analysis. It turns out that our usual terms such as 'verb' and 'noun' are Latin word classes, and are pretty much irrelevant to English. English has valid word classes, but 'verb' and 'noun' aren't among them.

      The sentence "Don't verb nouns" is a good illustration. Every native speaker of English instantly understand this, and knows that 'verb' is the verb. How do they know? It's because English syntax tells them that a word in that position is the 'verb', and a word in that other position is the noun. There's nothing in an English verb (except for 3rd person) that marks that word as a verb. Also, 'nouns' could be a 3rd-person singular verb form, but we know it's a plural noun, not because of its form, but because of its position in the sentence.

      So 'verb' and 'noun', if they mean anything in English, don't describe word classes. They're the names of syntactical positions within a clause. Pretty much any "content" word (often called "substantives", as opposed to syntactic particles or relational words like prepositions) can be plugged into a verb or noun position, if their basic meaning makes sense there. This was done by Bill Waterson in "Don't verb nouns", as well as in the followup "Verbing weirds language", to good humorous effect. But these also pleased a lot of linguists, because they're both excellent examples of how the English language really works. The real proof that they're both correct English syntax is that we all understand them without any problem. And we understand (if only subconsciously) that they're funny because they violate the invalid grammar rules we've been taught in school.

      Now if we could just get the school system to stop trying to impose Latin grammar on English, and teach actual English syntax. But I suppose that won't happen within our lifetime. And it might also eliminate much of the humor that we get out of the whole mess.

      --
      Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
  8. HTTP-only? by ickleberry · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But will this service be HTTP-only like the Wifi Google provides at some airports? After all protocols other than HTTP and maybe XMPP don't really fit into Google's way of doing business.

  9. Good Luck Finding a Sympathetic Ear Here by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 3, Funny

    This is the industry that twisted "architect" into a verb. Presumably "build" or "code" weren't pompous enough.

  10. Pure speculation by tfountain · · Score: 3, Interesting

    From the article: "Parliamentary sources have told PC Pro that the Tories' plans were based on foreign investment in the UK broadband network. Google is one of the few companies with the necessary capital and motivation to invest in British broadband" so this story is based soley on the fact that Google is a foreign Internet company with money?

  11. "Medieval"? by Kupfernigk · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Yes, because out here in the sticks we regularly used to get 7Mbit/s downloads in the 11th century AD, just like I do today. At our office, which is in the real sticks, we get a miserable 4Mbit/s download and 1Mbit/s upload on our lines, just like they did in the days of Henry 1st.

    Actually, London is a problem - it is spaghetti under the streets and a lot of areas have poor connectivity.

    However, you really do need to reconsider your voting. The Party that wants us out of the EU (civil liberties, human rights) seems to want to allow us to be bought by the US. Energy privatisation under Thatcher just worked so well, didn't it? So well that we pay the Germans and the French for the privilege of supplying us with energy, and then they nearly run out of gas because they have emptied our tanks to be sure their home markets are OK in a cold spell. And we have to be bailed out by the Russians. And now the idea is to get the US to pay for our broadband infrastructure so that for the rest of time our money can be exported to US companies, who will naturally bend over backwards to supply our data to the US and avoid European data protection laws.

    The Conservatives went wrong when they appointed a PR man with media connections to run the Party rather than an old fashioned English patriot. I can't see how David Davis (who understands civil liberties) would have gone along with this. It would be funny if it was not so sick that the Conservatives are run by the man who did PR for the channel that puts on Big Brother.

    --
    From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
  12. Surely "From the department of making shit up"? by Curmudgeonlyoldbloke · · Score: 4, Informative

    In case anyone doesn't realise, there's going to be an general election in a couple of months or so. The current extremely unpopular party is likely to be replaced by another slightly less unpopular one with broadly similar policies, the main difference being that instead of being fronted by a dour Scotsman they have a posh ex-PR bloke with a nice smile. At this time politicians on all sides are more likely than ever to say stuff and not mean it.

    What the Tories actually said was this:
    http://www.conservatives.com/News/News_stories/2010/01/Conservatives_to_deliver_nationwide_superfast_broadband_by_2017.aspx

    The key weasel words there are "up to 100mbps" and "the majority of homes". Roughly 50% of UK homes have cable available now, and Virgin Media are already offering headline speeds up to half that. 100Mbps by 2017 is hardly flying car territory.

    They were actually responding to a Labour suggestion of universal (i.e. 100% not 50%) of UK homes getting 2Mb coverage by 2012:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7858498.stm

    The Labour plan sounds less exciting but would actually be much harder to achieve (not that they'll have to - they're unlikely to get reelected and have been careful to say it only in an "interim report").

    As to what orifice the PCPro writer pulled Google out of, your guess is as good as mine.