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90 Percent of Eligible Kansas City Neighborhoods Sign Up For Google Fiber
puddingebola writes in with a story about how popular Google Fiber is in Kansas City. "The company wrote in a blog post yesterday that at least 180 out of 202 'fiberhoods' have already qualified for the super-high-speed Internet service. Google says that it's still processing verification requests, and should be able to hand over the final list later this week. Since bringing fiber to homes can be expensive, Google is charging each home that hopes to hook up to the service a one-time $300 construction fee."
Nuff said.... You don't want the real graphic details do you?
(my support email to google fiber-)
Hello,
I've recently filed an FCC form 2000F complaint regarding how your
current terms of service for google fiber prohibit hosting any server of
any kind. I feel this is in violation of paragraph 13 of FCC-10-201
which I believe cements my right as an end-user to provide novel
services to the internet at large via a server hosted at my residence
connected to my fixed broadband internet service. While I have
communicated secondhand with Milo Medin about this, perhaps this is a
more official channel. Please tell me if I've misunderstood the concept
of "Net Neutrality" or your Terms of Service. All I want is to host a
linux lamp server. I.e. web pages and files served with apache via IPv6
to other IPv6 clients on the internet. And probably I'd want to host a
quake3 server as well as other entrepreneurial servers I conceive of and
deploy due to the abundance of helpful free and open source server
software available to me.
A length debate on the subject (57 posts, 15 authors) was recently held
on the discussion forum for the Kansas Unix and Linux User's Association
(ironicly hosted on google groups rather than someone's server at home
running linux+mailman). I encourage an official response clarifying the
situation from Google.
https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/kulua-l/LxsOtdglNM0
Thanks for any feedback, Regards,
-dmc
Douglas McClendon
da...@cloudsession.com
(note, this online/form tract was reached after selecting that the
target of the complaint was a fixed broadband internet service provider,
believed to be in violation of the 2nd(blocking) of the 3 primary open
internet rules layed out in the FCC's 10-201 report and order preserving
the free and open internet.
--- REF# 12-C00422224 ---
Google's current Terms Of Service[1] for their fixed broadband internet
service being deployed initially here in Kansas City, Kansas, contain
this text-
"You agree not to misuse the Services. This includes but is not limited
to using the Services for purposes that are illegal, are improper,
infringe the rights of others, or adversely impact others enjoyment of
the Services. A list of examples of prohibited activities appears here. "
where 'here' is a hyperlink[2] to a page including this text-
"Unless you have a written agreement with Google Fiber permitting you do
so, you should not host any type of server using your Google Fiber
connection"
In my professional opinion as a graduate in Computer Engineering from
the University of Kansas (and incidentally brother of a google VP) I
believe these terms of service are in violation of FCC-10-201.
[1] http://fiber.google.com/legal/terms.html
[2]
http://support.google.com/fiber/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=2659981&topic=2440874&ctx=topic
--- (end of form 2000F complaint text)
Because 640kb of ram ought to be enough for anybody right?
ohh wow.
I live in an area that gets fios, 150mbit down/ 65 up.
Sure torrents are faster. Usenet is even faster, but everything is just so much quicker. Those downloads you wait 2 minutes for? Try like 5 seconds on my end. There's really no wait time for things. I have a openvpn set up between my home and a remote location and copying things to my backup site is much quicker and faster. I can even open videos on the other site and watch them real time without having to download them. I don't really get the concept of "ohh this is enough, i don't need any more". There's always a use for more bandwidth and speed. Plus it drives the prices down due to competition. Maybe the fastest speed isn't worth the price, but you'd better bet the competition will take note and offer better deals.
You're a total geek and you can't figure out what to do with a better upload speed than 1Mbps? Turn in your geek card, your time has come.
Digging is ok in most parts of the country. But lets pick a 'big city' New York. Do you have any idea how much infrastructure is under those roads already? Oh which is used and which isnt? Not so simple a task anymore is it?
How about Texas. Nice open wide spaces. Did you know there are many areas where digging involves explosives? Dig down 1-2 (sometimes more shallow) ft and you are in bedrock.
Ok lets pick the one Google picked. Kansas city. They probably can dig. So long as they do not mind the occasional boulder. The soil is fairly soft (being so close to a major river). So they probably will dig.
Or we can make wild sweeping statements like 'always in backwards America'. Those guys putting in those wires sure are stupid aren't they? Putting in wire needs to be tailored for each region. The Americas has a wildly diverse soil, rock, hilly areas. That is putting aside any sort of 'traditional way it is done in the area' and laws.
$300 for 10Mbps for 10 years is $2.5/mo. That's less than a penny a day.
250 cents / 31 days = less than a penny a day ...
another victim of the public education system.
They are going to use the existing power poles here in KC. It was one of the original stumbling blocks. The city is letting them use the infrastructure for less than they charge existing cable and telephone companies.
No sigs in BETA. Beta SUCKS.
I just read this Wired article a few days ago:
Google Fiber Splits Along Kansas City's Digital Divide
http://www.wired.com/business/2012/09/google-fiber-digital-divide/
Basically, the signup for Google Fiber was split along the line dividing historically white and black neighborhoods.
But Liimatta [who runs a Kansas City nonprofit that works to bring broadband access to low-income residents] says the pre-registration process itself set a high bar for those already on the wrong side of the digital divide. To pre-register, residents needed to be willing to pony up $10. They also needed a credit or debit card, a Google Wallet account, and a Gmail account, which are harder to come by if you never had internet access in the first place. "Many don't even have bank accounts," Liimatta says. "That's why there are so many check-cashing places out there."
The fact that they managed to get these neighborhoods qualified in 3 days says a lot about the lengths Google went to.
The Wired article talks about Google sending out teams to knock on doors and expedite signups for families that don't have internet already.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Think of a family connection. Four people watching different programs at the same time. Now how many people make or receive phone calls whilst watching a video program. Now add in downloading other software whilst watching a program, just for example legally bought steam games. Now ramp up that phone call to a video call and add in email or something you will see more often now that fibre has become available vid-mail.
Now I wont bother totalling that all up because of course that steam game wants it to be downloaded as fast as possible same with the vid-mail. Of course people will be passing a lot more video around the internet especially with phones becoming much more capable at producing it. Even without wanting maximum download speed for the items mentioned a digital family could readily suck 25 MB download and you can see how burst into 100 MB is desirable when people are waiting for the game they have just bought.
Then of course there are things like scenery channel for people without a view but who have a 90inch LED LCD screen, I have a view and believe me they are well worth it. With falling prices in video displays having a live scenery feed, whilst watching a program are feasible. Just as previewing multiple video streams simultaneously is desirable when possible.
Now add in modern age things like live health monitoring when people are suffering an illness so they can be at home rather than in a hospital or for the elderly. Face it you are the cave man, squatting in a cave not knowing or understanding why people would want to live in a timber framed house, what could they possible need or want that is not provided by a cave.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
I don't care how it gets to me. I just wish they offered it NORTH OF THE RIVER! It doesn't make sense to not offer it north of the MO where there is a major tech company in the area who employs nerds who are all drooling over this.
Well, the solution is simple; You just need to park your van DOWN BY THE RIVER!
Digging is ok in most parts of the country. But lets pick a 'big city' New York. Do you have any idea how much infrastructure is under those roads already? Oh which is used and which isnt? Not so simple a task anymore is it?
This is much less of a problem then most people realize. My north-Dallas suburb has all underground utilities (including electricity) running under the sidewalks (due to legacy layout there is no right-of-way zone) and Verizon managed to run fiber with zero issues and without digging up the sidewalks. Unfortunately Dallas proper is ATT so no fiber for those inside the city limits, which is funny because the much higher density would make it a better payoff. NYC is more complicated but ultimately it can (and is) being done.
The utilities tend to be segmented vertically, with more sensitive ones buried deeper, then with same-class services being spread out horizontally. The fiber was run by using machines that navigate conduit through the ground without actually digging the entire length up. This also allows you to run new conduit under existing services without disturbing them. I'm not sure how much sensing those machines have but it would be fairly easy to have metal-sensors, radar, ultrasound, etc in the dig head, along with actuation to allow you to steer it. This would let you avoid almost any issues by sensing when you are near a gas line or legacy copper and steering the cutting head around it (the conduit itself is flexible plastic). Funny enough, the densest downtown cores all have underground utility tunnels and the like which makes running lines there even easier.
What we do know is that Verizon was able to reduce their capex spend on legacy copper infrastructure in FIOS areas and that the actual rollout was less expensive and faster than anticipated. It will certainly pay for itself in less than 20 years. They also claim to have spent 20 billion on it, but when you look at their capex budgets over the past few years you can see that a lot of that is offset by less spending on the copper plant.
Think about that for a minute... For maybe 100 billion (less than 1/5 of the defense budget) we could roll out gigabit fiber to 90% of all homes and businesses in the United States. There is a ton of dark fiber criss-crossing the country for backbone purposes.
The problem isn't money and it isn't technical. The problem is that our institutions are dysfunctional (by design). Our Telco companies would rather pump the short-term stock price than invest in infrastructure - the new Verizon CEO killed future FIOS rollouts and did the handshake deal with cable to avoid competing with each other so they can focus on wireless revenue - a place where data caps and high prices ensure huge profits.
Our government has been hijacked by the "no new taxes ever" crowd, who deliberately cut taxes to introduce deficits, to justify cutting government services and reducing the pay/benefits (and thus quality) of government employees**. Then they point to the government they deliberately broke as justification for further cuts.
**Why is it that you only need to spend money to buy a good CEO? Why can't the government spend money to buy good civil servants? Or get more employees to reduce lines at places like the DMV or INS?
No new infrastructure has ever succeeded without massive government intervention. Part of that is you can only get financing when you can show a good chance of return on investment... but with new infrastructure you are stuck with the chicken and egg problem. Without the infrastructure there is no demand and without demand private enterprise won't build the infrastructure.
Government financed, cleared the way for, and rolled out the army to protect the trans-continental railroad. Without the largesse of the federal government the railroads would have only built the profitable lines to certain areas, on incompatible track gauges (check the history books). Without government-mandated air brakes and knuckle couplers we'd sti
Natural != (nontoxic || beneficial)
Because the bandwidth of the fiber is shared among all the people at your node. If everyone simultaneously cranked up iTunes or BitTorrent and started downloading movies at the same time, I doubt you would maintain that 20+ Mbps service speed.
Also because your speeds and cost are so atypical that it isn't even funny. Most Internet service in rural areas seems to average about $50 a month and provides less bandwidth.
Finally, because we're rapidly approaching the point where Internet bandwidth is hopelessly insufficient to meet users' needs. With users wanting to watch downloaded or streaming movies, perform network-based backups, use virtual computers (e.g. using VLC) that are maintained and backed up by someone else, etc., the performance and throughput of the outgoing pipe is getting more and more critical for a good user experience, and it just hasn't kept up with internal infrastructure speeds.
It's hard to even find a switch these days that isn't gigabit, yet as soon as you leave the premises, you're at a clunky single-to-low-double-digit megabit speed—about two orders of magnitude slower. That's just not acceptable. We're at the point where there's little reason to further upgrade the speeds of internal networks, mainly because of the lack of performance upstream. That's really rather bad news for all the industries that depend on the sale of upgraded equipment, and it potentially holds back lots of useful innovations—concepts that we haven't even dared to dream about because they are so completely infeasible over double-digit megabit networks.... Distributed social networking. Mass-market acceptance of video-and-voice-over-IP. True virtual/cloud computing (doing video editing using a hard drive in another state, for example). And so on.
Gigabit (uplink and downlink) to the premises would solve SO many problems.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.