

Google fiber – “experiencing awesome things together” - kevinalexbrown
http://scrawford.net/blog/google-fiber-experiencing-awesome-things-together/1634/

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casca
TL;DR - fiber is good, Google is installing fiber in Kansas City. Nothing new
here.

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kevinalexbrown
While I have been critical of Google Fiber, this author was on the board of
directors of ICANN, and is an extremely well-regarded professor of internet
and communications law. She represents a viewpoint that I disagree with
somewhat, but she is articulate and very well read in this area. Previous
submissions regarding Google Fiber seem to have been announcements from Google
itself, which were, to put it mildly, devoid of critical assessment.

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njharman
No matter how credentialed, experienced, or articulate you are, saying "the
sky is blue" is still saying nothing at all.

~~~
rodly
Beautifully said.

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olalonde
I'd be curious to see how fast Gigabit Internet feels like. Is there any video
available that showcases just how fast it is?

~~~
axusgrad
I found some progress bar porn on Youtube:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWUliBMrS90>

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dbecker
It's $70/month for internet and $120/month for internet+TV.

People already moving away from paying $50/month for TV, and the TV connection
will be even less valuable once you have a gigabit internet connection.

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runako
This argument mostly holds water, except for one gaping hole: sports. In the
US at least, anyone who cares about watching sports at home will be the slave
of a pay TV service for what looks like the foreseeable future. Even streaming
the Olympics on the Internet required proof of a pay TV subscription.

Mark Cuban, who knows a couple of things about sports and broadcasting over
the Internet, has written that he doesn't think streaming is a feasible option
for most US households, for pretty clear technical reasons. He may not be
right, but he makes cogent points.

Gigabit or no, until sports comes to streaming in a big way, most US
households will have pay TV.

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dbecker
I agree that some people will keep cable for sports, but cable has been losing
about 1 million households a year recently
([http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/04/over-1-million-u-s-cable-
subsc...](http://www.bgr.com/2012/04/04/over-1-million-u-s-cable-subscribers-
cut-the-cord-in-2011/)). That's driven mostly by internet access, and faster
internet will accelerate that phenomenon (even if cable keeps those willing to
pay $600 a year for sports.)

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ctdonath
_One-time chance to get 5Mb down/1 up for free [for 7 years], if you pay the
construction fee._

Intriguing. Wonder what that costs.

~~~
runako
<https://fiber.google.com/plans/residential/>

$300.

