Over 1,100 Communities Compete for Fast Google Fiber

By Nick Mokey Published March 29, 2010

Want Google to fire up ultra-fast fiberoptic Internet service in your town? Get in line. According to Google, over 1,100 communities submitted requests to be considered as test beds for its experimental fiber network.

The deadline to file passed last week, with city responses nearly doubling in the final hours. Google will now consult with local officials and third-party organizations to help winnow its choices. Eventually it will select one or more spots to lay down fiber for between 50,000 and 500,000 users, giving them speed approximately 100 times faster than what most Americans currently have access to.

Recommended Videos

A map posted by Google depicts every hopeful fiber candidate with small dots, and big dots for cities that had over 1,000 citizens respond.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Topeka, Kansas made waves earlier this month when it changed its name to Google, but other cities have piled on with the publicity stunts. The mayor of Duluth, Minnesota jumped into the icy waters of Lake Superior for it. The mayor of Sarasota, Florida jumped into a shark tank for it. Citizens in Greenville, South Carolina formed “Google” out of 2,000 LED glowsticks.

Google claims it will announce its final target communities by the end of 2010.

Top photo credit: Michael Bergen, AidJoy.org

Topics

Google

Editor in Chief

As Digital Trends’ Editor in Chief, Nick Mokey oversees an editorial team covering every gadget under the sun, along with…

Computing

This computing breakthrough just transferred the entire internet’s traffic in 1 second

CPU Computer Chip being put in place with tweezers.

A team of researchers have made a huge breakthrough in data transmission via fiber optics by using a single computer chip to transfer 1.84 petabits of data per second, which is roughly twice the entire internet's traffic (or approximately 230 million photo downloads per second).

Asbjørn Arvad Jørgensen at the Technical University of Denmark in Copenhagen and his colleagues from Denmark, Sweden, and Japan used a photonic chip – a technology that allows optical components to be built onto computer chips – to divide a stream of data into thousands of separate channels.

Computing

Google Meet just got a massive advantage over Zoom and Teams

Google Meet's stylized background show movement glitches.

If you've ever tried Google Meet's visual effects, you already know that moving around can create glitches and gaps at the edges where the foreground object (you) meets the stylized background. The computer's confusion about which part of a webcam image belongs in the front and which goes in the back is getting a huge upgrade with the latest Google Meet update.

The issue with the old version is that many computers lack the processing power to extract depth information from a webcam. That means Google Meet might not find the edges well enough to begin with, and it is often slow to update whenever you move. It's not as noticeable when using a blur effect but can spoil the experience when you apply a stylized background. Nothing wrecks a peaceful nature background more than a pixelated hand with pieces missing when you wave.

Computing

Google Fiber is bringing high-speed internet to five new states

google fiber tv hands on box remote 2

In what is the first significant expansion since pausing new construction in late 2016, Google recently detailed future plans to bring its Fiber internet services to more regions. The company now says it is planning to deliver high-speed internet through Google Fiber to five new states, specifically Arizona, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada, and Idaho.

According to Google Fiber's Dinni Jain, Google has been busy the past several years behind the scenes. In a blog post, Jain mentioned the teams have been focusing on the Google Fiber vision and have been looking at refinements to service delivery and products. Jain also said the Google Fiber team traveled across the United States and had conversations with elected officials to bring internet to businesses and residents "as quickly as possible."