41–50 of 382 posts
Just as expected. It was just to force the network carriers to speed up wasn't it?
Force them to speed up (maybe) in a dozen cities? I don't think that's "just as expected."
Can't say I'm surprised. I expect Google fi to have a similar fate in a few years. It's not Google business.
What fate would that be? Fiber isn't going away, they have just stopped expansion. There are also hints about investing in other tech instead of laying new fiber across an entire city (WebPass as the article mentions). I agree that Fiber isn't Google business, which is why Alphabet was created. It allows for the company to try expanding into areas that aren't just software. Also, Google does a LOT of infrastructure w…
It's a 0-5% margin business for the foreseeable future; and best-case scaled scenarios it's a 10% margin business with huge capex. Google shouldn't be interested in anything with less than a 20% margin at scale. So from a portfolio standpoint, it was a stupid bet.
My guess is that Google entered the business without knowing all the nuance of the access world. They made an assumption that there was some magic bullet of architecture and comp sci that could lead to game-changing economies of scale. But it turns out the telecoms are pretty solid on the engineering / design side, and customer service and network maintenance are the big cost centers. Neither of those can be automated with algorithms or AI (well, network maintenance sort of can be, but the telecoms are already on top of it), so there's not a ton of opportunity for Google to leverage its strengths.
Running a datacenter is a very different business from running access networks. Operations that are cheap in a datacenter are expensive in the field (cable runs, equipment swaps, etc.) Likewise, there are different considerations around who does the work -- it makes sense to hire full-time people in a datacenter; less so when your equipment is scattered over a few million square miles. All of that leads to a very different operating model, so it's no wonder that Google couldn't figure it out.
Anybody know what is going on here? This seems like a page out of Verizon's FIOS rollout. Is Google working on their own cellular network (non-MVNO)? Is this due to the FCC reclassification of internet as a common carrier?
Just as expected. It was just to force the network carriers to speed up wasn't it?
Force them to speed up (maybe) in a dozen cities? I don't think that's "just as expected."
Building infrastructure is hard. Even 100 years later we still have original AT&T (Verizon and AT&T) as the dominant telecommunications company. Google also seems to just give up on a lot of its products: Google+ Hangouts Project Ara Google Buzz Google video Orkut Talk Meebo etc. http://www.lemonde.fr/pixels/visuel/2015/03/06/google-memori...
Actually, we don't have the original AT&T. They went bankrupt. Cingular Wireless bought the bankrupt assets and changed their name to AT&T. But yes, building infrastructure is hard.
That sucks for citizens of the US. I think the Swedish (Nordic?) model for bringing internet connectivity to it's citizens is superior. The municipalities own (most of) the networks and all the fiber cables, letting companies use them for a small(ish) fee. These companies later sell it to customers. This help people to get the best deals and ensure that the networks are continually upgraded. For example, I have 250/1…
Why not skip the middle step and just have the municipalities provide it to the customers directly?
Because monopolies are wasteful and horrible at things like customer service. The fiber in the ground is a natural monopoly. Connecting that fiber to the rest of the world isn't. You don't want the monopoly to extend one inch more than it has to, regardless of whether the natural monopoly is municipal or Comcast.
That sucks for citizens of the US. I think the Swedish (Nordic?) model for bringing internet connectivity to it's citizens is superior. The municipalities own (most of) the networks and all the fiber cables, letting companies use them for a small(ish) fee. These companies later sell it to customers. This help people to get the best deals and ensure that the networks are continually upgraded. For example, I have 250/1…
Why not skip the middle step and just have the municipalities provide it to the customers directly?
Can't say I'm surprised. I expect Google fi to have a similar fate in a few years. It's not Google business.
That sucks for citizens of the US. I think the Swedish (Nordic?) model for bringing internet connectivity to it's citizens is superior. The municipalities own (most of) the networks and all the fiber cables, letting companies use them for a small(ish) fee. These companies later sell it to customers. This help people to get the best deals and ensure that the networks are continually upgraded. For example, I have 250/1…
