Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#141

Post by cheald » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:09 PM UTC

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #103

CapitalistCartr wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what happened when GMail offered 2 GB inboxes. The competition got serious.

> The competition got serious. It's interesting how pure competition and "rational self-interest" got us the likes of Comcast and Cox and Verizon and all these other awful, awful companies. They quickly locked up the market, injected their own lobbyists into Washington, and then were content to provide a poor service for a lot of money. What is shaking them out of their complacency now is not "the market" or "competi…

You don't think that the core of the issue is regulatory capture, rather than a failing of "the market"?

It takes a lot of money to break into a captured market, which is why it takes a large company to do it. Google entering the ISP market has done more to shake up and spur on the incumbents in the past couple of years than anything regulators have done. And furthermore, you can be assured that their doing so is absolutely self-interested; Google isn't building fiber for the betterment of humanity, they're building it to improve the delivery of their services which make them money.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#142

Post by cheald » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:10 PM UTC

mabbo wrote: post #135

samelawrence wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also worth noting that Google isn't doing this because: 1) They want to be an ISP 2) They feel bad for America and want us to enjoy faster internet. They're doing it because they have plans for products which necessitate nationwide high speed internet. I don't know what those plans are... maybe making YouTube the everything-video-delivery-system, maybe massively collaborative work tools as they expand Google Docs et…

And you know what? I'm fine with that. If Google wants to go and improve my internet experience as a part of some master plan where they do make a boatload of money, I'm perfectly happy to go along with that plan.

It's almost like mutually-beneficial exchange is the backbone of our economy or something!

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#143

Post by res0nat0r » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:11 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #131

res0nat0r wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google has only been expanding to cities that give them extensive tax breaks and other perks that haven't been afforded to most other companies. This is a good thing as it allows Google to expand, but they would never do this unless they got these incentives, plus the guaranteed number of users pre-signed up for the service so that they can guarantee some sort of ROI.

The big telecom companies got massive tax breaks at various times over the last 20 years to deploy high speed broadband, and essentially defrauded customers and tax payers by not doing what they said they would. One example of many: https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20131012/02124724852/decad...

Techdirt really has some of the most one sided and consistently terrible articles of any "news" site I've seen.

Here is some actual relevant information related to the Google Fiber concessions, mainly in that they don't have to build out infrastructure to the entire city (unlike Comcast etc), and other breaks not given to previous providers:

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/09/how-kansas-city-t...

> Google received stunning regulatory concessions and incentives from local governments, including free access to virtually everything the city owns or controls: rights of way, central office space, power, interconnections with anchor institutions, marketing and direct mail, and office space for Google employees. City officials also expedited the permitting process and assigned staff specifically to help Google. One county even offered to allow Google to hang its wires on parts of utility poles—for free—that are usually off-limits to communications companies.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#144

Post by jsz0 » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:13 PM UTC

rkalla wrote: post #6

For anyone interested... the whole motivation of Google Fiber to motivate ISPs to stop gouging us does exactly what it is designed to do. Cox, in Phoenix, miraculously doubled everyone's speeds > 100mbps last year because they were concerned with our general happiness levels and wanted to show their affection. Nope... that's not it. Ran into two leads at Smash Burger in June of 2014 and asked them on the spot "When a…

The cable industry has been working on ramping up speeds for the last decade starting with DOCSIS 3 to compete with Verizon FIOS. The development of DOCSIS 3.1 for gigabit speeds over cable actually started before Google Fiber existed. It seems like people don't want to give Verizon credit for this because perhaps Google offers a more compelling story or maybe because it would suggest that competition in the telecom duopoly actually worked out pretty well. Even after Verizon scaled back / halted their build-out of FIOS they had dumped so much money into it that we suddenly had a competitive market for FTTH/G-PON equipment and trained contractors to build it. Google Fiber and muni FTTH projects couldn't have existed without Verizon basically seeding the market for it in the US.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#145

Post by arjunnarayan » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:13 PM UTC

fideaux64 wrote: post #130

rkalla wrote: post #6

For anyone interested... the whole motivation of Google Fiber to motivate ISPs to stop gouging us does exactly what it is designed to do. Cox, in Phoenix, miraculously doubled everyone's speeds > 100mbps last year because they were concerned with our general happiness levels and wanted to show their affection. Nope... that's not it. Ran into two leads at Smash Burger in June of 2014 and asked them on the spot "When a…

> the idea of going back to Sincere question. What are the specific functional improvements that you've seen at a much higher mbps? Better youtube performance? Faster p2p? Faster web page load times? More supportive of a multi-device household?

Here's a concrete instance. Last week I made the decision to buy the new Dragon Age game. I have 100mbit, and it downloaded in about 30-45 minutes. This was frustrating because my time is valuable, and of the 3 hours I had to play a game, I only got to play for 2 hours. If I had had the foresight to upgrade to gigabit, it would have downloaded in under 5 minutes. My excellent provider, CondoInternet.net provides 100mbit for $60, and gigabit for $80, but unfortunately I cheaped out. (Well, rather, I decided to first try 100mbit since it was such a huge upgrade over my previous Internet before spending more cash because I'm cheap like that).

Gigabit means you can make decisions on a whim, and not have to schedule down time days in advance. I mean I play video games when I'm physically and mentally exhausted (the couple hours post-gym, for instance).

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#146

Post by cwal37 » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:15 PM UTC

saboot wrote: post #123

cwal37 wrote: post #44

I am now surrounded by Google Fiber to the east and west, and Chattanooga's public fiber to the south, out here in Knoxville, TN. I really wish we could manage something here. This area has the biggest national lab, and a host of tech industry around it, I was kind of surprised more options didn't exist when I moved down a year ago. It makes sense to me that Google went after these southeastern markets, because we ar…

Same situation for myself currently. Doing some grad work at ORNL also. I'm really frustrated by comcast, my fiance and I have a hard time doing bandwidth using things simultaneously (netflix/twitch). I constantly watch our data meter to make sure we don't approach the cap. Although it's kind of baffling because I recently lived in the bay area. AT&T's UVerse I had wasn't much better in terms of the bandwidth and pri…

Unrelated to this, but do you guys like board games or really almost anything else? I made the mistake of living in Oak Ridge and I've had a hell of a time meeting people ( I mean, clearly, I'm propositioning a random person in an unrelated HN thread). When my mentor isn't around I can go days without talking to people, and it's starting to drive me a bit mad. I keep buying board games and local multiplayer PC games, but they all languish unplayed.

Back onto the topic, I seriously feel Comcast is "trialing" their data caps her because the southeast is perceived as less tech-savvy, and they're probably aware they can get away with it more.

EDIT: Thanks y'all, I'll be sending out some emails when I get home.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#147

Post by cloakandswagger » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:18 PM UTC

kevinwallace wrote: post #119

evanm wrote: post #54

I'm fully aware of the extreme cost of rolling out a fiber infrastructure in new locations, but I still wonder why Google isn't more aggressive with their expansion. While the upfront costs are great, they more or less have guaranteed success in most major cities. Nobody likes the incumbent telcos--they're hated all over the US. I just dream of a world in which we aren't getting raped by Comcast, TWC, and Cox. They a…

I assume your comment was not meant to come off as hostile, but please don't use the word 'rape' to refer to things other than sexual violence. Doing so creates a hostile environment and minimizes the experiences of rape victims.

rape (n) - an act of plunder, violent seizure, or abuse; despoliation; violation:

Kindly take your ludicrous brand of social justice somewhere else.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#148

Post by Florin_Andrei » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:19 PM UTC

cheald wrote: post #141

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The competition got serious. It's interesting how pure competition and "rational self-interest" got us the likes of Comcast and Cox and Verizon and all these other awful, awful companies. They quickly locked up the market, injected their own lobbyists into Washington, and then were content to provide a poor service for a lot of money. What is shaking them out of their complacency now is not "the market" or "competi…

You don't think that the core of the issue is regulatory capture, rather than a failing of "the market"? It takes a lot of money to break into a captured market, which is why it takes a large company to do it. Google entering the ISP market has done more to shake up and spur on the incumbents in the past couple of years than anything regulators have done. And furthermore, you can be assured that their doing so is abs…

Regulatory capture is definitely involved, yes. Except it's not the originator of the woes, it's merely an instrument.

It's not the bullet that kills the victim, it's the assassin that pulls the trigger.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#149

Post by jsz0 » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:19 PM UTC

rkalla wrote: post #51

aesthetics1 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Saw the same thing from Comcast in a very rural area - doubled speeds for free with higher tiers available. Went from 50 to 100. I think we are finally seeing some change.

Funny you mention 'rural area' -- my in-laws all live in the wooded section of Troy, IL... total population is like 1,000 people. Anyway, they have Charter cable over there - and for the last decade they have been asking me about 'Getting Netflix' - but with a maximum download speed of 3mbps I kept telling them "It's just not going to work well for you..." 2 months ago Charter bumped them from 3mbps to 50mbps. My fir…

Over the last 5 years the cable industry has mostly completed their own analog-to-digital transition and now have a decent amount of spectrum to throw at faster data speeds.

Re: Google Fiber is coming to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville and Raleigh-Durham

#150

Post by cjslep » Tue, Jan 27, 2015, 9:20 PM UTC

cwal37 wrote: post #146

saboot wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same situation for myself currently. Doing some grad work at ORNL also. I'm really frustrated by comcast, my fiance and I have a hard time doing bandwidth using things simultaneously (netflix/twitch). I constantly watch our data meter to make sure we don't approach the cap. Although it's kind of baffling because I recently lived in the bay area. AT&T's UVerse I had wasn't much better in terms of the bandwidth and pri…

Unrelated to this, but do you guys like board games or really almost anything else? I made the mistake of living in Oak Ridge and I've had a hell of a time meeting people ( I mean, clearly, I'm propositioning a random person in an unrelated HN thread). When my mentor isn't around I can go days without talking to people, and it's starting to drive me a bit mad. I keep buying board games and local multiplayer PC games,…

My friend and his wife are in Knoxville working at ORNL (He's also working on his Masters at the moment). He was in my DnD group at NC State for our Nuclear Engineering undergrad. Feel free to email me and I can put you guys in touch.