5 ms·

Google Fiber is ending a free-internet offer in its first city

26 points by mathattack 11y ago

wolfgke 11y ago
Just three (four) words: Embrace, extend and extinguish > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- amazon_not 11y ago
  What basis is there for this comment? Google Fiber stopped offering a (very expensive) product for free. How is that extending or extinguishing anything? It's not like Google's competitors stopped offering broadband.
- bargl 11y ago
  Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish is typically seen as a bad thing that takes a highly competitive market, turns it into some form of monopoly or oligopoly. And it is almost always associated with Microsoft not Google. How is this relevant? There already exists a market where consumers have little to no choice, they are locked into the stale and almost ludicrously bad options of one or (if you're lucky) two service providers. You are already within a form of control that you can't hope to break out of. Now if I were to coin a phrase for Google it would be, Data, Data, and Data. Where this gives them just another angle for sucking up user data and using how they see fit, but that's not to say that Verizon, Cox, Comcast can't already do that. They just don't have all my search history as well as email to boot. Final thought, Microsoft was known for Extinguishing some cool and open companies in it's time, I for one don't mind seeing Comcast, Verizon, or Cox get a little competition to make them step up their game.
  - infogulch 11y ago
    Exactly. Extinguish what? Comcast et al's regressive monopolistic consumer-hostile business practices? Sign me up! ISP's have not been a free market for a long time, if ever, and it's about time they saw some competition that forces service to improve and prices to drop in step with the rest of the economy.
chmike 11y ago
A free Fiber is not viable on the long run. It looks like dumping to me. It looked more like an attempt to kill competitors than a constructive competitive pressure. However I find 50$ expensive. The most expensive offer in France is Orange for 37€ (42USD) for 100Mbit/s download and 50Mbit/s upload. And with this you get 160 TV channels and unlimited phone calls through the fiber. I have 1000MBit/s download and 250 Mbit/s upload for 26€ (~30USD), many tv channels and unlimited phone calls and fixed IP address (no IPv6 support yet). This allows to use twitch and publish our games. It also allows to do a backup and restore of my rented server in a snap although I could in theory host it at home. I'm afraid that US people loose the benefit of much cheaper device prices (Apple, etc) on the cost of monthly fee of the Internet line or mobile phone line.
- Dylan16807 11y ago
  $300 for a teaser connection isn't really that cheap. I wouldn't call it dumping. Note that only the no-monthly-fee plan paid that $300.
- dawnerd 11y ago
  I'm on a locally owned ISP and pay 50 dollars for gigabit symmetrical. This is in Portland too. I feel that the cities that actually push to have fiber everywhere are the ones that end up with cheaper prices.
- blacksmith_tb 11y ago
  It isn't much like dumping in the US, where local monopolies are the rule. I pay $120/month for 150/30 cable service in Portland OR, which is pretty terrible compared to many other parts of the world. I can't imagine Google is really interested in becoming another regional monopoly, they are clearly trying to drive the existing ISPs to improve their offerings (since GOOG makes money when more people are online). If killing the competition was their plan, they are certainly doing it very slowly (I'd happily pay them for fiber).
Someone1234 11y ago
This is a little off-topic so I apologise for that: How close does the literal fiber on Google Fiber get to a home? Meaning do they terminate from fiber in the home itself, or does fiber terminate on the street, or on the block, or what? For example they could be using cat6 or heck even cat5e to deliver 10-1 Gbps internet the final mile.
- amazon_not 11y ago
  > How close does the literal fiber on Google Fiber get to a home? The fiber is brought to the building. > For example they could be using cat6 or heck even cat5e to deliver 10-1 Gbps internet the final mile. Ethernet only work to 330 feet. Beyond that you have to use VDSL.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
ryao 11y ago
My guess is that the most people are fine with 5mbps and very few went for gigabit service. They could have reduced speeds to 256kbps to encourage people to sign up for faster service. 256kbps is the ITU definition of broadband.
ryao 11y ago
This appears to only affect new sign ups. Those who already have the free tier will have at least 7 years of service: https://m.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4e7i2e/google_fiber_ends_free_5mbps_internet_offer_in/d1xy7rp https://m.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4e7i2e/google_fib... Either this was planned to be a promotional offer from the start of people in Kansas were beginning to downgrade to the free tier after noticing those around them had no problems on it.

26 points by mathattack 11y ago

Just three (four) words: Embrace, extend and extinguish > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
amazon_not 11y ago
What basis is there for this comment? Google Fiber stopped offering a (very expensive) product for free. How is that extending or extinguishing anything? It's not like Google's competitors stopped offering broadband.
bargl 11y ago
Embrace, Extend, and Extinguish is typically seen as a bad thing that takes a highly competitive market, turns it into some form of monopoly or oligopoly. And it is almost always associated with Microsoft not Google. How is this relevant? There already exists a market where consumers have little to no choice, they are locked into the stale and almost ludicrously bad options of one or (if you're lucky) two service providers. You are already within a form of control that you can't hope to break out of. Now if I were to coin a phrase for Google it would be, Data, Data, and Data. Where this gives them just another angle for sucking up user data and using how they see fit, but that's not to say that Verizon, Cox, Comcast can't already do that. They just don't have all my search history as well as email to boot. Final thought, Microsoft was known for Extinguishing some cool and open companies in it's time, I for one don't mind seeing Comcast, Verizon, or Cox get a little competition to make them step up their game.
- infogulch 11y ago
  Exactly. Extinguish what? Comcast et al's regressive monopolistic consumer-hostile business practices? Sign me up! ISP's have not been a free market for a long time, if ever, and it's about time they saw some competition that forces service to improve and prices to drop in step with the rest of the economy.

chmike 11y ago

A free Fiber is not viable on the long run. It looks like dumping to me. It looked more like an attempt to kill competitors than a constructive competitive pressure. However I find 50$ expensive. The most expensive offer in France is Orange for 37€ (42USD) for 100Mbit/s download and 50Mbit/s upload. And with this you get 160 TV channels and unlimited phone calls through the fiber. I have 1000MBit/s download and 250 Mbit/s upload for 26€ (~30USD), many tv channels and unlimited phone calls and fixed IP address (no IPv6 support yet). This allows to use twitch and publish our games. It also allows to do a backup and restore of my rented server in a snap although I could in theory host it at home. I'm afraid that US people loose the benefit of much cheaper device prices (Apple, etc) on the cost of monthly fee of the Internet line or mobile phone line.

Dylan16807 11y ago
$300 for a teaser connection isn't really that cheap. I wouldn't call it dumping. Note that only the no-monthly-fee plan paid that $300.
dawnerd 11y ago
I'm on a locally owned ISP and pay 50 dollars for gigabit symmetrical. This is in Portland too. I feel that the cities that actually push to have fiber everywhere are the ones that end up with cheaper prices.
blacksmith_tb 11y ago
It isn't much like dumping in the US, where local monopolies are the rule. I pay $120/month for 150/30 cable service in Portland OR, which is pretty terrible compared to many other parts of the world. I can't imagine Google is really interested in becoming another regional monopoly, they are clearly trying to drive the existing ISPs to improve their offerings (since GOOG makes money when more people are online). If killing the competition was their plan, they are certainly doing it very slowly (I'd happily pay them for fiber).

Someone1234 11y ago

This is a little off-topic so I apologise for that: How close does the literal fiber on Google Fiber get to a home? Meaning do they terminate from fiber in the home itself, or does fiber terminate on the street, or on the block, or what? For example they could be using cat6 or heck even cat5e to deliver 10-1 Gbps internet the final mile.

amazon_not 11y ago
> How close does the literal fiber on Google Fiber get to a home? The fiber is brought to the building. > For example they could be using cat6 or heck even cat5e to deliver 10-1 Gbps internet the final mile. Ethernet only work to 330 feet. Beyond that you have to use VDSL.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

ryao 11y ago

My guess is that the most people are fine with 5mbps and very few went for gigabit service. They could have reduced speeds to 256kbps to encourage people to sign up for faster service. 256kbps is the ITU definition of broadband.

ryao 11y ago

This appears to only affect new sign ups. Those who already have the free tier will have at least 7 years of service: https://m.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4e7i2e/google_fiber_ends_free_5mbps_internet_offer_in/d1xy7rp https://m.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/4e7i2e/google_fib... Either this was planned to be a promotional offer from the start of people in Kansas were beginning to downgrade to the free tier after noticing those around them had no problems on it.