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I remember the prevailing attitude at the time in message boards being that Google had no real intention of taking this serious and was instead just trying to b

I remember the prevailing attitude at the time in message boards being that Google had no real intention of taking this serious and was instead just trying to bluff the entrenched interests to upgrade. It worked in the markets Google rolled out in...and that was it. These companies stubbornly refused to preempt Googles expansion anywhere. Maybe they called Googles bluff, maybe they were never nimble enough to even think about getting ahead of Google let alone execute it, and maybe Google was just never that serious in the first place.

justonepost 9y ago
Or, just face value, wireless is where the big money is.
sureaboutthis 9y ago
This is true, I believe, and in my area of the country, we went from 10Mb to 125Mb in short order. And now, years later, even ATT now offers 1Gb fibre (though limited areas and still mostly slow 3Mb everywhere else) .
glenstein 9y ago
I think the time you are referring to was at least a few news cycles after the start of Google fiber. I think it genuinely was received as the Cool New Thing for a while. Then the cities applied to be Google fiber cities. Then fiber rolled out to some cities. At some point competitors responded by upgrading their service. And then with some retrospection, we collectively looked back at that series of events and said "ah, this must have been Google's plan all along." I honestly don't doubt that Google's initial plan was insanely ambitious. And that what transpired, while falling far short of the original vision, nevertheless did advance their interests. But my recollection of the events as they unfolded in real time wasn't that this was their plan from the start, or that people felt that way, until a few news cycles passed and it was clear that it spurred other internet providers to action. But I do agree with you that it definitely did become the prevailing wisdom, eventually.

justonepost 9y ago

Or, just face value, wireless is where the big money is.

sureaboutthis 9y ago

This is true, I believe, and in my area of the country, we went from 10Mb to 125Mb in short order. And now, years later, even ATT now offers 1Gb fibre (though limited areas and still mostly slow 3Mb everywhere else) .

glenstein 9y ago

I think the time you are referring to was at least a few news cycles after the start of Google fiber. I think it genuinely was received as the Cool New Thing for a while. Then the cities applied to be Google fiber cities. Then fiber rolled out to some cities. At some point competitors responded by upgrading their service. And then with some retrospection, we collectively looked back at that series of events and said "ah, this must have been Google's plan all along." I honestly don't doubt that Google's initial plan was insanely ambitious. And that what transpired, while falling far short of the original vision, nevertheless did advance their interests. But my recollection of the events as they unfolded in real time wasn't that this was their plan from the start, or that people felt that way, until a few news cycles passed and it was clear that it spurred other internet providers to action. But I do agree with you that it definitely did become the prevailing wisdom, eventually.