City of Evanston Sunny Award
Carolyn Tang
a transparent government website: http://networkedblogs.com/16bkR
Also, submitting below for reference.
**
Google Seeks Volunteer Cities For High-Speed Hookup Tests
Mar 11, 2010 16:50:38 (ET)
By Therese Poletti
All across America, mayors are jumping into lakes, temporarily
changing city names and creating Facebook fan pages, in an effort to
woo Google Inc. (GOOG) and its broadband network trial.
From Juneau, Alaska to Sarasota, Fla., cities across the U.S. are
vying to be chosen by Google as a test bed for its experimental
ultrahigh-speed broadband network, projected to be 100-times faster
than what is available in most U.S. homes.
But some cities might want to think twice before they court Google.
They might want to make sure they have some funds in their coffers and
incentives that will very likely be required to help turn their cities
into 21st Century digital hubs.
"By the time this is over I expect this to be a bidding war," said Rob
Enderle, principal analyst at the Enderle Group. "If you get a bidding
war going, you might find out that the winning city ends up paying for
more of this than they expect."
Available details so far are slim. Google is now requesting
information. Interested communities, local governments and their
constituents are submitting responses on why they would be the best
host for an ultrahigh-speed network. Google announced its plans Feb.
10 and cities have until March 26 to submit their pitches.
There are 89 fan pages on Facebook, sponsored by cities such as
Huntsville, Ala., with 5,729 fans, to Ventura, Calif., with 1,320 fans
and a multi-colored logo that mimics Google's. The mayor of Topeka,
Kan. temporarily changed the name of that Great Plains city,
population 122,000, to Google, Kan., with a proclamation that included
a mandate not to do any evil. Citizens of Duluth, Minn. saw their
mayor jump into a 35-degree Lake Superior at a dual-purpose event for
Google Fiber and the Special Olympics.
"We've already received a good number of submissions from communities
across the country, and thousands of submissions from people who are
excited about ultrahigh-speed Internet access," said a spokeswoman for
Google in Mountain View, Calif. The company isn't asking potential
partners to share in the cost of the network build out.
But surely, cities which provide the easiest ways to cut through their
own bureaucratic red tape, and the most economic incentives, will be
favored as likely hosts.
"We would support implementation through access to currently installed
fiber and other existing network resources to the extent of our
ability, as well as property access, zoning assistance, permitting and
regulatory facilitation," said a spokesman for Sarasota's Google fiber
initiative. The city, which has a population of about 372,000, can
also promise great demand for network bandwidth and potential
subscribers. The coastal city also temporarily changed the named of
its City Island to Google Island.
Doesn't zoning and permitting usually mean costs, or money going into
city coffers? Cities may lose out on some potential revenue in their
ardor to win the ultimate prize.
That prize, as Bill Bunten, Topeka's 79-year-old mayor told CNN, would
hopefully inspire younger people to stay in the city and encourage new
businesses.
"The technology will be an enabler for unknown innovations," said
Jeremy Hansen of Hansen Gress Corp, and an information technology
consultant to the city of Juneau. "I'm not trying to guess what those
innovations are."
By fueling this frenzy, as cities across the country compete with each
other to host the experiment, Google may cleverly get the cities to
pick up more of the costs than they expected.
What if Google's trials remain only an experiment? Google has spent a
lot of money buying up dark fiber, meaning fiber that is not currently
in use, some of it built up during the dot-com boom. But it's not
clear that Google wants to be a network service provider.
Google and the host cities may have a hard time trying to find another
company to manage their awesome--but costly--fiber network that zips
video around at speeds of one gigabit per second.
Be careful what you wish for.
-By Therese Poletti; 415-439-6400; AskNew...@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 11, 2010 16:50 ET (21:50 GMT)