http://tidbits.com/ The City of Seattle has partnered with a private firm and the University of Washington to bring gigabit-per-second fiber-backed Internet service to several neighborhoods — but not those inhabited by any of the Seattle-based TidBITS staff, darn it! en-us Copyright 2012 TidBITS Publishing Inc. Mon, 07 Jan 2013 00:00:00 EST Mon, 07 Jan 2013 00:00:00 EST editors@tidbits.com (TidBITS Editors) editors@tidbits.com (TidBITS Editors) http://tidbits.com/images/tb_logo_152x55.png http://tidbits.com/ 55 152 TidBITS badge http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17088 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:45:39 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17088
There is a lot of actual telecom expertise in Seattle. This outfit has no competition. There is no reason why they can't release ALL of the technical detail. You know, "open source" it. Let the 1,000 people in town who really know what they're talking about take shots at it and see what survives.

I sound like I don't want it to work. Other way around. It'd be great if it worked. But I've seen way too much money wasted on way too many of these things that not only didn't work, but which obviously weren't going to work yet managed to raise money during a bubble. Go ask Paul Allen how many billions he lost. There's a reason he's in real estate now. Land is easier.

I'm not holding my breath for the details. For now, I regard it as part of McGinn's re-election campaign. Nothing gets the hipsters breathing hard like promising a shiny new broadband toy. Gigabit! Wow!]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17085 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:18:15 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17085
As a former VC and corporate director, very few ideas ever made the cut with me, but when they did, at least they worked. I hope this one works too, but "hope" plus $3 gets you a cup o'joe at Starbucks. I've never been anyone's cheerleader, and I'm not going to start now. By the way: In a startup, the operators and the technology are inseparable, period. Also: You'd better look again. Their press release says they want to raise money. They're not running some charity.]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17086 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:13:09 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17086
An economic development corporation is still for-profit (or can be). If you read about the approach they have, it's a private-public partnership methodology that doesn't produce telecom-scale returns. They'll make money, but their goals are attempting to align with social purposes as well. Lots of companies these days work that way; cf., beneficial corporations (B corps).]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17083 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:11:42 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17083
Several "millimeter wave" startups (Teligent, WinStar, Advanced Radio Telecom among them) were very prominent during the Internet/telecom bubble of the 1990s. They got huge market valuations. And then they went bankrupt because, alas, the s*** never worked. I know what Gigabit Squared (and especially its venture capital promoters) will be telling everyone, but I'll be quite interested to see what actually happens. If past is prologue, these promises and performance will be two very, very different animals]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17087 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 21:09:18 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17087 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17084 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 20:52:42 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17084
I think you're conflating the operators (as you mention) with the technology. From what I can tell, Gigabit Squared (which is founded as an economic development corporation, so a little different than a venture-backed aggressive high-margin firm) plans to use wireless for fill-in, not for primary connections. It's using fiber for that.

]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17077 Wed, 19 Dec 2012 16:23:25 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17077
There may be some of the city's notorious property developer politics involved here, particularly in the selection of South Lake Union. For someone looking to sell out a condo, the option for gigabit broadband would be a major selling point.

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I'm also right on the border of coverage, enough so that I've emailed them to find the exact border of the service area...]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17004 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 15:30:38 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17004 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_17001 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 14:47:42 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_17001
I really think Google's free offering (5 mbps down/1 mbps up) is the most interesting aspect of their offering. Pay for installation ($300 or $25/month for a year) and fiber internet is free after that.

Google's fiber may offer some other benefits such as faster connections to Google offerings like youtube just by not having slow interlinks to other providers to route through.

It's not raw speed i'm looking for. I'd just like my Crash Plan backups to not interfere with my XBox games.]]> http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16991 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 11:41:14 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16991 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16990 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 11:29:18 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16990 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16988 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 10:34:02 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16988 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16987 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 10:26:43 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16987 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16986 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 10:21:21 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16986 http://db.tidbits.com/article/13458?rss#comments_16985 Fri, 14 Dec 2012 10:18:51 EST http://tidbits.com/article/13458#comments_16985