UPDATE:
Google’s Milo Medin, Mayor Lee Leffingwell and Governor Rick Perry were all on hand to announce Google Fiber’s arrival in Austin. With a message centering around “The public is frustrated with speed”, they made it official – Austin Texas will have super high speed internet by mid-2014.
Google Fiber is the search engine provider’s fiber-optic network that is recognized for providing ultra-fast home Internet service. First tested in Kansas City in 2012, Google Fiber now looks to be on its way to Austin, Texas. The Gigabit service offered through Google is capable of reaching speeds 100x faster than most cable-modem connections.
Google Fiber Announcement Austin
Buzz about the expansion to Austin began when Google Fiber’s news website briefly flashed a message over the weekend reading: “Google Fiber’s Next Stop: Austin, Texas.” Google may have inadvertently managed to scoop its own announcement, because the message was quickly removed. The formal announcement is expected to come as part of a joint press conference with Google and the City of Austin that is scheduled for Tuesday at 11:00 am CST.
Google Fiber: Get Ready to Wait
The prospect of faster connections has many in Austin excited, but the actual roll out of services is expected to take some time. Local Austin news site KXAN.com described the process of Google Fiber’s arrival in Kansas City this way:
“…the initial excitement of the announcement will give way to what might feel like a “deafening silence.” And then Google will steadily begin wiring a neighborhood or two at a time for the services.
An online video from Google posted on YouTube showed the recent rollout process in Kansas City’s metro areas. The production had the feel of a grassroots campaign rally where smiling homeowners waved and put up signs neighborhood by neighborhood.
Of course Austin’s 800,000 residents makes for scores of neighborhoods.
In Kansas City, it took Google six weeks of consultations, then eight more months of scoping out the urban area. Only then did it announce a list of 180 neighborhoods, or “fiberhoods,” and approve the then experimental one gigabit service.”
Due to the massive infrastructure required, excited Austin residents might be in for an extended wait before Google Fiber Gigabit service becomes a reality.
