Mountain View, California – Internet search company Google on Wednesday inaugurated a free city-wide wi-fi system in its home town of Mountain View, California, but insisted that it had no plans to offer a similar service nationwide.
The wireless network covers some 90 per cent of the Silicon Valley city of 72,000 and offers maximum data-transfer speeds of up to 1 megabit per second – slightly slower than DSL.
The system cost about 1 million dollars to build and uses 380 transceivers mounted on street-lights throughout the 31-square- kilometre city. Initial reviews of the network indicate that it works smoothly in open areas but that connections can be patchy in enclosed spaces.
Analysts have speculated that the online advertising giant set up the network as its prototype for launching a national wi-fi system covering the entire US.
But Chris Sacca, Google’s head of special initiatives, said the main purpose of his company’s backing local wi-fi access is to clear the way for broadband entrepreneurs and overcome legal roadblocks by established telephone and cable TV providers.
‘We want to inspire these networks to be built. We want to throw our hat in the ring and show the promise of these broadband networks,’ Sacca told the San Jose Mercury News. ‘We wanted to make it very unpopular for anyone to oppose the promise of these networks.’
Ellis Berns, economic development manager for Mountain View and the city’s liaison with the company, added: ‘It’s really providing them an opportunity to better understand how people are accessing this technology and how this technology works.’
Source: http://tech.monstersandcritics.com
Similar Posts:
- Google Chrome OS sawifiahna
- Teenage hacker unlocks the iPhone !
- Mizoram I.T
- Happy Sys Admin Day!!!
- Vista on Cnet’s top 10 terrible tech products
Hawrawp pui a...
August 17th, 2006 at 4:51 pm
Hmanah ka hre tawh
Mountain View ah chuan hmanah an pek tawh kha. bw.. hei i successor 
Report this comment
August 17th, 2006 at 4:52 pm
Chuan Bangalore pawh an tum kha.. wireless ISP nge maw nge…
Report this comment
August 17th, 2006 at 4:53 pm
A hrim hrim in Google hian dark fibres kha a lei teuh an ti
Report this comment
August 17th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
hehe… i guess so…
Report this comment
September 6th, 2006 at 10:48 pm
Silicon Valley wireless project moves on:
SAN JOSE, Calif. – A proposal to blanket 1,500 square miles of Silicon Valley with affordable wireless access to the Internet stepped closer to reality Tuesday after a joint task force selected Silicon Valley Metro Connect to build and operate the network.
Metro Connect, a tech consortium that includes Cisco Systems Inc. and IBM Corp., said it secured the winning bid from the Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force. Further approvals by individual municipalities still need to be worked out, however, before the wireless network aimed to serve the region’s 2.4 million residents gets built.
Dozens of other communities across the United States, including the city of San Francisco, also are planning similar public wireless networks, but the Silicon Valley project would be one of the largest in scope.
The Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force, comprised of local government officials and representatives from utility companies, is proposing a network of thousands of radio transceivers that could carry Internet signals from South San Francisco all the way south through Santa Cruz. The project would essentially create a giant “Wi-Fi hotspot” like ones frequently found at individual airports and coffee shops.
Metro Connect said its privately owned and operated network would be financed through sponsorships, giving residents in the region free access to basic Wi-Fi service at broadband speeds.
Additional features, however, such as Internet-based phone calls or streaming video, would carry some fees. Actual pricing for the paid services have not yet been determined.
Report this comment