Does anyone know if these workers are working on a Google Fiber Hut?  I took this photo today while out in KCK

Leaders of The Mayors Bistate Innovation Team, Mike Burke and Ray Daniels, discuss Google Fiber on KCPT's The Local Show, on February 6, 2012.  The show also featured segments on depression, a meeting at the Kauffman Foundation discussing how Kansas City can become one of America's most entrepreneurial cities, and other subjects.  The video clip above jumps to the segment on Google Fiber.

Today, Google announced on their blog that the company will start putting in place thousands of miles of cables, containing many thin glass fibers, that will serve as the backbone for the Google Fiber infrastructure.

Once the backbone is in place, Google will be able to connect homes in Kansas City, KS. and Kansas City, MO. to a new high speed infrastructure that will cary data at speeds more than 100 times faster than what is available to most Americans today.

Google will post more updates and announcements on their blog as they build out the Google Fiber infrastructure.

There will be a "Give Us A Gig" Town Hall meeting held on Thursday, December 15, 2011 at 5:30 pm at the downtown KCK Public Library, located at 625 Minnesota Ave.

The meeting is about what the Google Ultra high-speed Fiber Project could mean to your neighborhood, and it is is part of a series of meetings planned by the Social Media Club of Kansas City.

All meetings are open to citizens and community leaders of both Kansas Cities.  More information on "Give Us A Gig" can be found at giveusagig.com

In thinking about the possible uses of an ultra-high speed Internet connection to the home, it seems like, with an external speed of 1 gigabit, the major slowdown will come inside the home, when transferring data within an existing home network.

I  am currently connect to the Internet through a  Netgear DG834G Wireless Modem Router.  For networking, I use the wireless features with my MacBook Pro laptop and a Lexmark All-In-One Printer, which also has wireless capability.

My older Windows PCs are networked using Netgear XE103 Powerline Network Adapters, connected to hub switches.  I have been using this system for some time, and have been happy with my recently tested 1230 kbps Internet connection speed, and 85 mbps home network transfer speed.

With Google Fiber providing a possible  1 gigabit download and upload speed, however, 85mbps will probably seem pretty slow.  I don't know what the upper speed limit for powerline networking is, but the fastest speed I could find doing a quick search of the internet was 200 mbps, and the price for that adapter seemed pretty steep.

With a 1gigabit Internet connection speed, it will  be faster to send data to a computer outside the home network, and then download the data to a computer on the home network.

As more information is made available about the Google Fiber service, I anticipate  that I will be looking at  ways to improve my home network performance.

One immediate use for an ultra-fast 1gigabit connection speed that comes to mind is its potential to serve as an alternative means of receiving entertainment programming.  I am a customer of satellite TV, and I cannot currently receive high definition programming, because of all of the trees surrounding my residence.

I currently watch a variety of TV programs on-line, and, with such a fast connection, I can imagine watching HD movies and other programs via  the internet rather than by satellite.   Up to now, I had not seen a need for a large computer monitor, but with the possibilities that Google Fiber could bring,  I can definitely envision a future need for a considerably upgraded monitor, or hybrid that  could take advantage of the new entertainment options such a fast connection could bring.  Of course, this is still thinking small.

I attended the Google Town Hall meeting at the Jack Reardon Convention Center, in downtown Kansas City, Kansas, on March 6, 2011, hosted by Google Community Affairs Consultant, Matt Dunne.

The first thing Mr. Dunne did was to clear up a few rumors that had started after the initial announcement that Kansas City, Kansas had been selected as the pilot city for the Google Fiber for Communities Program.

The main rumor dispelled was that Google would be doing a lot hiring in Kansas City Kansas.  Mr. Dunne stated that Google intents to  be up front about not  doing a lot of  KCK hiring.  In fact, he stated that Google may not even need an office, and that they would probably hire just 2-3 people. He added that the deployment will not require a lot of employees,  because many of the functions could be handled remotely.

When questioned about how the fiber installation and related jobs would be handled, Mr Dunne said that Google has infrastructure projects globally, and that Google already had relationships with companies that handle that kind of work.

The capacity crowd asked quite a few questions during the meeting, and I'm not going to touch on all of them here, because this was only the first town hall meeting, and there will be more to come.  Mr. Dunne stated that answers to the questions posed at the town hall would be posted at http://www.google.com/fiber/kansascityks/

Now, I'm going to get to service deployment.  Mr. Dunne stated that Google is currently starting the engineering part of the project, and the company will take one step at a time.

When the service is first rolled-out, it will not be available everywhere in KCK at one time.  Ease of deployment will be a major consideration, and the areas that are most conducive to easy deployment will receive the service first.  Mr Dunne received a good question regarding pricing.  The question was if everyone would have access to the 1 gigabit speed, or would be be a tiered approach, where a customer would pay for faster speed. Mr. Dunne said that had not been determined yet.

Also, Mr. Dunne had stated earlier during the meeting that 130 government entities such as schools, libraries, etc would receive the service free of charge.  Some in attendance wondered who would decide which government entities would be be included in the 130, and Mr. Dunne said that  the Unified Government would make that decision.

Now, on to a larger view of the project.  During the question and answer session, Mr. Dunne stated that the Google ultra-fast broadband service would be symmetrical, in the both the download and upload speeds would be 1 gigabit.

An analogy that Mr. Dunne used to describe the project is that KCK residents should think of it  as Google providing a big sandbox to play in, but it is up to those in the sandbox to bring the Tonka Trucks, etc to use in the sandbox.

He said that Google is interested in next generation technology, and that Google was not in Kansas City, Kansas by accident. He added that  the service will be based on community input, and Google believes that there is a lot of innovative talent in KCK.

Mr. Dunne also said that , once a month, thought leaders from around the country would be brought to Kansas City, Kansas to think about  what type of applications could make effective use of the service.

This is where I will end this blog entry for the first Google Town Hall meeting. I left the meeting feeling excited about the service, and I'm looking forward to the next town meeting. More to come in the next entry...