[IP] SiliconValley.com - Good Morning Silicon Valley All your Internet are belong to us
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Published: Tuesday September 20, 2005
Google: All your Internet are belong to usBy JOHN PACZKOWSKI
It seems Google really is planning to turn the Earth into a giant
WiFi hotspot. The company is said to be reviewing bids for the
development of a national DWDM fiber network and while it's
conceivable that it intends to use that network to cost-effectively
manage its ever-growing traffic loads, vendors who've reviewed
Google's demands say its far more likely that the company is looking
to become a competitive communications network provider. Now comes
news that the search juggernaut is preparing to roll out a WiFi
network along with a Virtual Private Network client to access it.
According to documents prematurely posted to Google's Web site - an
FAQ and privacy policy - the service is a beta available only at
certain locations in the San Francisco Bay Area. Whether the company
plans to further extend the service remains to be seen. Certainly,
it's a daunting task. "Becoming a service provider would be quite a
stretch for Google, but considering the billions of dollars Google
could throw at the problem it could become a reality," Ovum analyst
Roger Entner wrote a few months back when rumors of such a service
first began to circulate. "Depending on how Google can adapt to these
challenging areas and how committed it is to the space, it could
become a home run or could break the bank." Still, a move into the
communications space would be in keeping with Google's mission to
promote universal access to the Internet for users. And it would do
much to keep Google at the center of our Internet experience and in
prime position to do what it does best: Serve us targeted
advertising, in this case geographically targeted advertising.
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Q U O T E D
"I believe today even a chimpanzee could raise $100M for a venture
capital fund."
-- Sequoia Capital capital partner Michael Moritz assesses the
current state of affairs on Sand Hill Road.
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The first rule of The Google Partner Forum is - you do not talk about
The Google Partner Forum.
The second rule of The Google Partner Forum is - you DO NOT talk
about The Google Partner Forum. Google will hold its first-ever deep
thinker conference later this month, an invitation-only event dubbed
Zeitgeist '05. Attending will be Google co-founders Sergey Brin and
Larry Page, Yahoo Chief Executive Terry Semel, MSN Senior Vice
President Yusuf Mehdi, InterActive Corp's Chief Executive Barry
Diller, Arthur Sulzberger, chairman and publisher of the New York
Times, and Tipping Point author Malcolm Gladwell, among others.
Sounds like the makings of some fascinating conversation. Too bad
we'll never hear what was discussed though. Attendees are strictly
forbidden from speaking about it. From the Zeitgeist '05 FAQ:
All speeches and discussions at Zeitgeist are off the record. To
ensure that our presenters and attendees can speak openly, no press
coverage or blogging is permitted.
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