Google
has a reputation for being somewhat flighty with its technological forays (you
would be too if you were sitting atop a mountain of cash). Apps and services come
and go. There's a self-driving car, a pair of futuristic glasses, a mobile
operating system, tablets, a social network - all
circling tenuously around the company's core mission of internet search.
Now
there's another item on the list: Google Fiber. Announced 2011, Google Fiber
went live in Kansas City, Missouri last week. The high-speed service offers
users Internet access of 1,000 Mbps - both download and upload. That's roughly
100 times faster than most broadband connections available to consumers in the
U.S.
Google
is offering the service in several flavors. The most expensive is a $120
package, which includes the gigabit connection in addition to a pay TV package
(and a Nexus 7 tablet). The TV package is itself underwhelming - there's no
ESPN, Disney, HBO, TNT or TBS - but that doesn't mean that Google Fiber can't
shake up the TV industry.
There
are two reasons to watch this space. First, due to Google Fiber's enormous
bandwidth, high definition movies are no longer the over-sized load trying to
barge down a crowded highway. Streaming quality - and linear broadcasts - could
improve considerably over a gigabit fiber network as they'd require less
compression.
Second,
Google isn't wed to the old business model that has delivered cable TV and
internet access to consumers’ homes. Whereas those services are threatening their users with caps and
tiered pricing if they stream too much Netflix, Google could take a
more relaxed attitude about over the top TV competition - especially since
Google-owned YouTube constitutes one of the emerging threats to traditional TV
over managed networks.
The
market for broadband - and pay TV services in general - is very limited in the
U.S., when not downright monopolistic. Google introduces something critical:
more competition. Google Fiber not only embarrasses the pokey speeds of any
incumbent internet service provider, it erases the threat that bandwidth caps
and tiered pricing regimes could strangle a consumer's appetite for "over
the top video."
The big
caveat, of course, is that Google Fiber can only be competitive in the places
that have it and to date that is exactly one. Google will announce in September
a rollout schedule for additional Google Fiber build outs but it's likely to be
a slow process. The company's history of flirting with one business area only to dump it doesn't exactly inspire a ton of confidence
that Google Fiber can scale to a national offering to challenge DirecTV or
Comcast, either. The revolution, if it is to come, will be slow. But if Google
does make a go of it, the Hulus and the Netflixes of the world will rejoice.
