Today’s the last day for cities to make a bid to get Google behind them in building a city-wide fiber-Internet service delivering up to 1 gigabit-per-second download speeds.
As of this 10 a.m., Google said it received 600 community responses and 190,000 responses from individuals by way of cities renaming themselves, great YouTube videos, public rallies and hundreds of grassroots Facebook groups. Funny stuff.
Quite a handful hail from Orange County. An updated count will be available later today.
The 1 Gbps speed is up to 100 times faster than what many consumers get. One gigabit is 1,024 megabits, so compare it with your own service. Most cable and DSL users get about 3 megabits per second for about $20 to $30 a month.
This is also no small investment because it requires city permits and digging up the streets to lay fiber-optic cables and all the way up to a customer’s house. No wonder the company got 600 bids from cities.
“We’re thrilled to see this kind of excitement, and we want to humbly thank each and every community and individual for taking the time to participate. This enthusiasm is much bigger than Google and our experimental network. If one message has come through loud and clear, it’s this: people across the country are hungry for better and faster Internet access,” James Kelly, the product’s manager wrote on the official Google Blog.
Google now plans to review the requests and consult with city officials. The winning communities should know by the end of the year.
Here’s my unofficial list of area cities that want Google fiber:
- Fullerton, (Read the Register story: Fullerton wants Google’s super-fast Web experiment)
- Mission Viejo, (Read the Register story, “Google broadband could come to Mission Viejo”)
- Anaheim, see the city’s official Facebook page
- Orange County, via one person’s attempt to get something going.
- Nearby Rancho Cucamonga (corrected) is calling itself Rancho Googlemonga, which not only caught the attention of PC Magazine but Google itself, which linked to the city’s page on its blog today. Here’s Rancho Googlemonga’s Facebook page.
- And the city of Long Beach penned a letter-writing campaign.
If I left anyone out, let me know or comment below.
I didn’t spot anything from some usual suspects, like Irvine, Huntington Beach or Santa Ana. But there was one Orange County city that is definitely not interested. Laguna Beach voted against pursuing Google (read the Register story: Laguna Beach won’t apply for Google broadband).
Previously on Google:
Here's a list of TV/mobile companies helping consumers one tweet at a time. 
