Cities leap on Google’s broadband

DULUTH, Minn. (AP) — Wearing just a T-shirt and shorts, Mayor Don Ness strolled to the end of a dock jutting into frigid Lake Superior. He grinned, waved his arms to a cheering crowd, and jumped in.

They may not be taking a lake plunge, but city leaders around the country are competing hard for Google’s experimental fiber-optic network, which promises to be more than 100 times faster than the Internet connections currently available to most Americans.

Google’s experimental fiber-optic networks would deliver data at 1 gigabit per second to homes and businesses. That would be roughly 50 to 300 times faster than the DSL, cable and fiber-optic networks that connect most U.S. homes to the Internet today. Google has not said how many cities it intends to serve, or how much it is willing to spend to do it.

Tags: us business, business, google, broadband