You'll be aware by now that Google's
cooking up an experimental high speed broadband network, which is currently in the process of collecting applications and nominations from
interested communities. Given the limited coverage planned -- anywhere between 50,000 and 500,000 people -- there's understandably a lot of competition to get your small town on Google's radar, and city officials all around the USA have been doing their utmost to grab some publicity for their locale. Duluth mayor Don Ness can be seen above taking a dip in Minnesota's icy Lake Superior (with his unfortunate underling Richard Brown taking a fish to the face), while others have held parades, danced, invented a "Google Fiber" flavor of ice cream, and even
swam with sharks for the sake of that precious fiber. Duluth, however, is the only place officially endorsed by a senator, and you can see Al Franken promote the city's virtues on video after the break.
[Thanks, b3ast]
Update: We've now also got video of the actual dip in the water, slide past the break to see it [Thanks, TheLostSwede].
posted March 22nd 2010 6:14AM
Google city...brrrrrr...
wow... why Duluth?
why not Minnetonka?
@bigdonny Yeah, Google needs to purify its self in the waters. And spread the fiber love.
@bigdonny because duluth is in the frontier of renewing american commerce.. heck, who can compete of fan propelled airplanes?
Sorry, I don't understand the fish thing.
@Gregorian It's fairly simple, there's a fish, and it's in his face...
@JayTBennett Some people need that EXPLAINING to them?
Woah. Just... woah.
@The Madman
So is Google choosing the cities who get fibre using some "Wackiest Home Videos" competition?
If your mayor jumps around on a pogo stick singing Lady Gaga's "Telephone", you might end up with highspeed broadband?
@Gregorian who cares if you get it? getting your major to do that is enough fun in itself, isn't it? :)
@Gregorian the fish was already in his right hand before the jump, he just had to bite it before hitting the water
@Gregorian And this just keeps getting better and better, why are these cities so hype up with the new Google fiber connection? Well, because the speed is up to 1Gig. Future: http://bit.ly/fastest-internet-in-the-world
I highly doubt my city (New York City) needs any more publicity than it already has, considering how overrated this city is...
That fish made me laugh so hard. kerSLAP HAHAH TAKE THAT YOU FILTHY POLITICIAN!!!
Video of the actual dip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn1D9OVkruM
128MB broadband, its mazing to think japans and korea have had 100MB for over half a decade. its a shame the rest of the world behind
well, the rest of the world is pretty big, you know.
and money is another issue..
@OCEAN CLAK
80MB/s, taking TCP/IP overhead into account. Then you hit the brick wall that is the server on the other end. Hell, I have 30Mbit and I hit the remote server's bandwidth limitations a lot.
To all who thought Franken was a joke during the election and thought it was a sign of the direction of politics, well, he might get more done for this city than your politician did for yours. :-P. That doesn't necessarily discount that you may have been at least partially right about the direction of politics though.
...and the Aussies fall behind yet again :'(
@shmootz
Not for long
http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/07/australias-a-43-billion-broadband-project-up-to-100mbps-in-90/
@OCEAN CLAK
That also comes with good ol' censorship under stephen conroys rule as Minister for Communication, broadband and the digital economy
.. so yeah we're screwed
Sometimes i hate being aussie but then i just remember
American girls love our accent ;D
@futurerheza With Google pulling out of China (most likely) and the Chinese stance on censoring internet, I doubt it will happen in China, or North Korea. Not sure what part of Asia you're talking about though :)
I think the fish slap is a fake. His hand is in his hoodie pocket when he jumps, and he reaches up toward his face when he hits the water. I'm pretty impressed that a politician would plan this out, though, and being able to follow through while your body is hitting frigid water is action movie hero stuff. Yay for crazy Minnesotans!
he was holding it in his hands, right?
@vpr India needs this badly ;) here we are still talking about 1Mbps
It seems the picture is not fake... run the video in slow... fish pops up @ 1:40
@mtrpires Look closer. He has the fish in his mouth. People are crazy in Minnesota.
@NinjaTaco you're right. Crazy people and funny accent too.
Fish looks tasty, now a little curry would do wonders.
What... like CSI: NY?
@E71
Oops... Wrong article.
@E71 link the article you were referring to, please, so we can understand your joke!
yeah all we are doing this to support the paraolympics wohoooo, oh wait, and the greeeeat Google fiber.... this does not come along as cheesy, ohhhhh no.
Duluth tries to one-up "Google Kansas". I welcome my new name.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03pCyixPuws
I seen on the news where one city has renamed their welcome to signs , "Welcome to Google city" for a month. I can't remember which one it was tho.
@Ezye1313
Kansas?
Topeka KS
We here in Greenville, SC spelled out "Google" with 2,000 people spinning glow sticks in the air two days ago.
http://www.wearefeelinglucky.com/home
It's amazing what people will do for more bandwidth.
GIG4GNV!
something about that picture smells fishy!
I just wanted to add: Never underestimate the stupidity of Floridian government. We have, hands down, some of the dumbest idiots working for us... the more 'local' you get, the more idiotic.
Case in point: Orlando makes a bid for Google's experimental broadband. Ok, makes sense. It's Orlando. Big tourist town, biggest metro area in Central Florida... yep, makes total sense.
Except the city of Kissimmee (it's native American, pronounced 'Kiz-Simmy' or 'Kiss-ih-meh', depending on where you're from) also decides they are going to make a bid. What? Kissimmee are you NUTS? 1. Kissimmee is a PART of 'Central Florida'. Central Florida is compromised of about 6 or 7 'cities' (seriously, those who live here know how lame it is to call them cities), with Orlando the center of it all... wouldn't it have made a 1,000 times more sense for ALL the cities in Central Fla to band together and make a case to Google that if they bring the experiment here, it would end up serving 6 cities rather than 1? Thanks Kissimmee, for reducing O-town's (and Central Fla's overall) chances. 2. Kissimmee is a po-dunk nothing city, filled with failing properties and nothing of major importance. You wanna know what Kissimmee's big draw is? Orlando borders Disney on one side... Kissimmee borders on the other side. That's it. And it happens to be the 'backwoods' side of Disney, so really, nothing special in Kissimmee. Oh wait, our local Medieval Times is in Kissimmee. There you go. I guess with a Medieval Times, they totally need the 100GBs net speeds.
@Hate Everything
Google's Experiment would more likely have more impact in a smaller city like Kisseemee, than overdeveloped Mickey Mouse City. In fact, you and I probably move there if you could get 1GBps broadband, and Google would have made its point.
Lakeland would be an even better candidate, sucking residents from Tampa and Orlando at unbelievable rates.
Awesome! Go MN.. Too bad I dont live in Duluth! Hope Minneapolis/St.Paul see's some of this!
Farmington/San Juan County has a govenor - Bill Richardson, A State Senator - Tom Udall, and a US Represenative - Ben Ray Luján that have spoken in behalf of farmington. Don't know where they got that duluth is the only one. Anyways. It will be interesting to see what Google does.
http://www.thinkbigfarmington.com/
Bring it to ny , we need faster Internet
saint Paul please!
Saint Paul Please F*** Duluth.
I'm not sure if this is supposed to make me more or less proud to be from Minnesota. Maybe neither, since I wasn't born here. (Yes, that mean I actually CHOSE to live in Minnesota).
Anyone else see that UFO fly behind his head at 2:51?