Public Housing Units Getting Free Internet at Speeds Higher Than Most Homes

[roo_ster]

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/2016/02/03/public-housing-units-getting-free-internet-at-speeds-higher-than-most-homes/?singlepage=true

Google Fiber and the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) have partnered to bring “ultra-high speed” 1 gigabit Internet to public housing units in many cities – a connection speed much faster than the average household in the United States.

West Bluff Townhomes in Kansas City, Mo., has become the first public housing development with a 1 gigabit or 1,000 mbps Internet connection through the ConnectHome Initiative. Google Fiber said the speed has been provided free of charge and at no cost to HUD.

According to the most recent State of the Internet report, the average U.S. Internet connection speed was 11.9 mbps...

A Google Fiber 1,000 mbps speed costs $70 per month for those living in an area where the service is available. The service is currently limited with plans to expand to more states in the future.

The Free *expletive deleted*it Army getting more free *expletive deleted*it.

[Ben]

I guess  I can't yell too much if Google, as a private entity, is covering the cost. I'm sure all the Section 8 people will use the big bandwidth to search for jobs, take online courses, and otherwise better themselves out of public assistance. I'm sure they won't play online games and stream movies all day long.

Still, 1gb will go nicely with the Cadillac Escalades, $200 tennis shoes, and top of the line iPhones in the public housing. There's no way I'd be seen driving an Escalade and only having a crappy 12Mbps Internet connection.

[lee n. field]

I guess  I can't yell too much if Google, as a private entity, is covering the cost. I'm sure all the Section 8 people will use the big bandwidth to search for jobs, take online courses, and otherwise better themselves out of public assistance. I'm sure they won't play online games and stream movies all day long.

Pffff.  Yeah, right.  Bandwidth == quality porn.

11.9 mbps..

meanwhile, I have Frontier's slowest DSL.

[HankB]

When I read stuff like this, I immediately think "Kickbacks."

[zxcvbob]

So, a gigabit Internet connection to a housing project that is then split how many ways?  A half dozen 54 megabit wireless routers and a 100Mb Ethernet for the main office?  I don't see the outrage.

[MechAg94]

So, a gigabit Internet connection to a housing project that is then split how many ways?  A half dozen 54 megabit wireless routers and a 100Mb Ethernet for the main office?  I don't see the outrage.

Faster than my service and they aren't paying. 

[Scout26]

Can I turn my home into Section 8 housing with me living in it?

[Nick1911]

I'm mad.   

These *expletive deleted*ers get free internet, while I don't get the 1gbps I was promised!

[lee n. field]

When I read stuff like this, I immediately think "Kickbacks."

G00gle doing it out of the good of their hearts.  Yeah, right.

Did the bread and circuses ever run out, in old Rome?

[lee n. field]

So, a gigabit Internet connection to a housing project that is then split how many ways?  A half dozen 54 megabit wireless routers and a 100Mb Ethernet for the main office?  I don't see the outrage.

The article says gigabit to "units", which I read as to individual apartments.

[brimic]

High speed internet is becoming like a utility that is considered another fictional 'right.'
Its like electricity, water, and gas which can't legally be shut off in certain months of the year, where the ghetto rats simply move when 5 months worth of bills come due in the spring and stiff the landlord. My current energy bills have a line item fee on them for 'poor assistance' or something of the sort to defray some of the costs.
There is no way, no how that Google is paying for this, any more than a developer pays the burden of the cost of section-8  housing attached to his new shopping district.

[Ben]

The article says gigabit to "units", which I read as to individual apartments.

That's how I read it. Or if they decided to go wireless for the complex, there are certainly high bandwidth wireless routers, especially at 5Ghz.

[lee n. field]

When I read stuff like this, I immediately think "Kickbacks."

I can think of a lot of possible reasons.  "The goodness of their hearts" isn't one of them.

Google wants an in with HUD.  HUD in particular, and the gov't more generally, wants to  monitor the class of people who live in public housing.  Google can sell gov't that data ($$$$), and sell it again to commercial entities interested in it ($$$$). 

[Pb]

Maybe google is doing this for tax writeoffs.  Or a favor for democrats.  More likely for both.

[Ben]

My guess would be what both the fellows above me wrote.

Big tax deductions or tax credits, plus income from Google advertisers and others through the connection and Google services, plus more demographic and other data for Google's Skynet.

[Firethorn]

Big tax deductions or tax credits, plus income from Google advertisers and others through the connection and Google services, plus more demographic and other data for Google's Skynet.

Correct.

Plus, sadly, it's a lot cheaper to install gigabit there than to people who actually own their own homes due to the density. 

Want to service 100 homes?  You're probably looking at 10 miles of fiber to run, with a junction every couple hundred feet.  Wire up a HUD complex?  One fiber run to the building, pull individual fibers to the individual apartments.  Or even just Cat-6 Ethernet.  Done.

[brimic]

Plus, sadly, it's a lot cheaper to install gigabit there than to people who actually own their own homes due to the density. 

Heh. Yeah that.
When you have regional monopolies on broadband access, why replace outdated equipment when you can charge subscribers premiums until maintenance costs or a large jump in technology force you to upgrade equipment?
While right now it might feel good to be angry about what the freeloaders are getting for free, they'll probably still be stuck with it 10 years from now when the typical download/upload speeds might be an order of magnitude higher.

[KD5NRH]

I guess  I can't yell too much if Google, as a private entity, is covering the cost. I'm sure all the Section 8 people will use the big bandwidth to search for jobs, take online courses, and otherwise better themselves out of public assistance. I'm sure they won't play online games and stream movies all day long.

It would be priceless to listen to the bitching if they blocked all game and non-educational media streaming on the free service.  Of course, you'd want to leave YouTube open for the UMKC, OpenYaleCourses and similar, and I don't know of a good way to keep them from watching the rest of YT, but no torrents, Pandora, Netfix, Steam, XBoxLive etc. would have them in an uproar.

[brimic]

It would be priceless to listen to the bitching if they blocked all game and non-educational media streaming on the free service.  Of course, you'd want to leave YouTube open for the UMKC, OpenYaleCourses and similar, and I don't know of a good way to keep them from watching the rest of YT, but no torrents, Pandora, Netfix, Steam, XBoxLive etc. would have them in an uproar.

There would be rioting.

 

[roo_ster]

There would be rioting.

 

That is why we have belt-feds.

[brimic]

That is why we have belt-feds.

Correction- that is why they won't allow us to have belt-feds via creating artificial scarcity. The left can get just about anything they want with the threat of rioting by their weaponized plantation class.