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comment by blackbootz
blackbootz  ·  2957 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Google Curbs Expansion of Fiber Optic Network

Baltimore was so close to Google Fiber. This Webpass service the article mentioned Google acquired seemed interesting. Comes to find out that it's only viable in dense areas. As of June 2015:

    [Webpass's] network is a mesh. A building connected to Webpass has two transceivers on the roof, one to serve that building and a second to serve the next building in the network. As long as there is a line-of-sight connection from one building to another, Webpass can deliver service.

    "You want [the buildings] to be close, within 5,000 meters," Barr said. "Anything beyond 5,000 meters will still work but you lose bandwidth."

    Webpass buildings have radios capable of delivering up to 2Gbps both upstream and downstream. For residential service, Webpass advertises either 100, 200, or 500Mbps to each unit, depending on where the building fits in the network. The price is always $55 per month regardless of the speed. Residents can get a $160 discount by buying a full year of service for $500.

A bit of a dead end. So it seems that before Comcast is dropped in Baltimore, a 5G mobile network may materialize. Optimistically... a 2020 roll-out, in some places.

Also, it's interesting to learn that the reason Google rearranged into a parent company structure was to clean up the earnings and profits accounting tables of Google's revenue generating advertising services and all its "other bets."