Google Tells Cities To Greet Google Fiber With Open Arms Or 'Enjoy Your Time Warner Cable'

It’s hard to imagine a city not rolling out the red carpet for Google Fiber, the broadband service that boasts Internet speeds of up to 1000Mbps. But that’s exactly what’s happening, a Google executive said at a conference this week. Suggesting that Google is fed up with the resistance, VP of Access Services Milo Medin gave cities an ultimatum: warm up to Google Fiber, or we’ll leave you out in the cold. 

What’s frosting Google Fiber is that even the cities that are glad to receive Google Fiber are making the process slow by being inflexible when it comes to red tape. In particular, Google Fiber feels that it’s too cool for fax machines, which are a staple of city bureaucracies. Given Google’s role in shaping technology, it’s not surprising that it would balk at the idea of faxing documents, but the “take it or leave it” attitude is bad news for citizens who want the high speed broadband. 

Medin is showing no mercy, though. “If you make it easy, we will come,” he said at the conference in Washington, D.C., according to Gigaom.  “If you make hard, enjoy your Time Warner Cable.” Pow! You know your customer satisfaction record could use some improvement when others companies are using you as a threat.

At the moment, Google Fiber is in (or coming to) Atlanta, GA, Austin, TX, Charlotte, NC, Kansas City, KS, Nashville, TN, Provo, UT and Raleigh-Durham, NC. It has plans to move into several more cities in the near future, including Phoenix, AZ, Portland, OR, and San Antonio, TX, among others – assuming they’re willing to cut some of the red tape.