Google fired a shot across the bow of big ISPs like Comcast and Verizon yesterday, stating in a blog post from its Fiber division that it would never charge a content company like Netflix fees for a direct interconnection with its network. This positions Google squarely behind Reed Hastings, who has argued that such interconnect fees are an unfair toll being charged by internet gatekeepers and that the FCC should ban them as part of an expanded definition of net neutrality. The public display of allegiance from Google, siding with Netflix against the ISPs, is part of the larger battle heating up as the FCC debates the future of its open internet rules.
In the almost two years since Google started bringing its 1 gigabit per second fibre networks to users in Kansas City, the company has expanded its last mile network to Austin, TX and Provo Utah. Google now plans to bring Google Fibre to Atlanta, Charlotte, Nashville, Phoenix, Portland, Raleigh-Durham, Salt Lake City, San Antonio, and San Jose. Google is still a long way from being a national ISP, but that seems to be one direction they’re exploring. Besides getting really fast Internet, users in those cities can also expect to get fast access to Netflix and other video content providers. Google Director of Network Engineering Jeffrey Burgan explained, “We also partner with content providers (like YouTube, Netflix, and Akamai) to make the rest of your video’s journey shorter and faster. (This doesn’t involve any deals to prioritize their video ‘packets’ over others or otherwise discriminate among Internet traffic — we don’t do that.)”
