GoogleNet: Is it Next?

In the new issue of Business 2.0, there’s a brief article on what Google may have up its sleeve.

http://www.business2.com/b2/web/articles/0,17863,1093558,00.html

What if Google (GOOG) wanted to give Wi-Fi access to everyone in America? And what if it had technology capable of targeting advertising to a user?s precise location? The gatekeeper of the world?s information could become one of the globe?s biggest Internet providers and one of its most powerful ad sellers, basically supplanting telecoms in one fell swoop. Sounds crazy, but how might Google go about it? First it would build a national broadband network — let’s call it the GoogleNet — massive enough to rival even the country’s biggest Internet service providers. Business 2.0 has learned from telecom insiders that Google is already building such a network, though ostensibly for many reasons. For the past year, it has quietly been shopping for miles and miles of “dark,” or unused, fiber-optic cable across the country from wholesalers such as New York?s AboveNet.

Intriguing stuff. Could Google be positioning itself to cover the US with free wifi? This is speculation but it’s good to consider the impact on libraries. Presence would be a million times more important as our users move to laptops and portable, converged devices. With net access anywhere anytime, the library had better be a key player in folk’s information seeking behaviors.

Take a look at this article… and file it away to look at in a few months (years?) when Google is making opther huge strides for information access to users…