[CAnet - news] Will the RBOCs Be Googled Up

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[Here are a couple of interesting pointers on Google's network plans and
their potential impact.  Some excerpts -- BSA]

Press Release                                                      11/29/05

New Report - "Next Generation Network - Will the RBOCs Be Googled Up?"
Announced

Dr. Polishuk, president of Information Gatekeepers, announced to a recent
meeting of clients, "'Next Generation Network (NGN)' are magic words to many
in the telecommunications industry. They invoke an image of a new network
that will correct all of the problems of the existing network (s). However,
a major question to be considered when thinking about the NGN is the impact
of the coming network changes on the traditional carriers, particularly the
RBOCs.  Our latest report, "Next Generation Network - Will the RBOCs Be
Googled Up?" addresses these issues as well as a forecast for the NGN." 

"In forecasting the NGN, we must evaluate the unprecedented changes now
taking place in the network as they will impact the RBOCs who have a vast,
undepreciated investment in current, but now obsolete, technologies. They,
uniquely of all players in the communications game, will be stressed by the
need to continue to earn on their embedded investments, while making major
investments to replace their network assets, and while making substantial
investments to establish their competitive positions (e.g., SBC buying
AT&T.)"


"While the RBOCs face mounting problems, there is a group of companies that
has discovered how to make substantial profits from network traffic - these
are the new competitors! They use the telecommunications infrastructure, but
only as incidental delivery methodologies to their main products. Prime
examples of these are Google and Yahoo, but there are others that are more
or less successful. These companies deliver some particular service such as
search results, or an auction marketplace, which requires the use of vast
telecommunications facilities. However, no matter how crucial
telecommunications is to the service, the point of the business is the
service, not the telecommunications."

Dr. Polishuk continued, "These new competitors will participate in the
development and deployment of the NGN. The structure of this participation
is as yet unclear, but they have the financial ability to play any part they
want including as owners of the network!"


 
CONTACT:
Paul Polishuk
[email protected]
Information Gatekeepers Inc.
320 Washington Street, Suite 302
Boston, MA 02135
617-7782-5033, Fax 617-782-5735
[email protected]



Google-Mart
Sam Walton Taught Google More About How to Dominate the Internet Than
Microsoft Ever Did

http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/

By Robert X. Cringely

Play to your strengths. That's the key to success in any industry. This is
the week I promised to explain where I think Google is headed, and playing
to the company's strengths is key if they are going to do what I think,
which is effectively take over the Internet. Oh they won't steal it or
strong-arm us. They'll seduce us into giving it to them. And I am not at all
sure that's a bad thing.

The same follows for the rumor that Google, as a dark fiber buyer, will turn
itself into some kind of super ISP. Won't happen. And WHY it won't happen is
because ISPs are lousy businesses and building one as anything more than an
experiment (as they are doing in San Francisco with wireless) would only
hurt Google's earnings.

So why buy-up all that fiber, then?

The probable answer lies in one of Google's underground parking garages in
Mountain View. There, in a secret area off-limits even to regular
GoogleFolk, is a shipping container. But it isn't just any shipping
container. This shipping container is a prototype data center. Google hired
a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the
greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a
20- or 40- foot box. We're talking about 5000 Opteron processors and 3.5
petabytes of disk storage that can be dropped-off overnight by a
tractor-trailer rig. The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere
Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a
giant processing and storage grid.

While Google could put these containers anywhere, it makes the most sense to
place them at Internet peering points, of which there are about 300
worldwide.

Two years ago Google had one data center. Today they are reported to have
64. Two years from now, they will have 300-plus. The advantage to having so
many data centers goes beyond simple redundancy and fault tolerance. They
get Google closer to users, reducing latency. They offer inter-datacenter
communication and load-balancing using that no- longer-dark fiber Google
owns. But most especially, they offer super-high bandwidth connections at
all peering ISPs at little or no incremental cost to Google.

Where some other outfit might put a router, Google is putting an entire data
center, and the results are profound. Take Internet TV as an example.
Replicating that Victoria's Secret lingerie show that took down
Broadcast.com years ago would be a non-event for Google. The video feed
would be multicast over the private fiber network to 300+ data centers,
where it would be injected at gigabit speeds into each peering ISP. 

As for the coming AJAX Office and other productivity apps, they'll sit
locally, too. Two or three hops away from every user, they'll also be
completely backed-up by two to three data centers down the line.

This is more than another Akamai or even an Akamai on steroids. This is a
dynamically- driven, intelligent, thermonuclear Akamai with a dedicated
back-channel and application- specific hardware.

There will be the Internet, and then there will be the Google Internet,
superimposed on top. We'll use it without even knowing. The Google Internet
will be faster, safer, and cheaper. 


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These news items and comments are mine alone and do not necessarily reflect
those  of the CANARIE board or management.

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