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The Other Kansas City Chosen From 1,100 Towns for Google’s Ultra High Speed Broadband Project

posted on March 31, 2011


Google announced over a year ago that it was looking to bring ultra high speed broadband Internet connectivity to the world but they were going to start with one town first. The original blog post suggested that this town would be rural but according to the announcement yesterday that rural town happens to also conveniently be adjacent to and share the name of an NFL city, as Kansas City, KS won the great fiber race. Gee, I wonder why they might have done this (confusion over the name, more press etc. etc). Sneaky but effective.

Here is a video from Google’s blog explaining why they chose the Midwestern city over the rest.

Some of the areas that expressed their “Aw, shucks it wasn’t us!” sentiment were Baltimore, Durham, NC and many others.

It will be interesting to watch this experiment unfold over the next year or so with the focus being on the real story from the city’s residents and not the spin from Google.

We’ll keep an eye on it and we’ll see just how many people think Google is making this grand gesture for Kansas City, MO (the big city that everyone knows). I have to admit that it’s a pretty sly move although I suspect that Google would never admit that this name game had anything to do with their choice.

Any thoughts?


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  • http://www.fundraiseczar.com Baran Hill

    Saw this on my facebook news feed.
    Thanks for having video on this blog! Great Post. Didn’t even KNOW Google was planning ultra high speed internet. Hopefully they’ll take over the internet bill. I’m sick of Cox and Verizon and all the others anyways.

  • http://www.geni.com george

    Kansas City, KS and MO are the same city. The only difference is which side of the state line you’re on. There’s no separation of the two.

    • Paul

      There is a MAJOR difference between the two Kansas City’s. Although geographically touching (almost) in some places, they are totally separate.

      Some differences are: KC MO did not think it was worth having a NASCAR track (thank congressman Cleaver … former mayor … for that amazing lack of vision. KCKS, and its county, had the vision for the track and the resultant tremendously large new shopping complex. That expanded to a fine minor league baseball park. KCMO could not figure out how to gt a soccer stadium built for the team. KCKS did … near the baseball and soccer stadiums, NASCAR and shopping.

      KCKS is a mecca for illegal immigrants, more so than KCMO. KCKS has the area of development I described above and a city deteriorating just about everywhere else. Both have high taxes but KCKS has higher property taxes. KCMO school system is all new (billions were spent) but is failed (it lost most of its students in ten 10 years and test scores are just as bad as before.

      The government of KCKS is much more efficient. KCMO has more gentrification. KCKS likes the Jayhawks. KCMO likes the MO Tigers. Both KC’s have lots of murders.

      An article in the local (KCMO) paper made it clear why Google chose Kansas. Google actually did not seem to know there was a difference between Kansas and Kansas City, let alone the two KC’s. The article indicated Google ordered over hundred pounds of barbeq

    • Paul

      There is a MAJOR difference between the two Kansas City’s. Although geographically touching (almost) in some places, they are totally separate.

      Some differences are: KC MO did not think it was worth having a NASCAR track (thank congressman Cleaver … former mayor … for that amazing lack of vision. KCKS, and its county, had the vision for the track and the resultant tremendously large new shopping complex. That expanded to a fine minor league baseball park. KCMO could not figure out how to gt a soccer stadium built for the team. KCKS did … near the baseball and soccer stadiums, NASCAR and shopping.

      KCKS is a mecca for illegal immigrants, more so than KCMO. KCKS has the area of development I described above and a city deteriorating just about everywhere else. Both have high taxes but KCKS has higher property taxes. KCMO school system is all new (billions were spent) but is failed (it lost most of its students in ten 10 years and test scores are just as bad as before.

      The government of KCKS is much more efficient. KCMO has more gentrification. KCKS likes the Jayhawks. KCMO likes the MO Tigers. Both KC’s have lots of murders.

      An article in the local (KCMO) paper made it clear why Google chose Kansas. Googledid not seem to know there was a difference between Kansas and Kansas City. The article indicated Google ordered over100 pounds of barbeque … that’s the reason. BBQ

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