Google Fiber delayed again in K.C.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Even as Google Inc. warns that it might take longer to install gigabit-speed Internet across all of Kansas City and a handful of suburbs, other Internet providers are speeding up their broadband to compete.

Akamai Technologies Inc., which helps companies distribute online content, reports that average peak connection speeds in the U.S. nearly tripled since Google started its work in Kansas City, The Kansas City Star reported.

"We're seeing faster speeds everywhere," said David Belson, who authors the State of the Internet Report for Akamai. "Part of that is that the technology is improving to get better speeds out of existing networks. Part of it's consumer demand. And part is the pressure that Google Fiber's existence creates on everybody else."

For instance, Time Warner Cable, which dominates the Kansas City market, sells speeds of 50 megabits per second for what it used to charge for just 15 megabits per second. AT&T now has a deal to sell speeds as fast as Google's in Overland Park, Kansas. It's not saying when it might deliver that service in the sprawling suburb, but neither has Google.

After Google tabbed Kansas City for Internet service, it promised the same light-speed hookups in Austin, Texas. It's not yet installed the connections in homes there, but AT&T began firing data to residential customers there late last year at the speeds Google hopes to someday deliver.

"When Google announced it was offering a gigabit, everybody was [like], 'Huh? What are you going do with that?'" said Heather Burnett Gold, president of the Fiber to the Home Council Americas. Her organization promotes the deployment of fiber-optic data lines for click-swift Internet for residential customers.

"Now people are taking the approach that when they put a new line in, they need to make it as fast as possible," she said.