Google has still not reached its goals for its Fiber project in Kansas City. Consequently, Google has decided to lower its pre-registration goals as many neighborhoods are still very far away from reaching the threshold for getting Google Fiber’s Internet and TV service installed in their neighborhoods.
Here is Google’s official statement: “111/202 (well over half of eligible) Fiberhoods are currently qualified for service. We’re very happy with this number as we head into the final week of pre-registrations. You can take our blog post at face value—the reason we adjusted our numbers was simply to make pre-registration percentages more accurate.”
According to Google, the company heard about concerns about its pre-registration goals from KC residents and “sent [its] street teams back out into Kansas City, Kan. and Kansas City, Mo. to figure out what changes [it] needed to make.” In doing so, they realized that their estimates in many fiberhoods were not accurate. Google has now changed its thresholds in 73 fiberhoods just days before its own prescribed deadlines. It’s not clear if the move was made out of fear that Google wasn’t going to reach its goals in enough parts in the city.With the change, the majority of neighborhoods have now reached their goals. In Kansas City, Kansas, where the majority of fiberhoods hadn’t passed their thresholds, 40 out of 74 neighborhoods now qualify. In Kansas City, Missouri, 75 out of 128 neighborhoods have now reached their goals.
As Google also pledged to provide free Internet service to schools and other public buildings in qualifying neighborhoods, there was a lot of concern in Kansas City that many of the neighborhoods that could use these services most would miss out on getting hooked up to Google’s gigabit connections. While no one is exactly sure why so many neighborhoods still had not reached their goals, there had been rumors that the entrenched cable companies had tried to lock many of their customers into long-term contracts just before the Google Fiber launch.
