The Googlization of Everything

Gizmodo reports:

Google is not leaving anything to chance, and according to an Australian newspaper is now planning to span the Pacific Ocean with its own undersea fiber optics cable to blast the world with its do-no-evil goodness. Owning a fat pipe like this will make Google the Big Dick of the high seas, making it cheaper for the company to move data and to dominate all those other weasels that are selling internet bandwidth.

Let's hope Google's alleged entry into this bandwidth biz will bring prices down, because with the way things stand now, even though there's a glut of dark fiber spanning the Pacific, the stubborn owners of all that potential bandwidth aren't budging on their too-high prices. Do it, Google, and get going on that wireless carrier threat you made, too! Teach the rest of the world your catchphrase: "Don't be evil."

I understand there to be a glut of cable in the world. Anyone have a sense of what Google would make out of this endeavor?

The NYTimes reports:

Google would plan to be part of a project called Unity that would also include several telecommunications companies. Unity hopes to have a cable in service by 2009, the publication wrote. It would own a dedicated portion of the multi-terabit cable, giving it a significant cost advantage for trans-Pacific data transmission over rival Internet companies.

Barry Schnitt, a Google spokesman, didn’t confirm the plan, but did tell the publication the company is interested in the area, saying, “Additional infrastructure for the Internet is good for users and there are a number of proposals to add a Pacific submarine cable. We’re not commenting on any of these plans.” Communications Day also noted that Google has advertised to hire people who would “be involved in new projects or investments in cable systems that Google may contemplate to extend or grow its backbone.”

Google has long been buying up data communications capacity. Its search engine works by making copies of nearly every page of the Internet in its own data centers. That requires Google move no small amount of data around the world on a regular basis. And its new plans to deliver applications over the Internet will use even more bandwidth.