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Stanford in line for Google fiber network

A residential area adjacent to the California university will be the first town that Google has named as part of its experiment to build high-speed fiber networks.

Tom Krazit Former Staff writer, CNET News
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Google, as the most prominent company on the Internet defends its search juggernaut while expanding into nearly anything it thinks possible. He has previously written about Apple, the traditional PC industry, and chip companies. E-mail Tom.
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Tom Krazit
Google plans to build a fast fiber network adjacent to Stanford University for faculty and staff members.
Google plans to build a fast fiber network adjacent to Stanford University for faculty and staff members. Google

The first town on Google's list to receive a fiber broadband network is a very familiar one to the company's co-founders.

Stanford is the first area Google has picked to get a high-speed broadband network, it announced today. The network, which could deliver speeds up to 1 gigabit a second, will be built for residents of Stanford's Residential Subdivision, an area adjacent to the California institution where members of the university faculty and staff live. Construction is expected to begin in early 2011, Google said.

Google stressed that this is not, however, the first town to receive such a network through the selection process it announced earlier this year for Google Fiber, which prompted all sorts of silly publicity stunts from mayors and townspeople trying to get Google to build them a fast network. That process still continues, with Google due to make the first selections by the end of this year.

Google's ties to Stanford University run deep. Co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page are still technically on leave from the university's computer science department while they pursue their experimental business plan, which has worked out pretty well for them. John Hennessey, president of Stanford, is the lead independent director of Google's board. And numerous Googlers hail from Stanford, located about seven miles from Google's headquarters in Mountain View.