Google Fiber, live now in Kansas City, is a fiber optic network that connects users at significantly faster web speeds, up to 1,000 times faster than standard Internet services. Since the service is rolling out to residential rather than business customers first, hackers and tech enterpreneurs are buying and renting space in the neighborhood. To anyone who's lived in the Bay Area, the cost of KC real estate is a trivial startup expense. The real question is, will enough new uses for this kind of speed be generated by the KC startup community to attract the Sauron's eye of Valley VC?
This Anderson Cooper piece is fascinating- although the lack of diversity in the short piece is a little disturbing! Well, it is Kansas, I suppose. And it's not like the Valley is a model of diversity itself.
So far, a look at the Startup Village map shows just a few houses. But because this community is being created by immensely tech-savvy pioneers, its growth is being documented in real time and if you're considering jumping in, you can keep an eye on its development. For a young person with an idea that needs a lot of bandwidth, free housing in Kansas City could be a dream come true.