Last month, Google placed job advertisements in America and the British national press for “Strategic Negotiator candidates with experience in…identification, selection, and negotiation of dark fibre contracts both in metropolitan areas and over long distances as part of development of a global backbone network”.
Dark fibre is the remnants of late 1990s internet boom where American web companies laid down fibre optic cables in preparation for high speed internet delivery. Following the downturn in the technology sector during the early 2000s, the installation process for many of these networks was left incomplete. This has resulted in a usable network of cables spread across the United States that have never been switched on. By purchasing the dark fibre, Google would in effect be able to acquire a ready made internet network that they could control.
Late last year, Google purchased a 270,000sq ft telecom interconnection facilities in New York. It is believed that from here, Google plans to link up and power the dark fibre system and turn it into a working internet network of its own.
It was also reported in November that Google was buying shipping containers and building data centres within them, possibly with the aim of using them at significant nodes within the worldwide cable network. “Google hired a pair of very bright industrial designers to figure out how to cram the greatest number of CPUs, the most storage, memory and power support into a 20- or 40-foot box<” Robert Cringely wrote. “The idea is to plant one of these puppies anywhere Google owns access to fiber, basically turning the entire Internet into a giant processing and storage grid.”” (Times.UK)
