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Orange County is pretty famous. We’ve got a lot going on -- Disneyland (the original), world-renowned beaches (these ones, and this one), and we’ve also got some super fast Internet happening. Google Fiber launched last summer, and we’ve been growing steadily in the area ever since -- enjoying just how original the OC can be.

In true Orange County fashion, we celebrate our milestones. Last night, hundreds of residents of The Village at Irvine Spectrum joined us for a Google Fiber Festival, complete with food, music, fun and games.
 

The Village is the latest apartment community in Orange County with access to our super fast Internet + TV. Additionally, we announced on Thursday that sign ups are now open for residents of The Park at Irvine Spectrum. More than 1,400 residents there will have Fiber service available to them in early 2018.

Since teaming up with Irvine Company last year, we’ve been hard at work to bring Fiber to a number of residential and commercial properties in Orange County. Today, thousands of people in Orange County can sign up for Google Fiber. (Visit our website if you want to check if service is currently available for you, or to leave us your email address so we can keep you updated as progress continues in the area.)

Our partner, Irvine Company, is a leader in innovation for their residents, and recognized early the value of building for the technologies of the future. Not many companies would have had the foresight in the mid-1980s to install empty conduit in their properties, but that thinking allowed Irvine Company to future-proof its buildings and adapt to advances in technology quickly. They have been key in our efforts to expand high-speed broadband service in Southern California.
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Irvine Company understands that connectivity matters, and we’re excited to help their residents connect faster and more efficiently. And they are doing a lot with that connection -- from monitoring the latest surf conditions to more critical tasks at hand. One gentleman told us at a recent OC event that Fiber’s high speeds and low latency would allow him to keep tabs on his father’s welfare, through a webcam, when they can’t be together.

In fact, we recognize that Internet access can truly change a life -- that’s why we’ve also been working to make connections with Orange County-area organizations that share our goals of expanding STEM and computer science education opportunities to local kids. Through partnerships with the Girl Scouts, Irvine Public Schools Foundation and others, we’re excited to continue building those relationships to benefit the entire community, and enhance the efforts and capacity of these local nonprofits.

Orange County, we’re just getting started! You’ve already got a great reputation, but we hope that one day when people say OC, they’ll think about all the things that can be via fast Internet -- even if it’s just streaming the latest episode of every TV show set here simultaneously.

Posted by Erin O'Neill Schultz, City Manager, Google Fiber Orange County
Photos from Kimberly April Photography

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The Google Fiber blog is excited to feature a guest blog from a former NTEN Digital Inclusion Fellow -- DEADLINE EXTENDED: applications for next year’s program are now open, due on November 27, 2017.
 “Wait, what exactly is it you do again?” was a frequent question I was asked by my new co-workers during my first weeks as a Digital Inclusion Fellow at Charlotte Mecklenburg Housing Partnership (CMHP). CMHP is a broad-based, private, nonprofit housing development and financial corporation organized to expand affordable and well-maintained housing within stable neighborhoods for low and moderate-income families in the City of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County. We have dedicated staff who work with people to buy their first home, avoid foreclosure, and move in to affordable housing. A new digital inclusion program at CMHP would be a unique animal, and I figured it would be an exciting challenge to find ways to weave digital inclusion throughout seemingly unrelated existing programs.
As it turns out, digital inclusion seamlessly intersects with many, many factors necessary for a high quality of life and opportunity in our communities -- including housing. As a Fellow, I was able to work with staff to integrate aspects of digital literacy into their work with clients. Whether it be how to search online for affordable housing options, manage a bank account online, or check your credit score before applying for a mortgage. Along the way we also discovered how digital literacy classes can serve as a forum for building a sense of community between neighbors.
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As a Fellow, I worked with a variety of partners to highlight the connection between Internet access and daily life in areas such as health, education, and financial literacy. I created digital literacy curricula and tailored classes to meet the unique needs of the students in the room. This allowed our program participants to work toward their own definition of success. One student was able to learn how to use Facebook to connect with long-lost family members in Somalia. Another participant was just as thrilled to learn how to watch her pastor preach during the live streaming church service. During a “health + digital literacy” class, one student left satisfied when she learned how to share a photo of herself 50 lbs. slimmer. These varying pictures of success were what made being a Fellow such a meaningful experience. I was privileged to both teach and learn from hundreds of students (and volunteers!), and to be there to cheer them on when they reached their personal goals.
Upon completion of the Fellowship year, all questions about how digital inclusion could possibly make sense in our nonprofit housing organization have disappeared. I am fortunate to now be a permanent full-time employee at CMHP as the Community Engagement Specialist, where digital inclusion remains one of my key priorities. Recently, I was able to go back and visit past Computer Basics 101 students. These were residents at Cheshire Chase, one of CMHP’s affordable housing communities where Google Fiber is providing free gigabit internet to all residents and E2D provided each class participant a refurbished laptop. The coalescence of high speed Internet access, devices, and digital literacy training all in one place helped residents make the most of their educational and professional opportunities.. What a difference a year makes -- you can hear firsthand from residents what this program meant to them and their families in this video.
If you are a staff member at an organization interested in helping your community bridge the digital divide, now is your time! NTEN is currently accepting applications for 2018 Digital Inclusion Fellows, funded by Google Fiber and other companies, in cities across the country through November 27, 2017. Apply today!  

Posted by Cache Owens, former Digital Inclusion Fellow and current Community Engagement Specialist, Charlotte Mecklenburg Housing Partnership, Inc.

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Halloween has always been special at Google -- from our early days, Googleween celebrations were the stuff of legend. At Google Fiber, we continue that tradition -- and help to bring the spirit of the holiday to our Fiber cities, as well. From office decorating to trunk or treating in our communities, Google Fiber teams scared up some surprises and celebrated together this Halloween.


Check out some photos from our Halloween activities around the country (and be sure to scroll all the way to the bottom for another proud Google tradition - Dooglers!).

Team KC brings the hot dogs, flying squirrels, and more!

Salt Lake City embraces their inner Harry Potter.
Team Charlotte brings the bacon, unicorns, and more!

Team Nashville and families - Taylor Swift, Malificent, and the Brawny man -- oh my!
Raleigh Durham mixes it up!

Rockford Peaches in Charlotte




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UPDATE:  As of 6:05 PM CT, 10/25/17, the Community Bonus is currently $2 -- up an additional dollar in less than 24 hours.

 Giving more people access to faster Internet -- that’s been the mission since the beginning for Google Fiber, and we’re always exploring new ways to make it a reality, including ways to make superfast Internet more affordable.

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Art by Kyle Jones

Today, we’re excited to be opening sign-ups in many more Nashville neighborhoods, including portions of Midtown, Edgehill, Sylvan Heights, Acklen Park, Music Row, Hillsboro Village, West End and East Nashville, in addition to areas already open in Sylvan Park, Charlotte Park, The Gulch, Downtown and Germantown.
And now, for the first time at Fiber, new and existing residential customers across Nashville can save on their monthly bills by working together.

We call it the Community Bonus. The more people who sign up between now and December 14, 2017, the bigger the Community Bonus becomes. Google Fiber customers will see the Community Bonus as a credit on their monthly bill every month through December 31, 2019 -- starting right now! Existing customers will already see a $1/month bonus, and it can only go up from there to save them a bit off their bill every month. All customers on the paid Fiber 1000, Fiber 1000 + TV, Fiber 100, and Fiber 100 + TV are eligible for the bonus -- the amount off the Internet is the same regardless of plan.

Existing residential customers in Nashville will be included in the bonus from the very beginning -- so the city is already well on its way to making superfast Internet even better for Nashvillians.   

Google Fiber wants everyone to be able to make the most of the Internet. We at Google Fiber are excited to see Nashville’s innovators, creators, educators, gamers, caregivers, coders, inspirers, puppy-lovers, bakers, makers and entertainers do what they do best, and save some money while they’re at it!
Want to find out if you’re eligible? Check your address at www.fiber.google.com/cities/nashville.

Posted by Martha Ivester, Nashville City Manager
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While there may be arguments over the best bourbon for a Mint Julep or which horse is going to win the Derby, one thing Louisvillians can agree on is their city is on the rise. Louisville continues to move up the national rankings for population growth, job growth, and overall well-being, and with Google Fiber, internet speed is next!

As we’ve designed and constructed our Louisville network, we’ve seen firsthand what that excitement, energy and spirit of innovation can do. Louisville is the fastest we’ve ever moved from construction announcement, which happened in May, to signing up customers. Starting today, residents in the Portland, Strathmoor and Newburg neighborhoods of Louisville can sign up for Google Fiber’s superfast Internet, and take the first step in making the Internet their own.

We made the announcement this morning at the Neighborhood House in Portland. As our first Community Connection in Louisville, we are providing the organization with a gigabit connection to support their mission of breaking the cycle of poverty for children and families in the Portland community. In each Google Fiber city, we’re proud to work closely with the local community and partner with nonprofit organizations that focus on digital inclusion, STEM education, and supporting entrepreneurs and nonprofits, and we’re looking forward to doing even more in Louisville.

Residents in Louisville can sign up for our Fiber 1000 or Fiber 100 products. Fiber 1000 ($70 a month) is our superfast 1000 Mbps service, which allows customers to stream, play, and surf all they want across all their Internet-connected devices without issue. Fiber 100 ($50 a month) is a very fast and reliable connection perfect for budget conscious access to the Internet.

Google Fiber enables you to access all of the Internet, including taking advantage of all the ways you can get news, entertainment, and live sports -- Netflix, Hulu, HBO Now, and now YouTube TV.  For customers interested in watching live TV with YouTube TV, you can sign up through Google Fiber for $35 a month. YouTube TV offers cable-free live TV from Louisville’s local stations --  ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC -- and other popular cable networks like ESPN and AMC, along with a cloud DVR with no storage space limits. For more information on YouTube TV, visit tv.youtube.com.

And superfast Internet speeds make it possible to do whatever you want online at the same time, including playing online games, uploading and downloading files, and video chatting.
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Van art by Ashley Trommler; photo by Stephen Sugg
Louisville is a national leader when it comes to creating an environment where innovation can thrive. As the first city to approve One Touch Make Ready policies and to enable other efficient deployment methods, Louisville has been at the forefront of national policy on these issues because the city understands the importance of access and connectivity for all Louisvillians. We want to thank Mayor Greg Fischer and the Louisville City Council for their vision and leadership throughout this process. We can’t wait to see the impact that ultra high speed broadband can have in Louisville, on everything from economic growth to education to public services and more.

As we continue construction across the city, we’ll bring our service to more Louisville residents and neighborhoods. To sign up for availability updates and future announcements, visit www.fiber.google.com/cities/louisville.

Posted by Scott Pluta, Head of Business Operations, Louisville

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This fall we celebrated our first year in service of customers in the Town of Morrisville, right in the heart of the Triangle.  This ‘Fiberversary’ was a chance for our team to say thanks to the folks who got us started, and celebrate with 10 days of events to show our appreciation.
From rock climbing with the Triangle Rock Club to a Made With Code demo at the East Meets West Festival, we’ve had a blast simply saying “thanks” for allowing us to be a part of this  community. Here’s a few more of the ways we shared our gratitude:

  • Surprised early risers with free donuts from Rise Biscuits
  • Made new friends at the movie theater with free movie tickets and Google Fiber t-shirts
  • Hosted our neighbors at Park West for our Pop-Up Party
  • Treated a few Morrisville residents to Sunday brunch
  • Celebrated “Taco Tuesday” with residents at the Bradford apartments
  • Led a rousing senior tech day - streaming video was all the rage!
Since our beginnings in Morrisville, we’ve expanded to parts of Raleigh, Durham, and Cary, and we are working to connect new areas every day.  Our Fiber Space in Glenwood South is a vibrant community space that has played host to gatherings like the East Coast Game Conference, S.T.E.M. Family Days, the Cureat app launch, and even a reunion for our friends from the 518 West Italian Cafe.
We are continuing to invest with a variety of partners like the Kramden Institute, Triangle Literacy Council, and the Girl Scouts of the Coastal Pines to impact the digital divide in a meaningful way.  Earlier this year, we opened our first Gigabit community in Raleigh to provide free gigabit access to public housing residents, with more to come as our network expands.
We’re so thankful for the chance to serve these communities, and look forward to celebrating many more Fiberversaries with you as our business in the Triangle grows.

Want to get the latest news on what’s happening with Google Fiber in Raleigh-Durham?  Sign up for updates at www.fiber.google.com/cities/triangle.
Posted by Tia Bethea, Community Impact Manager, Raleigh-Durham
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author.name: Tia Bethea
author.title: Triangle Community Impact Manager

category: community_impact
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Google Fiber’s chief aim is to bring superfast Internet to more people.
This has been our mission since our beginnings in Kansas City, because we believe that it can have a huge impact in a community -- video conversations in real time with no delay; homework at the speed of light; downloads and uploads within minutes, not hours.  A lot can happen when you aren’t waiting for your Internet to catch up.
Over the years, we’ve worked to innovate the entire process. We’re not afraid to try new things as part of our normal way of doing business -- focused on the end goal of getting superfast Internet into people’s homes. From faster, more efficient new methods of deployment to our commitment to transparent pricing to ensuring our customer service is top notch to our approach to community impact work in each market, we’re always looking for the best way to serve our customers.
With that Google Fiber spirit in mind, we’re trying something new in our next two Fiber cities. When we begin serving customers in Louisville and San Antonio, we’ll focus on providing superfast Internet -  and the endless content possibilities that creates - without the traditional TV add on.
If you’ve been reading the business news lately, you know that more and more people are moving away from traditional methods of viewing television content. Customers today want to control what, where, when, and how they get content. They want to do it their way, and we want to help them.
Whether it’s through YouTube TV, Hulu, Netflix, or more specific targeted services  -- there are so many ways to watch what you want, when you want it. And Google Fiber’s superfast Internet allows customers to make the most of all these streaming choices by providing the bandwidth to use multiple devices and apps at the same time. So you can catch every minute of the big game at the same time you’re playing that online multiplayer game, or stream a new movie while editing and uploading your home videos.
For our existing markets with TV as a part of their product offerings, nothing is changing -- although more and more of you are choosing Internet-only options from Google Fiber. We’ve seen this over and over again in our Fiber cities.
As customers look for new options that better reflect what they value in their entertainment, sports and news, Google Fiber will also experiment with new ways to deliver that value and opportunity.

Louisville and San Antonio -- our superfast Internet service will be there soon. We’re excited to see what you do with Google Fiber in your own way.

Posted by Cathy Fogler, Head of Sales and Marketing, Access

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It's National Customer Service week. With that, we wanted to say a big thank you to our customers for choosing Google Fiber as your Internet service provider.


We believe there’s a better way to provide service in this industry. Every day, we receive feedback from you telling us what you love and what we can do better. This is an invaluable part of our growth as a business. We aim to do more of what you love (like offering installation appointments, not windows and cleaning up after ourselves when we visit your home) and continue to improve in the areas that you don’t (like repairing damages caused during construction).  If you’ve got something you want to share with us, we hope you won’t hesitate to reach out.  
The customer service and support we provide each day is a team effort. Happy Customer Service week to all our frontline agents in our Fiber Spaces, to our online and phone agents in our contact centers, and to our technicians in the field in each Google Fiber city! Thank you for the work that you do, for the professionalism you show every day and for giving our customers the service they deserve. We appreciate it every day, not just this week.

Posted by Caroline Dowling, Google Fiber Customer Service Director

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A little over five years ago, Google Fiber fiber launched a different kind of internet and TV service to the first single family home in Kansas City. Pretty soon after that, we heard from apartments and condos interested in partnering with Google Fiber to bring superfast internet and TV to their residents. To make this happen, we’ve worked closely with national and local real estate developers, property managers, and condo boards to bring Google Fiber to multi-family communities across the United States.
Today, we’re excited to report that we have activated Google Fiber service in over 3,000 multi-family communities across our Fiber cities, plus an additional 300 Community Connections, which, in partnership with local nonprofit organizations, provide Internet access and digital literacy tools to digitally divided communities.
We didn’t do this alone -- our real estate and organizational partners made this a reality for their residents. It’s a collaborative effort -- working with each property, we identify the best way to serve their residents from the beginning of construction to installation and our ongoing service. Each project is unique. We start with the design process and continue to ensure that managers can use Google Fiber as a way to differentiate their property to prospective residents. Google Fiber has brought thousands of eyes to real estate partner websites, and we’ve been lucky enough to be the chosen provider for internet for thousands of their residents.
Building on these partnerships, we’ve recently expanded our commitment to become a technology partner by launching the Google Hardware Program. This program is designed to help properties capitalize on the smart home ecosystem by offering preferred pricing on Google Home, Nest Thermostats, and other devices. It’s still early, but we are very excited to help real estate partners explore the future of the “connected home” in apartments and condos.
And we're lucky to work with some incredible partners across our markets:



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Sound like something you might want to check out? If you are looking for a place to live with Google Fiber, check out the Google Fiber Apartment Finder to find a property in your area. If you are a developer who would be interested in becoming a Google Fiber partner, please tell us more about your property here, and a member of our team will reach out to you.
Thanks to all our real estate partners across all of our Fiber cities — we look forward to bringing superfast Internet to more buildings and their residents!

Posted by Lee Bienstock, Head of Partnerships

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This week, North Carolina students headed back to class, and their teachers were ready for them. Beyond arranging their rooms, hosting open houses and preparing lesson plans, teachers are seeking out the tech resources that will make their classroom an environment that is better able to equip students with 21st century skills.
Thanks to a partnership with the Kenan Fellows Program at North Carolina State University, two elementary school STEM educators spent this summer as interns at the Charlotte and Raleigh/Durham Google Fiber offices, experiencing what it’s like to  work at a tech company and taking new ideas and experiences back to the classroom.
Michelle McElhiney, a 5th grade teacher at Oakhurst STEAM Academy in Charlotte, and Amelia Robinson, 3rd-grade math teacher at Envision Science Academy serving students in Raleigh and Wake Forest, both dedicated their summer to this project.
Their efforts resulted in two extensive STEM-focused projects, featuring new career-connected curricula and "STEAM To-Go" mobile learning labs or kits. The STEAM To-Go labs pair technology resources like Chromebooks, Makey Makeys, and stop-motion animation tools with lesson ideas and online resources for use in public school classrooms. There are two different mobile lab options. Teachers can choose between "Circuitry and Music" and "Animation and Coding." Each kit comes with a teacher’s guide that helps the teacher get up to speed on the technology, offers links to online tools and apps, makes recommendations for how teachers can connect the projects to state-mandated outcomes and "literacy links" so that they can enhance the grade-level goals in their classroom.

These Google Fiber funded kits are available at no cost to elementary and middle school teachers at the STEM and STEAM academies in Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools starting in the fall of 2017. STEAM To-Go mobile labs, which include hardware and educator guides, can be borrowed by teachers for one week, allowing educators to integrate them into classroom activities, link them to literacy extensions and align them with grade level standards. The experiences are designed for kids who have little or no coding experience; educators can easily modify the program for students ranging from lower elementary to middle school.
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To launch this project, Google Fiber hosted a back to school reception earlier this month at our Charlotte Google Fiber Space for teachers at STEM elementary and middle schools. More than 60 educators and administrators attended to learn about the STEAM To-Go mobile labs, have fun with hands-on STEM activities and celebrate the start of another school year together.

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Stay tuned for more news about upcoming teacher leadership trainings in Raleigh and Durham.  Let’s start the school year full STEAM ahead!

Posted by Tia Bethea in Raleigh-Durham and Jess George in Charlotte, Google Fiber Community Impact Managers

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