Was Google’s Fiber Plan Just Saber Rattling?

[Commentary] It has been almost 14 months since Google announced its plans to wire up an entire community with a fiber-to-the-home network that would be capable of gigabit speeds. More than 600 communities applied for the honor, but Google then changed its plans. It was going to make an announcement before the end of 2010, but Google delayed the news. Now, it is three months later and there’s nary a fiber to be seen. Higginbotham is left wondering if instead of wiring up a municipality, Google may have used its contest to win a fiber network as a threat to bring ISPs around to its way of thinking on issues such as network neutrality and tiered broadband.