Text 12958, 69 rader
Skriven 2006-09-13 17:38:56 av /m (1:379/45)
Ärende: Google Taps Fiber with Manhattan Move
=============================================
From: /m <mike@barkto.com>


http://googlewatch.eweek.com/blogs/google_watch/archive/2006/09/13/13133.aspx

===
Google's new Manhattan office sites atop one of the biggest fiberoptic
facilities in North America.

I've been doing research for a separate project on Google's new offices in
Manhattan, which I first reported about here. I can't reveal everything just
yet, but I do have more details to report. Turns out 111 8th Avenue is one of
the premier "carrier hotels" in the country, a 2.8-million-square-foot behemoth
of a fiber gateway.

What's a carrier hotel? It's a very secure, very expensive location for firms
that traffic in large amounts of data. 111 8th Avenue, it turns out, sits right
on top of the Hudson Street-Ninth Avenue fiber highway. By moving into its new
building, Google is gaining access to a nearly unlimited amount of bandwidth.
(For more eWEEK coverage on this, see David Morgenstern's Google and its
Continuing Dark Fiber Mystery.) The only other building in New York that has
this kind of power is 60 Hudson Street. Suffice to say, the two are closely
connected.

Google won't say anything about this. And what's more, anyone involved in the
deal is under a nondisclosure agreement, as Google is wont to do. But by moving
into 111 8th Avenue, Google is gaining access to a schload of Tier 1 service
providers like AT&T, Verizon, NTT, Sprint, and others, who all have a presence
in the building (here's a tenant list, which is more or less up to date).
Ostensibly, Google will be able to bypass the telcos and offer services
directly with the Tier 2 providers in the building.

It's also interesting to note that a co-landlord of the building is NYC
Connect, a premier co-location and fiber-optic services company. Its facilities
are built to N+1 redundancy. According to its Web site, its facilities are
served by 1,200-amps from a 480-volt electric power supply with a 750KW Cummins
diesel generator and UPS system providing backup power.

I can't say much more because of the project I'm working on, but suffice to say
Google basically just tapped the biggest river of data in North America.
According to a few people that I've talked with, at some point in time, every
piece of data that travels on high-speed cables in North America goes through
that building.

111 8th Avenue is also the second-largest building in New York (or perhaps
third--experts differ here), covering an entire city block between 8th and 9th
Avenues with 2.8 million square feet.

Other interesting facts: 111 8th Avenue was built in 1932 as the Port Authority
of New York's commerce building. It functioned under the PA until 1973, when
Sylvan Lawrence bought the building. In 1998 it was bought by another firm,
Taconic, which refurbished the place and installed generators, cooling systems
and fiber-optic capacity. They also remodeled some interior spaces, creating
the open areas that are part of Google's floor plan now.

Fascinating tidbit: 111 8th Avenue used to be an old media headquarters and was
once the biggest paper check processing center in Manhattan. Chemical Bank,
which merged with Chase in the '90s, ran a huge processing center here. If you
wrote a check in New York, odds were it was processed and filed in the basement
of 111 8th Avenue.

Today odds are, if you're advertising online, the money goes through that
building once again.
===

 /m

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5
 * Origin: Barktopia BBS Site http://HarborWebs.com:8081 (1:379/45)