Rural Albertan community builds its own fibre network and starts its own ISP

Now this is exactly the kind of thing that Big Telecom and other Corporate interests tell you is impossible to do.

This small Albertan town was tired of being disconnected from the Internet. Tired of paying high prices.

Source CBC

Ultrafast internet speeds that most Canadian city dwellers can only dream of will soon be available to all 8,500 residents in a rural Alberta community for as little as $57 a month, thanks to a project by the town's non-profit economic development foundation.

"We'll be the first 'gig town' in Canada," said Nathan Kusiek, director of marketing for O-Net, the community-owned internet service provider that runs the fibre optic network being built by the non-profit Olds Institute for Community and Regional Development in Olds, Alta., about 90 kilometres north of Calgary.

On Thursday, the board of O-Net gave approval for residents to get access to a full gigabit (or 1,000 megabits) per second of bandwidth for the same price that they currently pay for a guaranteed download speed of 100 megabits per second — $57 to $90 a month, depending on whether they have bundled their internet with TV and phone service

Not only is it cheaper, it's MUCH faster than any ISP offering to date in Canada. It's actually on par with Google Fiber service.

This just goes to show that a community CAN come together and create something that works for them.

Thoughts ATS?

~Tenth

reply to post by tothetenthpower


Good for them!

To often have i seen services and industries slowly monopolized by the big 3. (Rogers, Bell and Telus).

I for one was forced to go with Rogers as the infrastructure in my neighborhood was owned by rogers. I NEED 1 GIG SPEED!

Well that just awesome for them, make me a bit envious no doubt, need something like that to happen here, hell every where, so many craptastic ISPs out there. Just jacking you for your money.

It's crazy, non profit comminity based isp, thats the future!

So what do you do with that speed?

Seems crazy expensive. Currently I have but a fraction of that and I can stream in HD and download 20 and 30 gig games in an hour or two.

So just because I dont see any need or use for speeds like that at this point in time I'm asking what you do with those speeds at those prices.

Instead of $57/month can I get half the speed for $30/month? That's still be faster than I'd realistically need.

Anyway, good for them setting this all up.

Just curious about the speed since I keep hearing how much faster speeds are everywhere outside the US. Try as I might to see what I'm missing I can't.

reply to post by thisguyrighthere

Instead of $57/month can I get half the speed for $30/month? That's still be faster than I'd realistically need.

The average price for 100MB connection in Canada is about 90$ a month.

This service provides 10x the speed for almost half the cost. Personally I run servers, so high speeds are required, the more the better.

Your ISP speeds do not top out over 100Mbps unless you are paying more than 100$ a month.

ETA: the increased speeds also mean stabler connections. The more people connected to the fiber network, reduces congestion at peak times.

~Tenth

This sounds no different than rural electric or water co-ops.

That's how it should be done. Recognize a need and local people get together to provide a solution.

Originally posted by tothetenthpower
reply to post by thisguyrighthere

 

The average price for 100MB connection in Canada is about 90$ a month.

Geez. Well, hopefully other providers take note and prices across the board fall accordingly now that somebody has shown such fees arent necessary.

Wish my community would do this. I'm paying 67/month and can't get over 3mb/s. Stupid monopoly keeps other providers out of my area.