Alex Reid

Over 1,100 American cities applied for the Google Fiber project which promises to provide an ultra-fast fiber optics network which is expected to be 100 times faster than conventional broadband.

Today, Google announced that Kansas had won the opportunity based on positive community and government relations. Google plans to offer service to between 50,000 and 500,000 people, and says they expect the network to be up and running by early 2012, ready to ” develop the gigabit applications of the future.”

You may remember it was nearly five years ago that Google setup its home town with free wifi, so these are still baby steps for Google to become the next big ISP.

Ikea is coming to Winnipeg in late 2012, CBC reports.

After the election was official this past weekend, canada.votes2011.ca went live, gathering up steam on Facebook and Twitter. It’s a project that I’ve been somewhat busy with for the past ten weeks, in anticipation of the five provincial elections coming up this fall.

The site is built around using the new functionality of WordPress’ Multi-site network, and a subtle domain hack. I’m still adding to the site, and recruiting writers to add content over the next five weeks, and again closer to the five provincial elections in October.