Google Replaces AT&T At Starbucks 100
coolnumbr12 writes "A new partnership between Starbucks and Google hopes to improve the lives of freelance writers around the country. Starting in August, Google plans to make Internet speeds at all 7,000 Starbucks locations in the U.S. 10 times faster than the current AT&T-powered service. For people in a city equipped with Google Fiber, Google says the speed in Starbucks could increase as much as 100 times."
This was definitely needed! (Score:5, Interesting)
It's about freaking time!
Whenever I go to Starbucks I often find myself turning OFF my Wi-Fi because my (also AT&T, strangely) LTE cellular connection is several times faster than the Wi-Fi there. Sometimes I even have trouble sending something as low-bandwidth as a freaking tweet!
I think Starbucks uses slow consumer-grade DSL connections, because that's what it feels like. Upstream capacity is severely limited, and downstream is only slightly less so. I remember attempting a Facetime call and getting less than one frame per second in both directions and constant reconnecting...turned off Wi-Fi and it was smooth as silk.
Meanwhile, my experience in Starbucks in Canada (where they don't use AT&T) is far superior.
McDonald's too? (Score:5, Interesting)
I wonder if this also includes McDonald's, which has the same WiFi contract with AT&T?