Mayor launches MetroNet high-speed data service with EPB, as mentioned yesterday.
MetroNet will offer its super-speed [gigabit Ethernet] connectivity service at rates that are approximately 50 percent less than other services currently available in Chattanooga. Through MetroNet, businesses that compute [sic] large amounts of data and digital images are provided service at more than six times the speed of a T-1 connection. ...
"Through the great partnership with EPB and [Covista chairman] Henry Luken, we now can use MetroNet as an economic tool to draw businesses that are looking for a presence in the Southeast to our city, especially technology companies," Mayor Corker added. "These companies bring with them great, high-paying jobs for citizens of our community."
MetroNet is a non-profit organization offering 10 Mbps connectivity at $425 per month and 100 Mbps connectivity at $4,000 per month.
A funny bit:
Local Internet providers will be able to offer value-added services to MetroNet customers, including website hosting....
Then no more than two paragraphs later:
Amy Walker Cherry of the mayor's office... said it is not for every company, but will especially help firms that deal with a lot of data at high speed, including web hosting companies.
The article says Covista is Chattanooga-headquartered,
yet its web site says it is headquartered in Little Falls, New Jersey.
A previous press release Google found was datelined Little Falls, but since this 21 February 2002 press release is headlined Chattanooga, I imagine that's simply lack of a current web site.
Regional manager someone or other from BellSouth was there to complain, but I'm even more disinclined to care what she had to say than I would've been if I hadn't read Larry Lessig's The Future of Ideas. I think.
