Cleveland is getting public 100-gigabit internet connection

Building upon a legacy started by Case Western Reserve University, the City of Cleveland has launched an initiative to create one of the fastest publicly available internet services available to the public.

Linking downtown to the city's technology center in University Circle, the project will provide 100 gigabit internet service to commercial enterprises, and eventually, residents. It will connect to an existing 100-gigabit network at Case Western that links Ohio institutions and government entities together, and for the first time, the public will be able to tap into such high speeds.

"We can tell the next candidate from Silicon Valley, 'We have the first 100 gig Internet right here in Cleveland.'" And you don't.

 "The commercial Internet is being reinvented in Cleveland," said the article related on Cleveland.com. Read more here.

Some will remember a few of the groundbreaking networking projects that have germinated in this city.

In 1971, Case Western Reserve University was one of the first ten universities to be connected to ARPANet, the predecessor to the internet.

One of the predecessors to the internet as we know it was the dial-up bulletin board system. Later iterations would produce CompuServe and the more graphically friendly interface America Online. The inspiration for both of these services can be traced back to the Cleveland Free-Net, which was run by faculty at Case Western. For many years the system served as an archetype for the implementation of similar services across America.