High Speed

Sega of America announced it is selling a high-speed modem for its Dreamcast video game console. The console now comes with a slower, dial-up modem that lets users connect to the Internet and play video games with other Dreamcast owners. For now, the new Ethernet modem, priced at $59.95, is available only through the company's Web site, Sega.com. The company expects retail stores to begin carrying the modem in coming weeks.

The California bullet train agency on Thursday defended its bidding criteria for selecting the winner for its first construction contract, saying that the process held down prices and was handled properly. The California High-Speed Rail Authority has come under fire from critics who assert changes to the bidding criteria could jeopardize the quality of the project. The authority tentatively chose a team led by Sylmar-based Tutor Perini to build a 29-mile segment of track through Fresno even though it had the lowest technical score.

Google Inc.'s announcement last month that it would build a high-speed broadband network set off fierce competition among 600 communities, the Internet powerhouse said in a blog post Friday. Google hasn't been specific about the criteria in selecting which community will get the experimental fiber optic hookup, simply saying it wants to increase Internet access and spur competition. The service would offer connection speeds of 1 gigabit per second -- 100 times faster than many high-speed home connections, the company said.

There's a short piece of Bay Area freeway, Interstate 380, named for Quentin Kopp, which is ironic considering that he's beaten the drum for public transit - specifically bullet trains - for years. But then again, he's always been a contrarian, as a Superior Court judge, a San Francisco supervisor and a state senator. He also headed the California High-Speed Rail Authority. The man nicknamed the "Great Dissenter" is dissenting now over the course of his beloved bullet train, created on paper in 2008 with a bond measure, Proposition 1A. Its prospects have been slowed considerably by lawsuits, the latest from the state itself, a preemptive bring-it-on legal action called High-Speed Rail Authority vs. All Persons Interested.

Culminating a year of extensive outreach and study, federal regulators on Tuesday will propose an ambitious, decade-long road map to extend high-speed Internet access to every corner of the country and make the United States home to "the fastest and most extensive wireless networks of any nation." The plan by the Federal Communications Commission sets a goal of assuring that at least 100 million homes have affordable access to so-called broadband networks that allow them to download data from the Internet at speeds of at least 100 megabits per second -- 20 times or more faster than most people get today.

More than just the name Accelerated Networks connotes speed. Virtually every step the company takes happens at a faster pace, be it the attempts to carve its market niche or the rapid fluctuations in its stock price. The Moorpark-based company makes products that bundle the various telephone services--voice, fax, Internet and other data services--to be sent over a single broadband network.

The high-speed Chunnel train that runs from London to Paris and Brussels is getting cheaper and even faster. New track on the English side is scheduled to open Sept. 28, shaving about 20 minutes off the journey. The London-Paris one-way trip will take two hours, 35 minutes, and London-Brussels will take two hours, 20 minutes.

An experimental airplane was flying at nearly 250 mph when it collided with another plane over a golf course last month, and the high speed could have contributed to the collision that killed four people, the chief accident investigator said Thursday. The aircraft, a Questair Venture, collided with a Bellanca Scout circling at about 98 mph, said George Petterson of the National Transportation Safety Board. Analysis, however, has not been completed to determine who was at fault in the Feb.

Trooper Robert Mayra will never forget the scene: the mangled snowmobile that had rammed a concrete bridge abutment at 75 m.p.h., the broken bodies of the two young riders. "These kids, they just feel they're invincible . . . and all of a sudden, bang, it's over," Mayra said. On Jan. 30, the teen-age victims and another couple left a party for a moonlight spin on the trails. Investigators said the driver of the doomed machine lost control trying to pass the other.

Re "Amtrak to Unveil High-Speed Rail Plan in California," March 6: It would be a great help to crunch some numbers occasionally. Twelve million people at 52 weeks per year and five days per week results in just over 46,000 people daily in 2020; this assumes no people on weekends. When the I-5, 91 and other freeways around Los Angeles carry close to 1 million vehicles per day today (almost 1.2 million people), not to mention airport passengers, how many would be carried locally by this newest waste of the taxpayer's money?

SHANGHAI - Gov. Jerry Brown's trade mission to China this week is intersecting with one of the most controversial issues of his governorship: California's $68-billion bullet train. The governor has staked part of his legacy on the rail network, a centerpiece of his vision for California. He is hoping that China, which is enjoying an economic boom and spent $77.6 billion on overseas investments last year, according to official figures, will pump some of its cash into the troubled project.

Google Fiber, the ultra-fast broadband Internet service developed by the search-engine company, will be expanding to Austin, Texas, in 2014. In a widely expected move , Austin city officials and Google on Tuesday morning announced the expansion of Fiber. The service is already live in the Kansas City area and provides users with Internet speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, which Google says is about 100 times faster than most American users' Internet speeds. "With a population of innovators and early adopters, Austin has always welcomed and embraced forward-thinking ideas," the Austin Chamber of Commerce said Tuesday in a statement.

LAS VEGAS - The spiral of former Nevada Assemblyman Steven Brooks continued with his arrest near Barstow on Thursday night on charges including resisting arrest and throwing objects. The incident came just hours after state lawmakers in Carson City, Nev., expelled him from office in an unprecedented move, calling him “potentially dangerous.” Officials say the 41-year-old Brooks was arrested about 7 p.m. on Interstate 15 at Stoddard Wells Road. He is being held in the San Bernardino County Jail in Rancho Cucamonga on $100,000 bail, jail officials told the Los Angeles Times.

Two men were arrested in Chinatown on Thursday morning after a 45-minute, high-speed chase that began in Long Beach. Police responded to an attempted break-in just after 5 a.m. at a business in the 4600 block of Virginia Road. A private security guard confronted the suspects, according to police, and they tried to run him down with their vehicle. The security guard fired at the suspects. Long Beach police arrived on the scene as the suspects fled, and a pursuit ensued. The chase continued on the 710 freeway and several other freeways at high rates of speed.

The California bullet-train project has collided with farmers, political conservatives and wealthy suburbanites who would like to see the $68-billion system killed. Now it is facing tough criticism from an unlikely quarter: within the ranks of high-speed rail's true believers. Some longtime backers of the project are objecting to political compromises that they say undermine legal safeguards for the massive investment, notably a design that would move passengers between urban destinations faster than air travel, as well as requirements intended to prevent a half-built system.

WASHINGTON - The departure of Julius Genachowski as chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has some public interest groups hoping his successor will fight harder for consumers against the growing clout of telecommunications giants. On Friday, Genachowski, a former venture capitalist and technology executive, said he would step down in the coming weeks after nearly four years on the job. He said his biggest accomplishment was focusing the agency on expanding high-speed Internet access.

Concerned that a state panel might derail the possibility of expanding Palmdale Airport, the Los Angeles City Council voted Friday to request that the Antelope Valley be included in the route of a proposed high-speed train system. The state High Speed Rail Authority meets Tuesday to discuss a staff recommendation to have a rail system bypass Palmdale on its way between Los Angeles and Northern California.

SACRAMENTO -- Public support continues to lag for California's $68-billion bullet train, a centerpiece of Gov. Jerry Brown's long-term vision for the state. Though California voters approved nearly $10 billion in state bonds to pay for the first phase of the project, a new survey from the Public Policy Institute of California found that they remain divided over the proposal, which is scheduled to begin construction later this year. Just 43%of likely voters surveyed now say they favor the project, while 54% said they are opposed.

The U.S. Postal Service, in its latest bid to save a few billion bucks, plans to stop delivering mail on Saturdays. It's not enough. The ugly truth is that the Postal Service's commitment to universal mail service is no longer financially viable in the age of email, text messages, Facebook and Twitter. As currently configured, it will never again be able to meet its legal obligation to pay its own way. To survive, the Postal Service will need to reinvent itself for the digital age. I have a few ideas on how to do that, which I'll get back to in a moment.