Still in their experimental stage, the balloons were the first of thousands that Google's leaders eventually hope to launch 20 kilometers (12 miles) into the stratosphere in order to bridge the gaping digital divide between the world's 4.8 billion unwired people and their 2.2 billion plugged-in counterparts.

If successful, the technology might allow countries to leapfrog the expense of laying fiber cable, dramatically increasing Internet usage in places such as Africa and Southeast Asia.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/google-launches-internet-balloons-2013-6#ixzz2WI0EkZSs

This is not just real. This is real significant.

Remember when Eric Schmidt said he believed the whole world would have Internet access by 2020?

This could make it so. More people would have access to Internet than electricity or clean water!

Accelerating the coming of the Singularity once the whole world is connected into a single hive mind.

Will some variation on Google Glass be ubiquitous by then?

Only if they can get the price down significantly.

We're well on our way...

More: http://pandawhale.com/post/21558/143-trillion-web-pages-are-live-on-the-internet

More about Google Loon: http://www.google.com/loon/

Great Reddit discussion about it:

http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/1gdsy3/google_introduces_project_loon_balloonpowered/

Just Reddit - thanks for posting! 

Exciting!

You're welcome and yes, super exciting!