An overreach? Really?
I'd say that you're not paying attention.
And how do you come to that conclusion? By the fact that "very
little" of the original AT&T is in the current monolith?
Well, given the entire 'two-tiered' money-grab-tastic issues
involved, I'd say you're a little out of touch.
- ferg
An overreach? Really?
I'd say that you're not paying attention.
Sorry, Fergie, but I gotta disagree with you here.
In the 1980s, cell phones were not even close to useable by most people, but now there are lots of people who don't need anything else. Not to mention cable TV providers doing voice. Oh, and that whole VoIP thing.
Etc., etc.
So I would say that equating the BS & SBC^wat&t merger with the (lack of) choice we had in the 80s an overreach. Really.
And how do you come to that conclusion? By the fact that "very
little" of the original AT&T is in the current monolith?Well, given the entire 'two-tiered' money-grab-tastic issues
involved, I'd say you're a little out of touch.
Hey, I didn't say it would be good for the consumer. 
Clearly, this is not the best possible situation for the end user.
But the current situation is still much better than the 1980s. And way better than before that. (Remember when it was _illegal_ to own a phone?) One could argue that there were times between 1990 and now that was better for the consumer, but not all of them.
IMHO, of course.
Nice rant. But since this isn't your blog you'll probably have to grace us
with some substance.
None of AT&T exists anymore--SBC acquired that corpse last year, so the
company currently calling itself "AT&T" isn't even really "AT&T". The new
deal is basically SBC buying up BellSouth and getting the rest of Cingular
in the deal. I just don't see how this is all that different from the
stream of M&As that produced Verizon back in the 90s.
Sure it's a big deal, just like that one was. Another giant telco, hoorah.
Nightsweats about the ghost of Ma Bell rising? lol no.
Section 271 of "The Act" prevented RBOCs from selling long distance
unless if they truly opened their networks to competitive access by
CLECs (UNE-Ps primarily
Right, LD was the carrot in the MFJ
Then, AT&T and Sprint exit the long distance market. MCI Friends &
Family? Nowhere to be found.
...because as it turns out, nobody can compete when LD is ~$.03 per min
(or worse, when it is $.00 with voip/skype/etc).
Sure there was some effort by RBOCS to get into national LD at first but
once it got down to sub-nickel rates nobody cared anymore, and even the
existing market giants have long since bailed on it. Too bad their debt
loads weren't tied to shrinking projections.
So the use of LD as carrot was the prime failure here, and is arguably
what [in]directly killed the old giants. Hoorah for regulation, which
tried to pick a winner, and got it absolutely wrong.
Let me cut this very short. Local, long distance, and the newest
children: cellular and Internet, all under one umbrella, well two.
Except that local service is also becoming available through non-telco
providers, LD is already non-existent as a market, and POTS line
deployment overall has been declining for years. Internet penetration in
the US has pretty much stabilized.
The telcos are supposed to just whither away? The reality of realigning
markets and new technologies demands that the telcos adapt.
Competition? I guess I have cable.
I certainly agree that the limited range of low-latency broadband options
is a problem. There is some choice there but not much.
But fear of telco might also result in another scenario: cable only.