AT&T Offering Merger Concessions

TheFarmerInTheDell writes that AT&T is offering concessions to make their merger with BellSouth happen as fast as possible. From the article: "AT&T filed a letter of commitment with the [Federal Communications Commission] Thursday night that adds a number of new conditions to the deal, including a promise to observe 'network neutrality' principles, an offer of affordable stand-alone digital subscriber line service and divestment of some wireless spectrum."

merger.

I for one won't be taking part in this merger

Don't forget the fine print.

affordable stand-alone digital subscriber line service

* pricing only valid for the first three month of contract.

But

TechDirt is pointing out that

The wording is a little tricky, but while they agree not to remove network neutrality from their standard network, hidden in the middle of a later paragraph is this sentence: "This commitment also does not apply to AT&T/BellSouth's Internet Protocol television (IPTV) service."

and

AT&T promises not to violate network neutrality on a network they never intended to use that way, and carves out permission to use it on their new network, where they had planned all along to set up additional tollbooths.

Yay, AT&T!

SBC != BellSouth

SBC already merged with AT&T. It is this AT&T that is now offering concessions to get the merger with BellSouth to go through.

Re:SBC != BellSouth

One network to rule them all, One network to find them,
One network to bring them all and in the darkness bind them

Read The Fine Print

According to TechDirt [techdirt.com], the concessions might be just smoke and mirrors, at least in part. They've carved out exceptions to their agreement to keep network neutrality ("This commitment also does not apply to AT&T/BellSouth's Internet Protocol television (IPTV) service") and possibly some limitations on how useful the "affordable stand-alone digital subscriber line service" is.

Welcome Back Ma Bell

Wow, and to think the Antitrust suit from the 70's against AT&T was supposed to break up the monopoly. Now they are coming back strong http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_break_up_of_AT%26 T [wikipedia.org].

Re:Welcome Back Ma Bell

Maybe that industry "wants" to be a monopoly. You can't turn a pig into a chicken by gluing feathers on him, eventually they'll fall off. By the way, antitrust [wikipedia.org] laws are not intended to break up monopolies. They are there to deter and punish only certain anti-competitive actions. The laws were put into place for mostly political reasons. Many economists are against them.
 
Monopolies or oligopolies aren't all bad in some industries, sometimes they are the most efficient market structure. I'm not saying that the telecom industry is one of these, but there is a reason that after several breakups that they just coming back together. The same thing has happened in the airline industry. Any industry that demands a very large infrastructure will always lean toward a non-competetive market structure because the "cost to play" is so high.

Re:Welcome Back Ma Bell

I call bullshit on this one.

It's not the "industry" that wants a monopoly, it's the management of this industry. Industry itself has no self-organized will to monopolize. Monopolies are inherently anti-competetive. The reason Ma Bell was broken up in the first place was to protect consumers. It is inherently in the best interest of these companies to raise the "cost to play" once they've formed a monopoly in order to keep small players out and thus kill off competition. Once you're the only provider, you can afford to pay whatever outrageous fees are needed because consumers have no choice but to pay you for service. Look what happened when the government recently removed the Universal Service Fund fee and the big telcos moved to fill that gap to help pay off their taxes. And they're still getting away with "tax recovery" fees, passing on their social responsibility to their customers in order to bolster their bottom line. Can I get a raise of hands here on how many people find today's cable or telco companies (land-line or cell) doing all they can to respond to market pressure and consumer demand instead of just filling their own pockets?

But hey, if you want to go back to renting phones, be my guest...

Re:Welcome Back Ma Bell

Right. And this is why the people (Read: Government) should own the lines themselves and only allow telecoms to run services on them. If you think that is a bad idea then you have to go the regulation route and basically force the telecoms to get their grubby hands off the lines they "Own" (Read: The taxpayers paid for most of those lines) and to let any service provider into any region. This way while one player in the market may own the infrastructure, it is not of benefit to them because they are forced to offer that infrastructure at cost to the competition. Will the Telecoms have a fit at hearing these plans? Yes. But seriously who cares. This is for the good of the country and once again it was the people of this country who subsidized most of those lines in the first place. We should get to use them how we like.

That ain't no concession

including a promise to observe 'network neutrality' principles,

That's not a concession - that's an attempt to head off binding legislation with a 'promise' that is easily broken once the merger is past the point of no return. They want to have their cake and eat it too.

SBC or BellSouth?

AT&T already merged with SBC, now SBC Management controls AT&T and they want to merge with BellSouth.

I know, confusing.... but wait till AT&T merges with the Borg.

Wait a sec

--A greater commitment to network neutrality, or nondiscrimination involving Internet traffic. AT&T said it would "maintain a neutral network and neutral routing in its wireline broadband Internet access service" for two years.

So in 2009 they can screw with network neutrality again?

Some 'consession'....

A two year commitment to net neutrality is just a bunch of hot air, if consumer advocacy groups accept something like this they have obviously been drinking the kool-aid. Net neutrality to be reviewed in two years and would need to be revoked would be a concession, this needing to be reinforced two years from now is nothing.

Not to mention the other bs in this agreement:
$20 DSL for consumers whether they sign up for other services or not - when you are an effective monopoly in the area, does it matter if signing up for other services is required?
Repatriate 3,000 outsourced jobs - when you are dropping 10,000 jobs, 3,000 is a drop in the bucket.
And, going back to the net neutrality clause, 'AT&T said it would "maintain a neutral network and neutral routing in its wireline broadband Internet access service"' - sounds to me like they are trying to leave all sorts of wiggle room here...

Which is it?

...including a promise to observe 'network neutrality' principles...
But I thought network neutrality was bad for consumers last time we asked the telcos?

Effect on WiMAX

The Net Neutrality concession is good news, but there's other interesting news.

According to the article:

To "assign and/or transfer to an unaffiliated third party" all of its 2.5 GHZ spectrum currently licensed to BellSouth within one year of the merger closing date.

A bit of trivia: according to the FCC's license database [fcc.gov], BellSouth owns more than 60 channels useful for WiMAX [wimaxforum.org], 40 of them at 2.5 GHz. The article implies that BellSouth would retain the 2.3 GHz spectrum they have (about 20 licenses). (AT&T probably has licenses, too, so the reason for divestment must have been to avoid overlap.)

This means that either a new service provider could appear who could deploy WiMAX, or an existing service provider could expand their footprint. BellSouth has been a major proponent for WiMAX, so it probably won't accelerate the adoption any more than before, but it could help increase the number of broadband service providers in the area.

I promise I'll pull out...

...c'mon baby!

It sounds like the FCC needs to invoke the "no glove/no love" rule.

Net Neutrality isn't always a good thing...

So AT&T saying they won't include their IPTV service in this network neutrality clause is a good thing. How can an ISP hope to give you reliable TV service over the internet if they arn't allowed to use Quality of Service to prioritize that traffic. Their backbone isn't crowded, so QoS doesn't matter there, its first in first out. The only place QoS (non-net-neutrality?) has any effect is on a congested link... like, I dunno, your DSL circuit?

Without QoS on your IPTV service, your 15 y/o daughter would cause daily reception problems because she keeps downloading Britney Spears albums.

Divesture?

Seriously, with all the mergers in the telecom world what was the point of breaking up Ma Bell in the first place? If this is allowed to continue in a few more years we're going to be right back at square 1 again.

Most of these 'concessions' sunset after 40 months

Observing network neutrality for 3 1/4 years is not a concession it's just an inconvenience, after the time is up they can start building the internet toll road they have been dreaming of for years.

Politicians always agree to these dumb time limits without thinking long term. The internet will be around for a hell of a lot longer than 40 months and they should understand that - the telcos sure as hell do.

Think about this...

AT&T nee SBC nee Ameritech nee Illinois Bell is - the last time I looked - paying more than one million dollars a day in fines. I guess it's just the price of doing businesses.

AT&T - service so bad they've rebranded the company three times (and counting).

Yeah...

Ask the GAIM developers how much fun they've had with the IM protocol that AOL was forced to open. "Oh, you want to use new features? yeah, we're not opening _that_ protocol"

Promise to observe network neutrality ...

Remember folks, this is not the AT&T of old we're talking about, this is SBC, the Southern Bastards Club, arguably the most abusive the RBOCs. Remember Edward J. Whitacre's comments regarding network neutrality:

"Now what they would like to do is use my pipes free, but I ain't going to let them do that because we have spent this capital and we have to have a return on it. So there's going to have to be some mechanism for these people who use these pipes to pay for the portion they're using," he said, according to Business Week Online's edited excerpts of the interview.

"Why should they be allowed to use my pipes? The Internet can't be free in that sense, because we and the cable companies have made an investment and for a Google or Yahoo or Vonage or anybody to expect to use these pipes free is nuts," he said.

So, given the rather unenlightened attitude evidenced by this double-dipping bastard I think I have reason to ask: what assurances is AT&T/SBC providing that they will not only maintain some level of neutrality, but will continue to do so in the future? Bland "assurances" mean absolutely nothing, and if the SEC takes them at their word in this matter I'll lose a lot of respect for that organization. It isn't wise to believe anything coming out of a telephone company executive's mouth, just on principle, and that applies to most cable company management as well.

Re:georgewellian mindphucking to continue in 2007?

Wow dude, you are just f*cking batsh*t nuts, aren't you?

Re:Skyrocketting prices already

I got that postcard too.

It started off saying "At AT&T, we are committed to bringing you great service.", followed by the usual corporate marketdroid head-farts telling me that "Now is the perfect time to switch to a new AT&T package that better fits your needs!".

The back of the postcard was full of rate changes. All nasty increases.

I was already pissed at SBC for getting into bed with YAHOO, requiring me to load proprietary YAHOO portal software on my machine. This resulted in my dropping PacBell, which I have had for five years as my ISP.

Now this.

And they have the nerve to give me their "bargain rates" of $24 and $26 a month for their bundles? Geez, they oughta just go ahead and throw in high speed DSL at those rates!!! This is likely to be just another "AT&T Price" which is apt to double in a year anyway.

Companies like AT&T are one of the main reasons I distrust MegaBusiness. They have the chutzpah to mail out all kinds of demands to customers in order to do business with them. They think 30% hikes are easy to swallow? I know I am talking peanuts in comparison to the salary and benefits AT&T is paying that marketdroid who sent me this card. AT&T Executives can sit in their boardroom shaking hands. I have made it my business to get AT&T out of my life as much as I can.

Irregardless, I will be dropping Caller ID, even though I did like it. Damm, I can buy an answering machine for less than two month's CallerID fee.

I know where I stand with AT&T. Absolutely useless. I am one of millions of proles dutifully getting our checkbooks out every month and returning a check with our statements. Why would a multibillion dollar corporation want me or my lousy twenty dollar check? Why would some corporate executive piss off millions of paying customers.... I get the idea his hand was itching something terrible and he needed a handshake from some man wearing a suit.

What would THEY do if I sent them a postcard saying I will pay 30% LESS? I didn't because I wanted to keep doing business with them. They DO have the chutzpah to send ME such a card.

Being a successful corporate executive these days appears to me to be highly related to one's skill in finding a person who will pay them a salary far beyond the benefit they provide. Its having the "people skills" to lead the man who approves their job to keep them, even while they shit on their customers.

The boardroom votes over a long corporate table. The proles vote over their checkbook and pen.

Both decide if its worth it to do business with the other.

As long as the game is in play, AT&T gets paid monthly. With their card, they raise. Do I fold or call? They have initiated endgame.

In short, this kind of shit requires a CEO at the top who completely disregards his customers, and is willing to risk longterm customer relationships over a marketing ploy. Do you wanna kill the geese laying the golden eggs?

Today, the barbeque, tomorrow, the famine.

I am now investigating any alternative I have to AT&T for land lines. I am of the opinion that land lines, even though they have existed for years, may just be completely economically obsolete. I hope Wal Mart decides to run a cellphone service, as I think they are one of the very few concerns out there which has enough capital to start such a system and do it right.

Your Rate Increase. Delivered. AT&T.