AT&T Offering Merger Concessions

TheFarmerInTheDell writes that AT&T is offering concessions to make their merger with SBC 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."

But

[JustOK]

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

[plaiddragon]

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.

Wait a sec

[techpawn]

--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'....

[trianglman]

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...

Re:SBC != BellSouth

[ffejie]

They actually bought them for the backbone and the services that come with it. SBC had no internet backbone previous to the SBC acquisition and as a result was using Sprint (in many cases) for transport to the internet. This is pricey, especially with all those DSL users. Classic AT&T has a great managed internet service for companies, very profitable VPN services and a ton of business VoIP customers. Once SBC bought AT&T, they could use their backbone and become a legitimate Tier 1 Provider -- and immediately bought legitimacy into the lucrative B2B internet service world.

However, typo remains -- this article is about BellSouth, not SBC. Some argue that this BellSouth "merger" is mostly to put Cingular under one roof. I agree. The rest of BellSouth isn't that valuable to the new AT&T. Cingular is generating a lot of money for the two companies and consolidation is in the companies best interest.

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

[Anonymous Coward]

Net neutrality and QoS are distinct concepts. QoS = prioritize traffic based on how important it is to get through quickly/reliably/? (however we need to discuss what these priorities are - the providers should not be left to decide this on their own) Net neutrality says that the provider cannot discriminate traffic based on its source (or destination?); the telcos want to give priority to traffic that profits them in preference to others (e.g., telco TV gets priority over Google TV unless Google pays the provider for priority).