Dismantling AT&T was one of the dumbest things ever done to this country. Our phone systems went from being by fat the best in the world to near 3rd world. Of course you can’t put the genie back in the bottle, no level of acquisitions will give us a proper national telephone system again.
“Dismantling AT&T was one of the dumbest things ever done to this country. Our phone systems went from being by fat the best in the world to near 3rd world.”
And the most expensive! I worked in the “Fiber to the Home” business post MFJ. AT&T tried to interfere with our business at every turn in the road. AT&T (actually Southwest Bell reconstituted as “The New AT&T” is a $hit company, with absolutely no morals or honesty. They are every bit as much a monopoly today as they were 40 years ago, and they should not be allowed to expand into new businesses ever.
Oh, I don’t know about that. Think we would have all the coms technologies we have today if MaBell had been left alone?
The problem with monopolies is they don’t like things to change that much. What are your long distance changes today?
Except for Bell Atlantic, US West and Bell Labs, it’s all been pretty much put back together.
They could have had most of the end result if they’d just made AT&T sell Bell Atlantic to GTE. Of course, then some lawyers and International Bankers and politicians wouldn’t have gotten rich.
I’m not so sure about that. What would be the advantage of allowing a company to maintain a telecom monopoly like that?
AT&T is all consuming alright, but I have to say I’ve had multiple accounts with several of their products, cell, 800 number, I was already with DirectTV so they got that one too. They have treated me better than any other company that provides similar service.
Just sayin’
No thanks. Ma Bell had no interest in technological change. Without deregulation, we’d probably still be using corded landlines and being charged 75 cents a minute to call grandma two hours away.