Interesting People mailing list archives
"Shameless plug: BOOK EVENT: TONIGHT: March 6th, NYC"
From: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Date: Mon, 6 Mar 2006 09:21:10 -0500
Begin forwarded message: From: Bruce Kushnick <bruce () newnetworks com> Date: March 6, 2006 1:04:27 AM EST To: dave () farber netSubject: Re: [IP] more on The Return of Ma Bell -- AT&T (SBC) to buy BellSouth?]]
Shameless plug: BOOK EVENT: TONIGHT: March 6th, NYC, "$200 Billion Broadband Scandal" release.... more: http://www.newnetworks.com/scandalinvite.htm =============Why is this book timely? America is 16th in the world in broadband because
these companies failed to deliveron their fiber optic committments. And it is now clear that the mergers were
to blame...Making them larger?First, Teletruth has an active complaint with the FTC over the previous Bell
mergers. http://www.newnetworks.com/FTCcomplaintSBCVerizon.htm Using their own data, combined, Verizon and SBC claimed they would spend $48.9 billion and have 36.5 million households by 2000. (this is the low number.) This was the fiber-to-the-curb services, 45 Mbps, 2 directional services, with 500+ channels. As we show, the companies essentially 'gamed' the regulatory system with promises that they would neverkeep. For example, the mergers closed down the fiber optic deployments in 26
states, even though they totally disregarded their promised committments in the states, such as NJ or Ameritech. Also, the companies nevercompeted with each other, as promised in their SBC-Ameritech and Verizon-GTE
mergers. SBC was supposed tobe in 30 cities OUTSIDE their regions and Verizon claimed 24 cities outside
their regions... Is 66 competitors in 22 markets robust competition? How did making these companies larger help the Public Interest? Here's a link to a chart showing the timing, the money to be spent, the number of households to be passed, and the fiber optic closures and the merger dates:. http://www.newnetworks.com/SBCVerizonmergers.htmHere's a few chapters on the SBC-Ameritech-Pacific Telesis-SNET- Southwestern Bells committments and their failure to deliver on competition and the harms
to broadband. http://www.teletruth.org/docs/SBCMergerharms.pdf (PDF File)(As someone who's been following this-- the linkages between the mergers and
the fiber optic closures was news to me.) The book was written to supply the data for our FTC complaint and other state actions. Bruce Kushnick, Teletruth ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as lists-ip () insecure org To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
Current thread:
- "Shameless plug: BOOK EVENT: TONIGHT: March 6th, NYC" David Farber (Mar 06)