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AT&T to Leave Residential Business
Herve writes "Just got it from a press release on the AT&T website: 'AT&T will no longer be competing for residential local and standalone long distance customers. The company stressed that existing residential customers will continue to receive the quality service they expect from AT&T; however, the company will no longer be investing to acquire new customers in this segment.'"
I just got a holographic postcard that must have cost a buck each from them advertising their *residential* VoIP service. Maybe they don't want to raise the ire of the feds and their competitors by saying "Hey everybody we were given a thorough beating with a clue stick and now realize that digital delivery to the end user is the way to go."
The end of analog phone service is here.
This spells a desolate future for AT&T residential subscribers. When a company isn't actively going after business, they aren't actively *keeping* business, and therefore the quality of service rapidly declines until that segment is folded. I give it two years of hell and then a skillful withdrawal from the residential market.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Since divestiture in the 80's, technical expertise took a second seat to
climbing the managerial org chart. PHB MBAs rose to the level of their
incompetency, and investment in the future was traded for the next quarter's
profit numbers. Real talent, the people that actually invented things and
did the creative work, either retired or left for greener pastures.
AT&T had deep enough pockets, so they could stumble around and
sell off assets for almost twenty years. It's finally reached the point that
that business model can no longer sustain itself. Shame really.
One Bell System. It Worked.