Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

AT&T To "Pause" Gigabit Internet Rollout Until Net Neutrality Is Settled

Posted by samzenpus on from the lets-see-what-happens dept.

An anonymous reader writes AT&T says it will halt its investment on broadband Internet service expansion until the federal rules on open Internet are clarified. "We can't go out and just invest that kind of money, deploying fiber to 100 cities other than these two million [covered by the DirecTV deal], not knowing under what rules that investment will be governed," AT&T Chief Randall Stephenson said during an appearance at a Wells Fargo conference, according to a transcript provided by AT&T. "And so, we have to pause, and we have to just put a stop on those kind of investments that we're doing today."

7 of 308 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah right by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yeah, right, AT&T. You were totally about to give us awesome internet but the big bad government stopped you? Please.

    1. Re:Yeah right by halfEvilTech · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Kind of hard to pause something the said they wanted to do. Which means they didn't even start it. Maybe notes on the back of a napkin. But that would be giving them to much credit.

      This is about holding customers hostage on promised upgrades and throwing a tantrum over possible Title II reclassification. Even though they already enjoy the benefits of Title II (subsidies) without having to be classified as such.

    2. Re:Yeah right by zlives · · Score: 5, Informative

      hey maybe they can just return all the fucking money they took to provide broadband and never did all these years

    3. Re:Yeah right by NotSanguine · · Score: 5, Informative

      This money.

      And that money.

      --
      No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
    4. Re:Yeah right by nine-times · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Yeah, it's hard to see this as anything other than a threat, that if the government doesn't do what AT&T wants, they might just take their ball and go home. I can see how someone would think this is fair, in the sense that businesses can't make good decisions without knowing what "the rules" are, but at the same time, you can only take that so far.

      It seems like businesses and rich people are constantly pulling this act. "I'm afraid that if you tax me at all, I'll just have to pull all my money and business out of the country and operate someplace where they don't have taxes." or "Well, we can't have laws barring us from acting immorally and unethically. If we can't be completely unfettered, then we can't get anything done and our business will fail!" At some point, I think we just have to say, "Sorry, but we can't just let you do whatever you want with no boundaries. The reality is, we all operate within constraints, and we all have to cope with an uncertain future. If you can't operate with fair and honest business practices within a framework that allows our society to grow in a healthy direction, then we'll find someone else to fill your shoes." I mean, really, AT&T doesn't see the benefit in growing and upgrading their network? Fine, let's rip their network out and replace it with public infrastructure. I suspect that if those were the options, AT&T would find that it could manage to upgrade their network while operating within the principles of net neutrality.

  2. It was mostly lies to begin with. by andywebs · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They were never going to widely deploy 1Gbps anywhere, in the first place. They had stated to share holders that their capital expenditures would hardly go up to implement this in 35 cities, meaning they weren't really going to be doing very much anyway, other than uncapping existing fiber from dsl speeds.

    http://www.dslreports.com/show...

  3. The modern day "Chewbacca Defense" by MetricT · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "We're going to stop doing that thing that we've been promising for years that we were gonna get around to doing one of these days, but never actually got around to doing, because OBAMA"

    It's sad, but adding "Obama" to any argument has become the modern day equivalent of the "Chewbacca Defense", and has been used to rationalize some profoundly stupid decisions. Even sadder, because it seems to work.

    I'm a moderate (r)epublican, and it's *lonely* nowdays. The intelligent ones liked David Frum have been muffled or sidelined. Meanwhile, the Wingnut Brigade as personified by Ted Cruz is always on the lookout to shoot the public in the foot for the sake of rich people.