"Ma Bell" is coming back...

[cute fuzzy bunny]

New new AT&T/SBC has announced they will be buying BellSouth and the rest of the portion of cingular they dont already own.

The part about this I find entertaining is that Cingular bought at&t wireless from the "old" at&t before the SBC buyout, renamed all the stores and trucks and whatnot, converted the customer base, and now cingular is going to become at&t again...maybe they can scrape off that new layer of paint off everything and save a few bucks...

I cant wait to see how this passes the regulatory folks...

 

[REWahoo]

DD #1 worked as a bean counter for SBC prior to their merger with/morph to AT&T. After suffering through 7 mergers in my minimegacorp career, my advice to her was run, don't walk to the nearest exit. She left them the end of the year and just called me about the latest announcement...and to thank me and remind me how smart old dad was.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

Looks like they're going to axe 10,000 jobs as a result of the merger.

 

[HFWR]

synergy...

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

lets not forget cost savings.

 

[mickeyd]

AT&T was one of the best run companies in America when the Feds made them brake it up into a dozen pieces back in 1984. Looks like the puzzle is continueing to be slowly put back together again.

I do not know if it will be better for the consumer or the workers or the stockholders or the AT&T management but here it is folks!

 

[laurence]

One of the best companies? Maybe one of the best monopolies...I remember my parent's long distant rates being higher than they are now, didn't they used to rent you a phone, acted as if you should count yourself lucky?

I don't really like the slow creep into monopoly again, but that era is gone. Cable phone, internet phone, cell phone providers falling all over themselves to get your business.

This latest gobbling binge reminds me of waterworld, last survivors shooting each other for the few scraps of dirt and paper left. They may get a bigger piece of the pie, but the pie itself is shrinking.

 

[cute fuzzy bunny]

The service was okay as I recall, but the price was ridiculous and the offerings were slim. But the telephones they rented you could be thrown down a flight of stairs and survive.

The problem I have with the current environment is companies willing to spend billions collectively on marketing and zero on actual customer service.

Now if the companies werent being run by marketing guys, I suppose it'd be different. You do what you understand.