Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!bellcore!texbell!vector!telecom-gateway
From: pantor!richard@uunet.uu.net (Richard Sargent)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Divestiture, Business and the General Public
Message-ID: <telecom-v09i0202m02@vector.dallas.tx.us>
Date: 16 Jun 89 14:08:06 GMT
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X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 202, message 2 of 9

Hello,

After the invitation to submit subjective comments, I have a few personal
opinions for you.

In many respects, deragulation, as practiced in the United States, is a little
like throwing out the baby with the bath water. What do I mean? Well, by way
of example, I went to SIGGraph last year in Atlanta. This little ET sure had
a difficult time calling home! When I tried to dial the call myself, I could
not get through (I can no longer remember the exact problem :-( ). So, naively
I tried to ask the operator to place the call, after explaining the problem.

Seemingly, every time I dialed 0 I got an operator from a different system.
Certainly, the responses weren't consistent with a single training program.
So, I had to field questions of "what LD service do you want to use?". Dammit,
I just want to call home! I eventually succeeded, but I vowed to fight any
similar efforts to deregulate Canada's telecommunications industry.

Digression: airline deregulation is similarly bad. The benefits are lost in
the enormously higher risks as airlines ignore safety (take Eastern Airlines,
for example, (please?)).

If Canada goes for deregulation, I hope we can achieve a balance between the
important factors of usability, convenience, and safety versus the other
benefits of deregulation (increased competition, purportedly bring costs
to the consumer down).

Well, enough said. I hope this fuels the fires, without starting any flame
wars.

Richard Sargent                   Internet: richard@pantor.UUCP
Systems Analyst                   UUCP:     uunet!pantor!richard