Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: john@bovine.ati.com (John Higdon) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: PacTelesis Power Grab Message-ID: <2021@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 10 Dec 89 07:18:32 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: John Higdon Organization: TELECOM Digest Lines: 60 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 9, Issue 566, message 8 of 10 Kian-Tat Lim writes: > Pacific Telesis ran a full-page ad in today's Los Angeles > Times. Here's the text (there is no copyright on the ad): > [...] > In 1984, an agreement between AT&T and the U.S. Justice > Department split up the nationwide Bell system, forming Pacific > Telesis and six other regional holding companies. At that time, very > narrow limits were imposed on the services that their phone company > subsidiaries, like Pacific Bell, could offer. And for good reason. This was the topic of a meeting at the State building in San Francisco a couple of months ago between PacTelesis, information providers, and a rep from the PUC. A lot was discussed, but the long and the short of it is that since Pac*Bell controls the network, they could and probably would use every trick in the book to unfairly compete with independent providers. Once they gained a monopoly (in a completely unregulated market), they would only concentrate on lucrative aspects of the service. Since the PUC is not really sympathetic to Pac*Bell on this issue, it appears that they have taken to the streets. To see how information services provided by Pac*Bell would evolve, just look at the nation's cable TV industry. Cable companies scrambled to get exclusive franchises in cities across the US, promising to offer, not only TV stations from all over, but interactive services, educational services, and cultural programming. What did we really get? With minor exceptions, there is no interactive capability, they dropped the "out of area" TV stations and substituted all manor of over-priced pop-market pay channels. There are shopping channels, pay-per-view channels, and the rates have gone through the roof, even though technology and economies of scale would contraindicate the present high cost to the consumer. > If the Bell companies could develop and provide these services, > along with many others that people in other countries take for > granted, they would become more widely available, and growth of this > market would encourage more information providers to enter it. This is blatant nonsense. If the market is so promising, why aren't entreprenuers falling all over themselves to enter it now, as they are perfectly able to do? Is the reasoning that just because a "Bell company" enters a market that a stamp of approval has been issued? > 1. I sincerely doubt that Pacific Telesis expects to make much > money off of education-only information services. I would expect them > to quickly take a back seat to more lucrative commercial services. Absolutely correct. See my comments above about cable TV to see how there motives line up with reality. > 3. Lifting restrictions may be a bit more general than the ad > implies. I plan to call to get the further information. There is only one thing to remember: PacTelesis' dream is to become an "unregulated monopoly". John Higdon | P. O. Box 7648 | +1 408 723 1395 john@bovine.ati.com | San Jose, CA 95150 | M o o !