Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: Joel B Levin Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: AT&T Advertisement is Stupid Message-ID: <2737@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 9 Jan 90 19:46:38 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Reply-To: Joel B Levin Organization: BBN Communications Corporation Lines: 29 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 16, message 3 of 11 In article <2708@accuvax.nwu.edu> 6sigma2@.UUCP (Brian Matthews) writes: |In article <2632@accuvax.nwu.edu> ddodell@stjhmc.fidonet.org (David Dodell) |writes: ||I figure that this ad is just plain stupid, since if someone can't ||dial a number correctly, it has nothing to do with the carrier they ||are using. The ad implies otherwise. |Not that I want to stick up for AT&T's advertising department, but when |I first saw the ad, I thought the point was that having called Fiji |instead of Phoenix, he had to call the billing department of whatever |long-distance company he was using, while an AT&T operator would give |him instant credit. Of course that's the point of the ad; what we complain about is the ludicrous strawman they set up, that someone might confuse calling Fiji with calling Phoenix. And of course the alternate implications, that the ordinary user is stupid enough to make that mistake, or that the alternate long distance carrier would make that mistake. This is only one of a number of moderately sleasy long distance ads, most of which are perpetrated by AT&T. /JBL Nets: levin@bbn.com | "There were sweetheart roses on Yancey Wilmerding's or {...}!bbn!levin | bureau that morning. Wide-eyed and distraught, she POTS: (617)873-3463 | stood with all her faculties rooted to the floor."