Reply #3: MY AT&T rant...

[mumon]

They have got to be the quintessential f*cked up American company.

Those "rules" were just the tip of the iceberg; I have had personal experience with the "strategy" of AT&T since divestiture, and frankly, if capitalism can't deep-6 a company as badly run as AT&T, then we're better off with Communism.

AT&T makes most of its money doing what today, you may ask? Well, yes, they still do have a long distance service. That's about it. They also make money "selling" their name to: AT&T wireless (spun off long ago), AT&T cable (spun off long ago), AT&T "business systems" (wtf?), etc.


In business proceedings AT&T has been inflexible, technically myopic, arrogant, and completely divorced from any kind of "business" strategy. They famously killed several important technical standards simply because they didn't get their way. These standards were later done in other forums- with AT&T kept on the sidelines. They are seen as a disruptive force generally in these kinds of proceedings.

Their treatment of employees is, well, feces.

In short, they never got over the fact that they WERE divested in the first place.