Hello,
This week as we continue our coverage of the Emerging Technologies we look at the growth of the Baby Bells. These are the companies that bring the info via our phone lines to us. first historically lets look at what happened...
The year was 1982. The government went to court with AT&T. In a settlemen. Two year later there was a divestiture of 22 Bell operating companies. Out of this emerged Seven holding companies which included the following:
1) Ameritech
2) Bell Atlantic
3) Bell South
4) NYNEX
5) Pacific Telesis Group
6) Southwestern Bell Corp
7) US West
These became known as regional bell operating companies (RBOCs). They were according to the original terms prohibited from engaging in the following:
1) manufacturing telecommunications equipment
2) provding long distance service outside of boundaries
3) offering information services
4) offering video entertainment
The 1991 saw a lift of item number three and recently courts are lifting item number four. These RBOC's provide the largest switched, distributed communications network in the world. This is the network providing numerous paths of communications. This is the network handling millions of calls simultaneously. You can undestand that the RBOC's are in competition.. The business and individual consumer are dependent on this service. Many of these phone lines provide the gateway for the Info Highway Traveler to the following:
1) Commercial Online Services
2) Bulletin Boards
3) The Internet
Again, I refer to my last BDPA NY General Meeting where the topic was Multimedia. The speakers words are ever so clear to me even now. These companies are battling for among other things to "get into the homes of the consumers". The consumer may not step out of his or her house, but often the curiosity is aroused when these services are "home delivered". There is an inclination to "order out" instead of "going out"
The lifting of some of the bands has helped the RBOC's much, but alas, another problem presents itself. You have the information that you would like to deliver to John Doe, but its a lot of information! You need quailty lines to this! Yes, he/she has a phone line, but it can only handle but so much due the the type of line! The Bandwith is very low.
The challeng now for the RBOC's is to deliver embrace the emerging technologies htat allow for use of some of the following:
1) Fiber Optic Cabling
2) Digital Compression (remember last lesson?)
You can hardly get the Phone company to put in Fiber Optic, even after the operator figures out what you are talking about! If the RBOC's are to corner the market, these technologies will have to be further explored. So they continue to look at others.
Another "out", so to speak is for them to invest in cable companies. The Cable Companies have found their way into the consumer homes, so the the RBOC's might as well try to piggy back. The Cable Companes can often reach far and wide. So when you know here the money is, you have to invest. Note the following "investments"!:
1) US WEST invested 2.5 billion in Time Warner
2) SouthWestern Bell invested 1.6 billion Cox Cable
3) Bell South invested 100 million in Prime Cable
In order to control the market, it seems one must in "invest"!
We wrap another lesson. Continue to join us as continue to look at the "bigger" picture in regards to the Info Super Highway.
Remember these lessons are found in their entirety via:
http://haven.ios.com/~lessons.html
ftp: haven.ios.com's pub/users/holmanm/info_highway_lessons
These lessons brought to you as a Holman's World project!
Our Tip of the Week
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Here comes the Judge! What are the backgrounds behind the Supreme Court Justices, past and recent? Where do you find such information?
Answer.
Gopher
Whree?
info.umd.edu
Go to?
Educational Resources
Government
United States
Supreme Court Documents
Justices of the Supreme Court Biographies