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Comments on news posted 2013-01-25 11:12:18: AT&T released their fourth quarter 2012 earnings this week, showing that the communications giant logged $32.2 billion in revenue for the quarter. The lion's share of that was of course wireless service, with AT&T saying they sold 8. ..

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Nezmo
The name's Bond. James Bond.
MVM
join:2004-11-10
Coppell, TX

Nezmo

MVM

Might wanna fix that headline...

Billion?

nickelman
Premium Member
join:2002-10-14
Medford, NJ

nickelman

Premium Member

Correction

8.6 Billion is a lot of iPhones....

skeechan
Ai Otsukaholic
Premium Member
join:2012-01-26
AA169|170

3 edits

skeechan

Premium Member

Lobbying should be outlawed

We roll into a Senator's office with a prewritten law and a sack of money, we go to FPMITAP for bribery but it is biz as usual for corporations, environmental kooks and unions.

Lobbying should be called what it is, bribery and prosecuted as such.

And you don't have to curtail speech, even for corporations and unions. The solution is simple; for politicians, a minimum life sentence and a billion dollar fine (so their families can't benefit from their corruption) if they take money from a contributor and then don't exempt themselves from voting on those issues. If they take money from AT&T, they go to prison if they vote on anything telecom. With the benefit from bribery gone, the money would instantly dry up.
TexasRebel
join:2011-05-29
Edgewood, TX

TexasRebel

Member

32 Billion in a quarter and...

they still can't outpace Verizon in LTE deployment.. WTF are they doing with all that money?!? Building a moon base on the dark side of the moon??

SHoTTa35
@munival.com

SHoTTa35

Anon

Apple would really like AT&T....

8.6 BILLION iPhones? Hehe... might want to make a few corrections there. They activated 8.6 billion - how many of those they sold we don't know as activations included unlocked phones that people bought Europe/Australia/Apple.com and used on AT&T as well as hand me downs (someone upgrading from iPhone 4s to iPhone 5 and gives their old phone to someone using another type of phone counts as 2 activations even though they were already on AT&T).

dnoyeB
Ferrous Phallus
join:2000-10-09
Southfield, MI

1 recommendation

dnoyeB to Nezmo

Member

to Nezmo

Re: Might wanna fix that headline...

I can almost see the pinky finger!

Transmaster
Don't Blame Me I Voted For Bill and Opus
join:2001-06-20
Cheyenne, WY

Transmaster to TexasRebel

Member

to TexasRebel

Re: 32 Billion in a quarter and...

That has to be a typo I don't think there has been that many iPhones sold period.

odog
Minister of internet doohickies
Premium Member
join:2001-08-05
Atlanta, GA

odog to Nezmo

Premium Member

to Nezmo

Re: Might wanna fix that headline...

Yeah... buy apple stock.
sparc
join:2006-05-06

1 recommendation

sparc to nickelman

Member

to nickelman

Re: Correction

with that many iphones sold, you'd really have to wonder why Apple's stock price went down.... lol
sparc

sparc to Nezmo

Member

to Nezmo

Re: Might wanna fix that headline...

that's only one iphone for every person on planet earth. AT&T can do better than that. :P
xenophon
join:2007-09-17

xenophon

Member

End of phone subsidies?

quote:
AT&T saw $17.6 billion in wireless revenues, but lost $3.9 billion, like Verizon, due to pension plans and handset subsidies.
Tmobile will soon stop handset subsidies, Sprint could be next. Will ATT/VZW follow?
silbaco
Premium Member
join:2009-08-03
USA

silbaco

Premium Member

Not until they see how it works out for their competitors.

nonamesleft
join:2011-11-07
Manitowoc, WI

nonamesleft

Member

at&t nothing but a shady bad all around corporation

Why don't they sell the unprofitable areas that they pissed off, to some other business that is slightly better then att?
I got a nicely hand written letter yesterday from att, "our neighbors at" "so and so's address" yeah, go away att, you blew it a few months ago! I ain't coming back!
Terabit
join:2008-12-19

1 edit

Terabit to skeechan

Member

to skeechan

Re: Lobbying should be outlawed

I always love how you guys group unions with the trillion dollar corporate lobbyists, into the same group.

Contrary to popular RWer myth, less than 6.6% of workers today are in a union. Therefore, to sit here and insinuate that this 6.6% is apparently ruining it for everyone, let alone in the same group as a billion dollar industry lobbyist, is just baseless and absurd.
decifal7
join:2007-03-10
Bon Aqua, TN

decifal7

Member

really?

How is it this many has been sold while apples stock crashs?

skeechan
Ai Otsukaholic
Premium Member
join:2012-01-26
AA169|170

3 edits

1 recommendation

skeechan to Terabit

Premium Member

to Terabit

Re: Lobbying should be outlawed

Of course they're in the same group. All of these special interests claim to be benevolent while in actuality they're morally bankrupt bloodsucking parasites leaching money they didn't earn.

Meanwhile that 6.6% number you cite is only for the private sector. In the public sector, where they routinely fleece taxpayers and bankrupt governments, it's 35.9%.

Greedy special interests can all go F themselves. They have run out of everyone else's money.

bsboy
@verizon.net

bsboy to decifal7

Anon

to decifal7

Re: really?

"It’s not that Apple isn’t making money. It made $13.1 billion last quarter. By some counts, that’s the largest non-oil-company quarterly profit ever."

»qz.com/47712/apple-earni ··· uidance/

Too close with estimates VS actual predictions?

IowaCowboy
Lost in the Supermarket
Premium Member
join:2010-10-16
Springfield, MA

IowaCowboy

Premium Member

AT&T vs Verizon

I used to have AT&T but I switched to Verizon shortly after they launched the iPhone, and I think Verizon has better call quality. I also like the 4G LTE on Verizon.

Rangersfan
@sbcglobal.net

Rangersfan to nonamesleft

Anon

to nonamesleft

Re: at&t nothing but a shady bad all around corporation

Because no other company wants to buy those areas.

Jack Legg
@comcast.net

Jack Legg to nickelman

Anon

to nickelman

Re: Correction

Karl was just using standard telco accounting practices.

delusion ftl
@slcgov.com

delusion ftl to decifal7

Anon

to decifal7

Re: really?

Because this was supposed to be their holy grail quarter, you know the one where they had just released a new phone (instead of the 4s "refresh") with LTE and a big screen and it was going to show that Apple was going to gain against android, that it could compete, at least in this quarter, substantially.
Over the course of the quarter it became apparent that they were selling a lot of iPhones, just not selling a lot to new users. Even ATT had around 80-85% of iphones sold were to existing iPhone customers. This is essentially a loss for ATT because Apple subsidies are staggeringly high, almost double in many cases. It's a good deal for Apple that many of their users are loyal, but without significant marketshare growth there is concern.

So Apple managed to move 47 ish million iphones, meanwhile Google activated around 150 million android devices in the same quarter. This was Apples quarter, their new, large screen phone, LTE, not a refresh, and the wind fell out of the sails.

At this point the analysts start to wonder if the shiny paint that most tech sites have been talking about disappearing for a year or more is starting to fall off of the iPhone and it's long term growth prospects is probably not nearly as good as some had previously believed.

Couple that with the absolutely dismal sale of Mac computers, and the eroding tablet marketshare to android and that why investors are taking a step back.
en103
join:2011-05-02

en103 to bsboy

Member

to bsboy
Apple actually because #2 overall today, as its stock value lost more than most companies are worth.

Eddy120876
join:2009-02-16
Bronx, NY

Eddy120876 to skeechan

Member

to skeechan

Re: Lobbying should be outlawed

We need citation for that my friend since you know the right only listen to Faux news that tells you Unions suck people dry and yet offer no proof of this. Yet those wonderful right to work states pay the less,work you to death and get no rights and can get fired and re hired 3 moths down the road so you can keep working and get no benefits. I call that Right to work=Modern day slavery

skeechan
Ai Otsukaholic
Premium Member
join:2012-01-26
AA169|170

4 edits

skeechan

Premium Member

Like it or not, you are worth only what it costs to replace you. There is a labor market just like every other market. When wages are artificially held above equilibrium, you have unemployment and inflated prices for goods and services. When they are well above equilibrium as they are now, you have very high unemployment; currently it is 8% despite there being millions fewer people in the workforce. Unemployment would be 11% if those people were still in the available workforce. When labor costs are sky high above equilibrium as is the case in certain sectors of the labor market the supply of those jobs evaporates. We saw that with textiles in the 1980's and manufacturing in the 1990's. Now there is no industrial base to support the economy so the public sector unions have run out of everyone else's money along with the shell games to hide the massive debt and pension burdens. Virtually every state has more government workers than those in manufacturing and there are now trillions in unfunded pension liabilities. The result is having to cut services right and left to pay for them. There is no one left to pull the cart while governments have accumulated an unimaginable level of union pension debt. Future generations have been fiscally raped to satisfy today's public union greed.

We have only to look at the Postal Service to see the unsustainability of this. A few years ago the USPS was compelled to start banking money to pay these future liabilities. They make the promise to the workers, they have to start setting aside the money to pay it. They don't have the money to even begin saving to pay these future liabilities. They are making promises they could never pay. Who seriously thinks that in 20 years, with all the advancements in digital communications that the USPS will have the massive profits needed to pay these obligations? No one. It would mean a taxpayer bailout just like GM, which still owes the taxpayers billions and billions of dollars and that is after stealing from the SECURED mom and pop bond holders and giving a chunk of the company to the unions. It is like making a promise to your kid that you will pay for their college education but instead of saving for it, you are just going to pay the tuition bills out of pocket when you get them. We all know the money won't be there and the kid is screwed out of his promise. Stop making promises ya can't afford and stop expecting promises for stuff that you know are not possible.

The economics of labor is just a fact of life, and it is a fact parents for the last 20 years have refused to tell their spoiled booger eating children. They have been telling their idiot kids that they are "special". Now those narcissistic, think anyone gives a crap about their blogs, tweets and FB, children end up getting a degree in Women's Studies with a minor in Sanskrit and then are shocked when they can't get a job, any job. After being told their whole lives that they're special they find that they aren't. In fact they're well below par, beyond worthless to all potential employers. Then they end up at Walmart and Starbucks pissed that they're not getting $50,000 for their 28 hour a week job and demand unionization. Meanwhile we need to issue truckloads of H1B Visas to get engineers here. The problem isn't that there aren't good paying jobs. The problem is that too many people are lazy spoiled brats.

The bottom line is no one owes you a living. The days of getting $90,000 with a high school diploma are long over. If you want more money and job security, get saleable skills instead of being a parasite. When you are a parasite the host dies, or it takes a chemical bath before leaving for Viet Nam and Malaysia.

The unions are dying because their economic model of artificially high labor cost is unsustainable. Not every job will pay a middle class wage, period. Now you can call it Faux propaganda, but this is how the world is and you can grit your teeth with the other 3 people who watch MSNBC and you can do it while filling out applications for McDonald's and Dominos. But wouldn't it be better to get saleable skills and forge your own future? Oh I know, that would require some hard work and initiative and today people want everything without having to work for it, the entitlement mentality that is turning a nation of makers into one of takers. It is time EVERYONE gets out of the cart and starts pulling.

That's all I'm going to say on this. Thankfully people are wising up and public sector pension reforms are being passed across the nation while private sector union ranks are on the decline. At the same time corporate welfare needs to end; enough with the subsidies for green energy and Wall St. bailouts. Enough with "capital gains" and time to regard all forms of "income" the same and tax it the same. Enough with the perks and special favors for ANYONE. Enough for one person or business getting a "break" while others are left to make up the difference with the balance borrowed on the credit of future generations. It is time that takers of all stripes: private, public, union, corporate; all of them stop holding their hands out and are forced to be makers again. The time has come to throw EVERYONE out of the cart and reconsider the criteria for getting back in.

/following stop

scguy864
@bellsouth.net

scguy864

Anon

No Choice

It's a shame that I live in a 194 unit apartment complex in Upstate SC where I have no choice. The idiots at Charter decided we are to far away from the main road which is BS to bring service in. So we are stuck with AT&T and Directv. The DSL and phone have worked fine although limited to 6 meg down and lousy 512k up. We keep hearing U-Verse is coming, but not quite sure that's any better. To be honest I was hijacked into the phone service to get a good rate on the DSL, that pisses me off. Like I said no choice here.
elray
join:2000-12-16
Santa Monica, CA

elray

Member

Un-Upgraded Losses?

Once again, Karl is reading the tea leaves and applying a bit of editorial license. Where does it claim in the quarterly report that the "DSL Losses" are in "un-upgraded" territory?

I submit that it could be the opposite.
Last May, Karl claimed that AT&T was forcing U-Verse upgrades.
Each of which would account for a "DSL loss" - in an upgraded area.
steevo22
join:2002-10-17
Fullerton, CA

steevo22 to Rangersfan

Member

to Rangersfan

Re: at&t nothing but a shady bad all around corporation

said by Rangersfan :

Because no other company wants to buy those areas.

Because we are talking about pesky regulated services. Yep. No one wants those.

Now if the regulators would just do their job and force ATT to maintain that infrastructure they were already paid billions of dollars to maintain.....

If the regulators would realize that IP service today is the bona fide equivalent of the PSTN of 50 years ago, and ATT was indeed paid to maintain that, they should be just forced to provide every one of their wireline customers with at least a 6 MBPS data line at regulated rates.

Yeah, I said it. Those services should *all* be regulated.

I am there. I have the $14.95 ATT DSL right now, and they are still advertising $14.95 DSL on their website. It can barely manage a 2 MB download, and they raised the rates to see if I would complain 7 months after they put it in. It's been a year now and they have just jacked up the rates again. To what they say is the "regular" price. I say the regular price is the one you put on your website. There ought to be a law!

These are all big bad companies and they are all using the same playbook. Advertise cheap prices then raise them later, claiming those are the "regular" prices. But only chumps pay those inflated prices.

Believe it or not TWC is cheaper, for a while at least.
kevin_pink
join:2006-10-15
Bronx, NY

kevin_pink to skeechan

Member

to skeechan

Re: Lobbying should be outlawed

I think you forgot your sarcasm tag

anon anon
@charter.com

anon anon to elray

Anon

to elray

Re: Un-Upgraded Losses?

said by elray:

Once again, Karl is reading the tea leaves and applying a bit of editorial license.

When DOESN'T Karl do this?

PremTech
@sbcglobal.net

PremTech to skeechan

Anon

to skeechan

Re: Lobbying should be outlawed

Are you a former Union employee? That's a lot of hatred for something that raises wages and benefits for working class families. Should we all have Chinese labor laws and pay? It's not unions that are bankrupting goverments. It's the fact that houses have lost 1/2 their values so property taxes have plummeted. I would be more than happy to vote for higher taxes. I did not ask for my taxes to continue to keep dropping.
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