AT&T, Comcast Start SwingingTV advertising takes aim.... ( old news - 09:58AM Wednesday Dec 26 2007) tags: Video · competition · business · Comcast · AT&T U-VerseTriple play competition between AT&T and Comcast is heating up in the Detroit market. According to the Detroit News, the two companies have been bombarding the region with new ads that take shots at one another. Comcast ads brush aside AT&T as the pesky TV upstart, while AT&T ads are trying to alert locals to the fact they they're not just providing voice service any more. AT&T insists they're taking the high road: "We're standing on what we believe without badmouthing the competition," Moore said. "We're also keeping it local. We know what pushes buttons for our Michigan customers." On their minds? Value and state-of-the-art technology, she said. The company has taken one dig at Comcast. A current TV spot advertising an Internet and telephone package promises its price is permanent, not temporary "like the other guys," a clear poke at Comcast's heavily promoted limited-time deals. This is only round one, given U-Verse service was only launched in Detroit last May. While AT&T offers U-Verse to 350,000 homes in Michigan, the company only just hit the 126,000 subscriber mark nationally at the end of last quarter.
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- U-Verse Arrives In Memphis
- AT&T Launches New Video Portal
- Comcast Internet Video Launching Before Year End
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dadkins
Can you do Blu?
Premium,MVM
join:2003-09-26
Hercules, CA
 ·Comcast
| Pricing? Permanent? LOL! Sure it is!
... until ESPN or Football Network, et al, decide they want more money for whomever to carry their programming.
We won't even get into internet speeds... 
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Think outside the Fox... Opera | |
|  | neufuse
join:2006-12-06
Indiana, PA | Re: Pricing? Permanent? Yep lets not get into how slow comcast can get when the node is saturated at different points in the day :P | |
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dadkins
Can you do Blu?
Premium,MVM
join:2003-09-26
Hercules, CA | Re: Pricing? Permanent? ... and that, of course, means everyone that has Comcast is having this same issue, huh? 
--
Think outside the Fox... Opera | |
| | | | neufuse
join:2006-12-06
Indiana, PA | Re: Pricing? Permanent? seen more slowdowns on Comcast then I've seen on DSL... | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC
 ·North State Commun..
| Re: Pricing? Permanent? said by neufuse  :seen more slowdowns on Comcast then I've seen on DSL... I was able to compare a Comcast cable connection and an AT&T DSL connection in Knoxville, TN this weekend. The Comcast connection was snappier and blew the DSL connection away in overall speed.
The AT&T DSL connection was painful to browse on at 1.5Mbps after using my 15Mbps fiber at home. The Comcast connection was so much snappier and seemed more responsive. It really was night and day.
It mirrored my previous experience here in Greensboro, NC with Road Runner and AT&T (Bellsouth) DSL. | |
| | | | | | neufuse
join:2006-12-06
Indiana, PA
·Comcast
| Re: Pricing? Permanent? DSL has different modes... such as fast and interleaved... interleaved is slower... but then I am on a 7.1Mbit DSL line right now and its just as fast as Comcast's cable and has the same ping and latency times... but don't have to worry about node saturation... just CO saturation... with Cable you have node saturation and the CMTS's backend being saturated... They might have a 128Mbit connection going into the Head end for internet... but having requests for 200Mbit of data at once ontop of that my node might be maxing out also... not that I don't like cable... just always felt like more room for problems to me
but anyways competition is good! | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC
·North State Commun..
| Re: Pricing? Permanent? said by neufuse :but anyways competition is good! That really is the bottom line! Regardless of which product works best for you, having competition directly helps lower the pricing of the product that works best for you.
It's refreshing to hear that ... sometimes the signal to noise ratio on this site can be pretty low.  | |
| | | | | | NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| I can't say I have seen a 15M connection. I can say that a 6M Comcast connection is no snappier than a 1.5M DSL connection.
For $57.95 a month to get a 4M connection (with DirecTV I have no need for cable TV; and even getting Comcast "Basic" TV for $13.41 only saves a couple of pennies a month on cost), I'll keep my DSL, thank you, and spend the difference on anime and manga.
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Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum | |
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entropy1
Premium
join:2002-09-25 | Re: Pricing? Permanent? Snappy is a very objective word. Your first statement that 6 is no "snappier" than 1.5 is just silly. I grew up in Knoxville, BTW. Colorado is "snappier" than Tennessee. | |
| | | | | | | | NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
·Pacific Bell - SBC
1 edit | Re: Pricing? Permanent? It is not silly at all, it is what I experienced. All of which just demonstrates that how "snappy" the web appears is a very subjective experience.
My experience, while visiting a relative with a Comcast HSI connection, and comparing with my DSL, is that there is nothing making the higher cost ($57.95 for Comcast, vs. $24.95 for AT&T) worth the higher speed.
P.S. Matt was first to throw "snappier" into this debate.
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Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum | |
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Homer J
Mmmm, Free Goo
join:2000-10-05
Springfield | Hmmmm, I live in Knoxville and have Comcast. I wouldn't call it snappy. It's ok, and has its issues like any other internet service. It gets bogged down too often, and the modems they use are crap. But in general it has been ok. | |
| | | | | cableguy619
join:2003-06-24
Chula Vista, CA | ON DSL if you are further away from the CO you will not get the speeds you pay for. I don't think you understand how both systems work at all. | |
| | | | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here
| Re: Pricing? Permanent? Actually you don't. ADSL is syncronous. If you can't get the speed you're buying the modem will not connect at that rate. Ergo, you shouldn't even be sold it. If you're sold 6Mb/s you'll get a consistent speeds around that rate.
But not getting the speeds you pay for is a cable thing and not a DSL thing. | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC
·North State Commun..
| Re: Pricing? Permanent? said by bogey780 :Actually you don't. ADSL is syncronous. If you can't get the speed you're buying the modem will not connect at that rate. Ergo, you shouldn't even be sold it. If you're sold 6Mb/s you'll get a consistent speeds around that rate. And you're saying a customer has NEVER been sold a DSL speed package and they didn't receive the speed they were promised due to DSL limitations? Surely you jest. | |
| | | | | | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here | Re: Pricing? Permanent? Sure, it's happened. But sales mistakes have always happened in the utilities business. Comcast will gladly sell people HDTV even if they don't have an HDTV set. Stuff like that will happen. | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | bogey780
join:2004-03-19
Here | Re: Pricing? Permanent? If you're living in the SE you have the old BST sync profiles which accomodate for it. You still get consistant speed seither way. | |
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imrf
Premium
join:2002-06-06
Utica, MI | Re: Pricing? Permanent? I'm talking legacy AT&T areas. Bell South had the smarts to add in overhead, AT&T/SBC didn't. | |
| | | | | | | | NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| said by imrf :They you obviously don't know much about AT&T then. They advertise 6Mbps internet speeds but the max you'll ever see due to overhead and ATM is 5.2Mbps. If you really know AT&T, then you would know that they have a fine print escape clause. They tell you, in the fine print, that they are selling you "synch" speed in those legacy SBC areas. If you order 6M service, and your modem holds synch reliably at 6016kbps/768kbps, you are getting what they advertise.
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Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum | |
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imrf
Premium
join:2002-06-06
Utica, MI | Re: Pricing? Permanent? That's all find and dandy, but their advertisements don't say that, they say download speeds up to 6Mbps, which you will never ever get. | |
| | | | | | | | | | NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA | Re: Pricing? Permanent? Is it shady? Is it legal? Those are the only questions that matter.
Answers, in my opinion:
Yes.
Yes.
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Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum | |
| | | | | | NormanS
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-14
San Jose, CA
·Pacific Bell - SBC
| said by cableguy619 :ON DSL if you are further away from the CO you will not get the speeds you pay for. I don't think you understand how both systems work at all. Really? I am getting all the speed I am paying for. If I were 500 feet farther from the DSLAM (yes, mine is in a CO; but there are folk who are 25,000 feet from their CO, yet only 5,000 feet from a DSLAM), the company wouldn't even sell me 3M DSL; and I would get the full 1.5M I was paying for. All the way until I was just too far to get DSL at all.
It all depends upon how the provider offers DSL. AT&T doesn't do it the same as Qwest.
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Norman
~Oh Lord, why have you come
~To Konnyu, with the Lion and the Drum | |
| | | 
orphanannie
@bellsouth.net
| yea, I just switched from comcast to at&t, and it's funny how it all turns out to be. We get commercials all the time showing dsl as "turtles" and thats quite contrary to the truth. While I had comcast, Every day once the evening came around and sometimes all day long I couldn't break 3 meg. I was not a happy customer because I was paying for 8 meg. Ten comcast techs must have come out to my house until I was fed up. My neighbor across the street had dsl and he said he never experienced such a thing. I switched to AT&T dsl about a month ago and have had smooth sailing ever since. What I love most about it all is that I signed up for 3 meg with at&t and I'm saving money every month and they gave me 300 bucks for ditching cable. I love you at&t! | |
| | | cableguy619
join:2003-06-24
Chula Vista, CA | uhhh ATT uses the same format as cable... Bring the node as close as they can to the service area. Difference is ATT shold have gone Fiber to the home to make a difference.. | |
| | |
ATT wannabe
@wideopenwest.com
| said by neufuse :Yep lets not get into how slow comcast can get when the node is saturated at different points in the day :P Yeah, no need to check AT&T's speed as it's never up long enough to check..  | |
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kapil
The Kapil
join:2000-04-26
Chicago, IL
| Oh Lawd! This is like picking a politician. Which one of the two giant faceless, heartless, greedy and profit-driven corporations will whisper sweet nothings into my ear and use some lube as it bends me over? hmmm.
First rule of fight club is, you must not talk about how you're about to screw the consumer until after he's signed by the dotted line.
--
»PropertyMaps.com - Real-time, map based, nationwide MLS property search! | |
| steven s
Premium
join:2002-09-14
Dearborn, MI
·WOW Internet and C..
| . The Detroit News has been having an obsession with advertising that AT&T's entry to the cable market had increased competition, will bring prices down, quality up, peace on earth, etc. Of course, they neglect to mention that Detroit, before AT&T's entry, is one of the few markets in the nation that already has cable competition. But this "marketing war" only exists in the minds of the hyper-conservative-corporatist Detroit News. I haven't seen any of these commercials, or any of these "aggressive tactics." In fact, any ad for AT&T TV services is for their Dish services, not U-verse. The Detroit News has a record, though, of publishing corporate press releases as news. | |
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imrf
Premium
join:2002-06-06
Utica, MI
·Comcast
·WOW Internet and C..
| Re: . said by steven s :The Detroit News has been having an obsession with advertising that AT&T's entry to the cable market had increased competition, will bring prices down, quality up, peace on earth, etc. Of course, they neglect to mention that Detroit, before AT&T's entry, is one of the few markets in the nation that already has cable competition. But this "marketing war" only exists in the minds of the hyper-conservative-corporatist Detroit News. I completely agree with you. This whole "competition brings dramatic price decreases" is a lie, and nobody on this site seems to understand this. AT&T brought an inferior product to market, thus making it cheaper.
I haven't seen any of these commercials, or any of these "aggressive tactics." I have, and they're lame. I don't know where the AT&T spokesperson claims that they aren't throwing mud at Comcast in their commercials, but they in fact are. The commercials are nothing more than a pissing contest for each side. And I am sick and tired of seeing that dumb woman from Comcast claiming Comcast is cheaper than satellite service. It was the most poorly scripted commercial yet from Comcast, I think. None of the promos from either side are all that great either. From Comcast, the promos were better 3 years ago. I know a few people who do sales for Comcast, and I ask them randomly what promos are good. For the last 6 months I was told that the promos aren't as good as they used to be. As for AT&T, I haven't even wasted my time with looking at their prices since they still can't offer more than 1 HD stream to a house.
The Detroit News has a record, though, of publishing corporate press releases as news. Yeah, it's a useless paper. | |
| 
ztmike
Mark for moderation
Premium
join:2001-08-02
Michigan City, IN | Comcast? My buddy in Detroit has WoW ..guessing Comcast doesn't offer service in Detroit? | |
| | steven s
Premium
join:2002-09-14
Dearborn, MI
·WOW Internet and C..
| Re: Comcast? said by ztmike :My buddy in Detroit has WoW ..guessing Comcast doesn't offer service in Detroit? They're competitors - both WOW and Comcast service Detroit. | |
| | hottboiinnc
ME
join:2003-10-15
Cleveland, OH | WOW used to be Americast service from Ameritech until SBC took over and decided to sell the entire company/network off. Then decided later on they wanted to get back in the game. I give them a few years and they'll be doing it again. | |
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Matt
Take me down to the paradise city
Premium
join:2003-07-20
Jamestown, NC |  100,000 Mark
No wonder they need a bought and paid for FCC to help. | |
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See 7 replies to this post | |
JPGrimmace
join:2003-09-16
Pontiac, MI
| U-Verse As a current & recent U-Verse customer and a former longtime Comcast customer in the Detroit Area, I've gotta say U-Verse TV or (Advanced HD TV or whatever they're marketing it as now) beats the snot out of Comcast's TV offerings in regards to price, features and performance. It's not even comparable. The value is twice as much as what Comcast offers and the price is less than half for the nearest package, not including that you have to pay extra for BTN or NFL Network on Comcast.
They've long since stolen the crown of evil greedy monopoly from SBC/ATT. Comcast is the worst. | |
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See 7 replies to this post | |
Titus Pullo
I came, I saw, I slept
join:2004-06-26
·Embarq
| Comcast is an attack ad I've never seen a positive Comcast ad, with the exception of ads claiming new hires. Everything I've seen is an attack on the competition in some way or another - never do they toot their own horn. Wonder why that is?
Did they sh_t can the ad where it looks like a news alert by a bona-fide anchor to catch your attention? I saw that, realized it was Comcast, and my BP went up a good 20 points. Idiots.
--
.sig gulping Zestril | |
| 
Rick
Premium,MVM
join:2001-02-06
Waterbury, CT
clubs: 
| lol.....AT&T... is talking about COMCAST promoting SPECIAL pricing?
That antiquated old piece of rotting copper company dotting America is the KING of PROMOTING special one time pricing.
They built their entire DSL business on it in fact.
And now..guess what their NEW game appears to be?
Promoting Uverse as a FIBER to the HOME company!!
Yep..that's right sports fans.
I've recently spoken to two different people in my area who were contacted by their sales people recently who were promoting their Uverse service as exactly that.
In fact..one of them is a member here and sent me a message about it after he had a Uverse door to door salesman at his door recently.
Nothing like trying to ride the coat tails of Verizon eh?
Well.guess what folks? It's not fiber to the home at all and with 100k customers after all this time..they aren't fooling ANYONE with that crap they're rolling out and too cheap to do the job the right way.
What it really is is that same old tired worn out copper that couldn't even get me a clear dialtone without static all over the place never mind them now trying to pump hdtv..high speed data AND voice over it.
AT&T is going down like the HINDENBURG with this service unless they somehow manage to wake up.
And do it QUICK!!
AT&T = the next AOL.
What a freaking disaster Uverse is!
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The Coyote captured the RR! Roadrunner Rick is now Comcastic! | |
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See 7 replies to this post | |
USMP Jason
@rr.com
| AT&T Vs. Comcast I am a field sales consultant for AT&T u-verse in the michigan market. I try by best though to be unbiased. I have had comcast for a long time and now I've got u-verse. Here are my thoughts.
First off, with the idea of competition in the detroit market... Yes there has already been competition in the detrtoi market... in VERY small areas. Most areas are strictly serviced by comcast. If you go further out
from detroit, you will see other companies such as WOW, Charter, and Brighthouse. These areas typically are once again strictly being serviced by only ONE of these companies. So there is competition in some areas... not much though.
AT&T U-verse is the best. No questions asked. Any other cable service cannot compare in service, features and simply picture clarity. I've been to many people's homes who have the service and I myself have been astonished at the picture clarity on even older CRT televisions. The price is pretty and usually less than the very best "introductory" offers that the other guys have, except without being introductory, and without being in a contract.
Now AT&T dsl... It's constant. Depending on what areas you live in, comcast is not even worth looking into. If you live in a highly populated area, you will get super slow, super expensive cable internet. With AT&T dsl, you get great value with what you pay for. 1.5 megs for 20$ a month... can't beat that. Especially if you only use it for surfing the web and checking emails. Please people do not forget though that u-verse dsl is very different than your standard "over the phone line" dsl. U-verse dsl is simply faster and at the same price when you package it with the television.
The big question of competition as it stands right now, is hardly visible. With such a small population of michigan eligable for u-verse, cable companies still have their reign. This is slowly diminishing though, as AT&T brings u-verse to more and more neighborhoods. Remember, in the words of Comcast... your world delivered, eventually. | |
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See 18 replies to this post | |
Mr Anon
@ameritech.net
| Here in IL too. We are getting tons of commercials you can't really go a commercial break or two on fox during a good show without one.
Comcast has their Big Old Expensive Phone Company, commercials complete with stuffy board members dancing badly - a few slowkies commercials (none new), AT&T has two that attack so far: One with a huge comcast bill that walks around and talks about introduction rates and how it will cost more now, email attachments and brakes a little girl's piggy bank so they can pay the bill. The other one has a guy that reads a really short bed time story with a large bill at the end. There is a third but it doesn't really attack its an add for ATT's triple play, Phone, Broadband, and Digital TV or Cellular.
Sometimes its kind of funny from booth sides, but the repetition makes me want to mute all commercials. | |
| 
insomniac
Oh Yeah
Premium
join:2002-09-22
Naperville, IL
clubs: | Chicago being bombarded too We've been getting these ads for months, though U-Verse isn't even available here yet.
--
If everything seems to be going well, you've obviously overlooked something. | |
| | brutesquad
join:2007-12-27
| Re: Chicago being bombarded too It may be sooner than you think. The area where I work is about 30 minutes outside Chicago. AT&t is putting in A MASSIVE AMOUNT OF FTTN boxes all over. The area where I live is far west of there and we have FTTN boxes going out all over too.
Also the Comcast 3x play really should be the 1.5x play. I had comcast 3x play and the only thing that really worked correctly was the cable piece. The phone worked poorly when the internet piece actually worked. Mind you My home was built in June so all the cabling is fairly new. I dropped everything but the cable and switched to DSL. I have excellent speed (getting 5.8) and have had 0 issues to date! I for one welcome out AT&T overlords and look forward to getting u-verse when it is available | |
| Gilitar
join:2000-11-20
Mobile, AL
1 edit | Old logo (previous death star) strikes again Contrary to popular belief, dslr proves once again that the old death star is still in existence. | |
| 
decadent
Premium
join:2002-04-02
Piscataway, NJ
| Telco advantage I think, both Verizon and at&t will beat at the end cable companies. And it is because it is one of few business that still believe in R&D. They really thought this thing through. They did make a bit of mistakes too. Verizon did not go with IPTV being a bit on conservation side. At the end 20 billion project may be slowed in its grows by 100 million piece of hardware. Also at&t did not go with widespread FTTH deployment. But it was just economical decision. And in beginning of 2007, it looked like not correct one. But at the end of 2007, it seems it was perfectly timed. With chances of recession in 2008 is about 70% (CEO of Vanguard and I trust this guy), it means that first thing to get trimmed at home is entertainment. And if at&t offers something 30% cheaper than cable, they can actually grow, when cable cos loose subscribers. Verizon is in a bit tough spot with tight credit and reduced spending, but hopefully long term they will survive. BTW, if somebody think that investors of cable cos will give green light for DOCSIS 3.0 capex in middle of recession, it is a dream. cablecos have waited too long. | |
| 
NOCMan
Verizon Fios User
Premium
join:2004-09-30
Flower Mound, TX
| At Stake? "At stake is the revenue from consumers in one of the nation's most lucrative broadband markets."
You have to be kidding me. What's the unemployment rate in Detroit? Jobs are leaving that city like rats fleeing a sinking ship. It's so bad in that state the they're hiring celebrities to run ad's asking employers to come there and set up shop.
--
Mac Chatter
»www.macchatter.net | |
| |
imrf
Premium
join:2002-06-06
Utica, MI
·Comcast
·WOW Internet and C..
| Re: At Stake? said by NOCMan : It's so bad in that state the they're hiring celebrities to run ad's asking employers to come there and set up shop. They are? Got any links to a commercial for this one. If this is even remotely close to being true I would love to see it.
The Metro Detroit area isn't in all that great of shape, but it's not as bad as you make it out to be. The state has had roughly the same unemployment rate since about Feb of 2003. The media is, again, over sensationalizing things. But that's expected from someone who doesn't live in the area and only gets their info from the media. | |
| | | attengineer
join:2007-09-26
Westland, MI | Re: At Stake? Ahh.. I live here as well and I have a completely different take on it. MI is in big big trouble. But like the governor said 5 years ago... "In 5 Years... you will be blown away!"
Yea, we are blown away alright. | |
| | | | | | | flycuban
join:2005-04-25
Homestead, FL
1 edit | Funny Funny Funny The funny part of this whole thing is: Number 1 - Comcast uses at&t as there internet backbone provider, and Number 2 - Why are they re-inventing cable TV in the year 2000! Cut the middle man out and get satellite TV, no over head...and no new cables to lay....They are getting into such an old technology... | |
| | 
prestonlewis
Premium,MVM
join:2003-04-13
Sacramento, CA
 ·VoiceStick
| Comcast is the winner . . . for now Comcast coax is quite capable of delivering triple play, for the moment. Their upload speeds are too slow, each customer service center says something different, they can't keep an appointment, but once things work, they work.
AT&T on the other hand is a joke with triple play. Much of their service area has old brittle copper, way too few CO/RTs, and their service footprint is ridiculously small. Sue they can offer phone service but DSL/Uverse is really only available to a handful of people, unless SBC bought some territory where the previous owned spent some cash on CO/RTs. Until AT&T gets serious about rolling fiber closer to the customer's door, they are not a serious contender in any war with Comcast, at least the way it appears if you consider Comcast vs. AT&T in N. Calif. Less than 6 COs/RTs in all of Sacramento County, a pretty large metropolitan area. How many DSL customers can they have with their 2 mile limit? How many Uverse customers can they have here? Comcast on the other hand serves pretty much everyone around here with triple play.
AT&T simply needs to increase their service footprint before they can be real contenders, at least in in former Pacific Telesys areas. Can't say it's the same everywhere. | |
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