Rhythms Files for Bankruptcy → Re: INSIDE SCOUPE FROM A RHYTHMS INSTALLER

No offense, but EVERYONE was showing up for work this past week at Rhythms because they want their severance check. They cut back on installs to "save money". As of today, they will be running on a skeleton crew.
And of course moral sucks. How would you or do you feel when you put you're all into a company, and it dies on you? Like I said before, a lot of people made lives out of what Rhythms gave us. A lot of us feel like our careers in Telcom are gone. So it's not just you guys out in the field whom are suffering for mistakes made by other people. There is going to be a lot of people whom possibly will go bankrupt over this, unlike Mr. Stringer and Mrs. Hapka (along with all the executives who gets 50 weeks of severance, not 4 weeks of severance like the "little people" who worked their butts of getting those lines installed) sit in their nice cozy houses, or on an island somewhere living it up. I just hope karma really does work and it's not a myth....can ya feel the love?

Tankgirl

To all Rhythms employees that gave it your best:

Thanks for your efforts and I'm sorry to see you get the short end of the stick. I hope you land on your feet when the dust settles.

I ordered Rhythms DSL shortly before my NP connection went dark. I had to wait 2.5 months to get back up. Service has been great and so were the people, although I admit my patience was tried while the routers were rescripted.

But now I ordered DSL from Ameritech and have my fingers crossed that it will be up before Rhythms goes down.

If you ask me its all a conspiracy. I think the CEO's of north point and ryhtms talked after ward I think its a scam something todo with money. Example the CEO could lie some how and profit money and just do a chapter and no more to be said. I mean well isnt that what happens when you go bank rupt? Example you could get a credit card with a 10,000 limit and take all the money off of it and do a chapter and its gone but you profit. Does this not sound right. For the workers look at jobs at Novell, SBC, IBM any where where its stable. It looks the CLEC's where corupted or dumb example if you have ISP's that just bail on you and you say ok bye thats crazy I think there should of been a big contract that said if you leave you owe us 1.1 billion dollars it sounds crazy but at least the party wont think about leaving!

It's a conspiracy but not exactly the way you describe. As a former Rhythms tech in Texas I was pretty upset about the whole thing, and was even more upset when I read the 10Q and saw what the exec's are getting. What sucks is that the shareholders allowed it-it went to a vote! Execs getting 50 weeks of severance on TOP of their remaining contracts and bonuses while I receive 4 weeks pay in lieu of notice, and little prospects in telecom? It stinks.
It's enough to ponder a career change-but I still believe in DSL and competition and long for the day when a CLEC comes along that can pull it off along with government regulators that will actually punish the RBOCs for the anticompetitive behaviors that are driving all the CLECs out of business.

said by BrianDamage:

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What sucks is that the shareholders allowed it-it went to a vote!

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Probably because those same execs are among the largest shareholders and because they attend stockholder meetings and vote. There should be a law against execs raiding the remaining capital when a company goes bankrupt. They actually benefit from the company going down.

You're right. However, I just wonder how they perpetrated the snowjob on the rest of the stockholders.
Considering what the execs are getting, they had nothing to lose by the company going tits-up.