AT&T wants to drop hardlines

[Dr Mordrid]

Link....

US telecom giant AT&T has asked US regulatory authorities to waive a requirement that it and other carriers maintain costly landline networks.

AT&T, the oldest US telephone company, made the request in a filing last week with the Federal Communications Commission in which it also asked the FCC to set a "firm deadline" for phasing out wireline service.

"The business model for legacy phone services is in a death spiral," AT&T said. "With an outdated product, falling revenues, and rising costs, the plain-old telephone service (POTS) business is unsustainable for the long run."

The AT&T filing was in response to an FCC request earlier this month for input on plans to extend high-speed Internet broadband to the entire country.

It was published online by technology blog GigaOM.

[cjolley]

Death spiral is the word considering how bad their cell service is.

[Jammrock]

Death spiral is the word considering how bad their cell service is.

ROFLMAO!!!

I love the old joke, "AT&T has fewer dropped calls because you can never connected in the first place!"

I think Verizon has the right idea for landline service. Update it to fiber and use it as a conduit for all your services, phone, TV, internet, etc. I hear a lot of Asian countries already do that and it works rather well. AT&T does have Uverse, though I believe that is ADSL2 based rather than fiber to the home.

While I like wireless, the spectrum is freaking expensive to own and wireless service will never be faster than wired service.

[degrub]

One of the big hits for the POTS is the required availability - either 3 or 4 9s past the decimal. Fiber and wireless do not have those regulatory mandated requirements. Huge cost to support. When we had the hurricane hit, the only thing working was the POTS. It took several days to get even the initial cell service back - and that was extremely limited. ATT only has a few trucks set up for cell and switch service. And fiber doesn't work without local power at the customer end, POTS does!

[Dr Mordrid]

Might be time to get out the old HAM/CB radio gear and set up some deep cycles and an inverter, just in case

[cjolley]

Might be time to get out the old HAM/CB radio gear and set up some deep cycles and an inverter, just in case

We could just about replace our AT&T cell service with paper cups and string to save money.
The service wouldn't be any worse.

[degrub]

What's your call sign ?;-))

[xortam]

We're off POTS and on ATT fiber (U-Verse). They supply you with an UPS for emergency phone service and you agree to a disclaimer regarding 911 availability. We still have cell service and neighbors in case the UPS fails to power the gateway.