I’m still reading about the potential benefits and drawbacks to this proposed deal, and I haven’t reached a conclusion yet on what I think of it overall. It seems like this won’t really benefit the consumer. AT&T already has DirecTV, so won’t adding Time Warner just be duplicating a service they already provide? I’m hoping this will somehow reduce prices, but I don’t see how that will happen with this merger. On the other hand, Trump immediately came out against the deal, which raises a red flag with me. Obviously just because Trump takes a particular stand on something doesn’t make his position wrong, but I do wonder what else I might be missing. I’d like to hear what you all think about this deal.
Please feel free to point out the existing thread if there is already one. I checked here and in GD and didn’t see one.
A distribution company buys an entertainment company to provide content, whatcould possibly go wrong?
Most mergers are bad ideas and I don’t see a reason to be hopeful for this one.
In general I think that producers should be able to distribute their own content but that people that distribute content for multiple producers should not be able to produce themselves. So I’m against the merger.
As an employee, my only reaction is to wonder how this might impact my job. They spun part of our operation off to IBM last year–who knows if they’ll spin the remainder off as a cost-cutting measure. I’m looking to retire at the end of 2017, so I don’t care what might happen after that.
There was a good article in the NY Times today about one ATT pitch that the merger is justified by the promise of 5G wireless service. I don’t quite see the connection, but according to the article I don’t have to. 5G will be 10-15 years from widespread adoption and isn’t a real factor in the merger. But it makes a good talking point for the ATT salespeople.
The rise of Ma Bell scares me. . I remember all the abuses of power she wielded. Want an extra phone in your house? That’ll cost you. Want to be excluded from the phone book? That’ll cost you. Answering machines had labels warning us that Ma Bell might get pissed for attaching them to their system.
I lived through the decade long Federal lawsuit to dismantle that monopoly. It cost this country tens of millions to kill that monster.
Now she’s back.
It’s true that people who don’t remember history are doomed to repeat it.
There was a time that my only contact with Ma Bell was my landline. That was one of the “Baby Bells” before they merged back into Ma Bell. My cell phone was Cingular. My TV was DirecTV. Life was good.
AT&T bought Cingular and DirecTV.
Now even the company that makes my movies is getting swallowed up.
Not good for anyone but the executives at the two companies. It’s not so much the vertical integration (which is always bad) but the sheer size makes it impossible for small operators to gain a foothold.
That’s a lot of money … could be in stock options and stuff like that. I was against it at first, but someone said that they got rid of the cable company part, so I don’t see any conflict.
I use Verizon so I don’t personally care about at&t’s phone business and I use Dish so I don’t care about their sat/entertainment business, but it is a lot of money.
Why? Just to make money off of entertainment to broadcast it on their satellites to talk about it on their cell phones.
What is this world coming to anyway $85 billion dollars for what?
