Some of America’s largest media companies are starting to get nervous over reported stipulations Comcast and NBC-Universal must meet in order to win FCC approval of their merger deal.

The Wall Street Journal reports ‘all-lobbyists-on-deck’ as companies fear collateral damage to their own nascent online video businesses.

At issue is the FCC-proposed condition that would require Comcast to offer NBC programming to any online video service that has reached a similar deal for content from at least one of NBC’s competitors, such as Walt Disney Co. or News Corp.

That could create a highly competitive online video marketplace, with open access to video programming — content many companies want to tightly control.

Last week, lobbyists from Disney, News Corp., and Time Warner pelted the FCC with filings fearing Comcast-NBC deal stipulations could also impact their businesses, potentially risking exclusivity deals with firms like Netflix or Apple.  At the worst, such rules could permit the development of virtual ‘online cable systems,’ delivering hundreds of hours of programming daily — more than enough to potentially invite customers to turn away from traditional cable-TV or satellite packages.

Perish the thought, suggest some Wall Street analysts who are prepared to downgrade companies that cannot maximize revenue from a controlled online video marketplace.

The three companies, among others, have suggested language that limits any stipulations exclusively to the Comcast-NBC deal, or changing the terms to impact their own operations less.

Public interest groups continue to press their views that the proposed deal delivers nothing to consumers but higher bills and fewer programming choices.

Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports, joined with more than two dozen public interest groups urging a more careful review of the deal:

“We believe that a merger of this size and scope will have a devastating effect on the media marketplace,” a letter to President Barack Obama and Congress says. “It will result in less competition, higher consumer costs and fewer content choices. It also will give one company unprecedented control over innovative new media that offer news, information, entertainment and cultural programming through emerging technologies.”

Joel Kelsey, policy analyst for Consumers Union, said this proposed merger could have major consequences for consumers: “This merger would combine a major television network and film studio with the nation’s largest cable company and residential broadband provider, which could be a recipe for disaster. This merged giant has great potential to lead to higher cable and broadband rates for consumers, less competition in online video, and less diversity among the programming choices for viewers. There are no clear benefits to consumers from this merger.”

Comcast has agreed to several stipulations that are supposed to protect consumers.  Among them, a three-year requirement Comcast provide standalone Internet service to consumers for $49.95 a month.  But the deal says nothing about Comcast’s Internet Overcharging scheme — an arbitrary usage cap on their broadband service.

Comcast would also agree to adhere to Net Neutrality rules (as defined by the FCC) for up to seven years.  Since those rules are closely aligned to what Comcast volunteered to follow earlier, there was little reservation agreeing to them going forward.

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bloomberg Comcast Deal May Hang on Showing Rivals Online Video 12-23-10.flv[/flv]

Bloomberg News’ Todd Shields explains the proposed conditions the FCC seeks to impose on the Comcast-NBC merger deal.  (12/23/2010 — 4 minutes)

Qwest’s head of financial matters told Bloomberg News the company’s decision to sell out to CenturyLink made good financial sense because the telecommunications industry needs more industry consolidation.

Chief Financial Officer Joe Euteneuer said the time was right for Qwest to sell operations in the north-central and mountain west region because there were too many competitors in the marketplace.  Euteneuer said the telecommunications market needs to resemble the cable-TV business, which has been heavily concentrated into two huge powerhouses — Comcast and Time Warner Cable.

Qwest’s merger with independent telephone company CenturyLink continues the consolidation underway among independent phone companies not affiliated with AT&T or Verizon Communications.  The merged entity will challenge Frontier Communications’ position in the landline marketplace.  Regulators in Qwest’s service area have been giving cursory review of the proposed merger and the company expects few problems in getting the merger deal approved in every state affected.

Euteneuer

The merged entity, tentatively to be called CenturyLink, has been spending most of its public relations efforts talking up the reshuffling of its management and executive office operations.

CenturyLink is promoting executives to new regional management positions the company unveiled Friday.  CenturyLink’s new regional structure:

• Eastern, headquarters in Wake Forest: President Todd Schafer, current president of Century Link’s Mid-Atlantic region. Member states are Georgia, New Jersey, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia.
• Midwest, headquarters in Minneapolis: President Duane Ring, current president of CenturyLink’s Northeast region; Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin.
• Mountain, headquarters in Denver: President Kenny Wyatt, current president of CenturyLink’s South Central region; Colorado, Montana, Utah, Wyoming.
• Southern, headquarters in Orlando: President Dana Chase, current president of CenturyLink’s Southern region; Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana; Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma, Texas.
• Northwest, headquarters in Seattle: President Brian Stading, current vice president of network operations and engineering for Qwest; California, Idaho, Oregon, Washington.
• Southwest, headquarters in Phoenix: President Terry Beeler, current president of CenturyLink’s Western region; Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada.

For both companies’ tens of thousands of employees, there is some trepidation about “cost savings” (translation: job losses) that are also expected from this deal.

In Nebraska, more than one thousand employees remain unsure whether they’ll still have jobs after the merger.

Qwest’s president for Nebraska operations, Rex Fisher, is not waiting around to find out.  He’s leaving, saying CenturyLink’s plan to restructure management roles “weren’t opportunities I was interested in,” the 53-year-old executive said.

A Qwest spokeswoman told the Omaha World-Herald the change in itself will have minimal immediate impact on the workforce level in Omaha.

Joanna Hjelmeland told the newspaper specific changes for Omaha’s workforce will “become more clear down the road,” Hjelmeland said.

“We are combining two companies, and in some instances there are going to be redundancies,” she said. “Eventually there are going to be job reductions as a result of the merger.”

[flv width=”512″ height=”404″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WKBT La Crosse WI CenturyLink moving regional headquarters out of La Crosse 12-1-10.flv[/flv]

WKBT-TV in La Crosse, Wis., reports the city is going to lose Qwest’s regional headquarters, formerly located in La Crosse, as part of the merger shuffle.  (1 minute)

Brian Stading, current vice president of customer operations for Qwest in Denver, is now preparing to relocate to head the regional office in Seattle.  He outlined some of the changes expected to impact Qwest/CenturyLink customers in the region.

“I think you’ll see the continued focus on providing the highest quality service at the best possible price, both from a local phone service as well as from a high-speed Internet perspective and you’ll see a continued emphasis on expanding our broadband capability both in the city as well as in regional areas,” Stading told the Puget Sound Business Journal.

Stading claims the company will be refocusing efforts to improve the reliability of its core business – landline service, and make incremental upgrades to broadband capability and speed.

“A lot of that does overlap with our high-speed broad deployment because any time we have the opportunity to go put in new fiber lines, it just provides additional quality throughout our backbone networks, so the two really do go hand in hand, both the expansion as well as the continued emphasis on reliability,” Stading said.

But there is every indication Stading is referring to middle-mile fiber infrastructure — cable that runs between telephone company central office facilities, and not to individual customer homes.  CenturyLink, like Qwest, relies almost exclusively on DSL service delivered over standard telephone lines for broadband services.  Qwest has also been deploying ADSL 2+ technology, a more advanced form of traditional DSL, in some areas in the Pacific Northwest and mountain west region.  But many Qwest customers have no access to broadband at all, because of the remote areas the phone company serves in many states.

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Bloomberg Qwest’s Euteneuer Says Industry Consolidation Was Needed 11-18-10.flv[/flv]

Bloomberg News talks to Joe Euteneuer, Qwest’s CFO about why Qwest merged with CenturyLink.  (4 minutes)

Time Warner Cable customers in North Carolina are getting rate hike letters from the cable company that foreshadows what other Time Warner Cable customers around the country can expect in the coming months.

For residents in Charlotte and the Triad region, Time Warner is boosting prices for unbundled customers an average of six percent, which will impact customers not on promotional plans or who are not locked into a “price protection agreement.”

The rate increases particularly target standalone service customers.  Those with the fewest services will pay the biggest increases.  Those who subscribe to cable, phone, and broadband service from the company will suffer the least.

A Time Warner Cable spokesman claimed the company is just passing on the cost of programming.

WXII-TV in Greensboro reported that for many customers already struggling with their bills, they don’t want to hear anything about a price hike.

“I think it’s ridiculous at this time with the economy — it’s hard to make it as it is,” one customer told the station.

“I wish there was a better option out there, but it’s about the only thing you can get,” said another viewer.

Time Warner has been developing pricing models that increasingly push customers towards bundled packages of services.  Standalone broadband service saw dramatic price increases in many areas in 2010, and the company’s most aggressive new customer promotions encourage customers to take all three of its services.

But broadband customers need not expose themselves to inflated broadband prices for standalone service.  Most Time Warner Cable franchises offer Earthlink broadband at comparable speeds at prices as low as $29.95 per month for the first six months.  When the promotion expires, customers can switch back to Road Runner at Time Warner’s promotional price.

Time Warner does face competition in some areas of North Carolina from AT&T U-verse, which offers attractive promotional pricing for new customers.  But the phone company’s broadband speeds come up short after Time Warner boosted speeds across much of the state.  The cable company now delivers Road Runner at speeds of up to 50/5Mbps.  AT&T tops out at 24Mbps, and not in every area.

When a competitor can’t deliver the fastest speeds, they inevitably claim consumers don’t want or care about super-fast broadband.

“We are focused on offering the broadband speeds that our customers need, at a price that they can afford,” said AT&T spokeswoman Gretchen Schultz.

Greenlight promotes its local connection to Wilson residents

Some North Carolina consumers are watching AT&T’s slower speeds and Time Warner’s price hikes from the sidelines, because they are signed up with municipal competitors.

Residents in Wilson with Greenlight service from the city don’t have to sign a contract to get the best prices and obtain service run and maintained by Wilson-area employees. The provider has embarked on a campaign to remind residents that money spent on the city-owned provider stays in the city.

In Salisbury, Fibrant is making headway against incumbent Time Warner as it works through a waiting list for customers anxious to cut Time Warner’s cable for good.  Fibrant customers are assured they’ll always get the fastest possible service in town on a network capable of delivering up to 1Gbps to businesses -and- residents.

MI-Connection, the rebuilt former Adelphia cable system now owned by a group of local municipalities is managing to keep up with Time Warner with its own top broadband speeds of 20/2Mbps.  The system is comparable to a traditional cable operator and does not provide fiber to the home service.  Its 15,000 customers in Mooresville, Cornelius and Davidson are likely to stay with the system, but it is vulnerable to Time Warner’s bragging rights made possible from DOCSIS 3 upgrades.  Since Time Warner does not provide service in most of MI-Connection’s service area, city officials don’t face an exodus of departing customers.

But that could eventually change.  Some MI-Connection customers have reported to Stop the Cap! they have begun to receive promotional literature from Time Warner Cable for the first time, and there are growing questions whether the cable company may plan to invade some of MI-Connection’s more affluent service areas.  Cable companies generally refuse to compete with each other, but all bets are off when that cable company is owned by a local municipality.

For most North Carolina residents, AT&T will likely be the first wired competitor, with its U-verse system.  To date, U-verse has drawn mixed reviews from North Carolina consumers.  Many appreciate AT&T’s broadband network is currently less congested than Road Runner, and speeds promised are closer to reality on U-verse compared with Road Runner during the early evening.  But some AT&T customers are not thrilled being nickle-and-dimed for HD channels Time Warner bundles with its digital cable service at no additional charge.  And for households with a lot of users, AT&T can run short on bandwidth.

“We have five kids — three now teenagers, and between my husband’s Internet usage and me recording a whole bunch of shows to watch later, we have run into messages on U-verse telling us we are trying to do too much and certain TV sets won’t work until we reduce our usage,” writes Angela.  “AT&T doesn’t tell you that you all share a preset amount of bandwidth which gets divided up and if you use it up, services stop working.”

Angela says when she called AT&T, the company gave her a $15 credit for her inconvenience, and the company claims it is working on ways to eliminate these limits in particularly active households.  For now, the family is sticking with U-verse because the broadband works better in the evenings and she loves the DVR which records more shows at once than Time Warner offers.  Their U-verse new customer promotional offer saves them $35 a month over Time Warner, at least until it expires.

“From reading about Fibrant and Greenlight on your site, my husband still wishes we lived in Salisbury or Wilson because nothing beats fiber, but at least what we have is better than what we used to have,” she adds.

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/WXII Greensboro TWC Raising Rates 11-16-10.flv[/flv]

WXII-TV in Greensboro reports of Time-Warner Cable’s rate hikes for the Piedmont Triad region of North Carolina.  (2 minutes)

Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix, shows off the company's growing reliance on broadband streaming, moving away from its original DVD-by-mail rental business.

Last week, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was showered with questions from Wall Street during the company’s third quarter-results conference call.  At the top of the agenda — the company’s shifting business model away from DVD rentals-by-mail gradually towards instant on-demand streaming over broadband networks.

At issue is how Netflix can survive a broadband industry that controls the pipeline Netflix increasingly depends on for its continued existence.

Hastings tried to assuage his cable competitors by telling investors the company is hardly a threat to cable-owned movie channels and basic cable.  But he admits ultimately the company will be in a real mess if Internet Overcharging schemes like usage caps and speed throttles limit the amount of content customers can affordably access:

“We have some vulnerability depending on capped usage and what happens. Comcast has a cap, but it’s 250 gigabytes and so most users feel that they have an unlimited experience, and it gives us plenty of room to deliver a high-def stream. On the other hand, AT&T Mobile data on an iPad is now capped at two gigabytes, [and that’s] not enough room to deliver hours and hours of high-def.  We are definitely sensitive [to the issue] in the long term [whether] the industry ends up at 250 gigabytes or two at the other extreme.”

There is some limited evidence Netflix’s success in Canada is already being tempered by usage limits near-universally imposed in the country.  Rogers, a major cable company in eastern Canada, even reduced usage caps for certain tiers of service around the same time Netflix announced its imminent arrival north of the border.

Barry McCarthy, Chief Financial Officer notes fewer Canadians are converting their free trials of Netflix’s streaming service into paid subscriptions.

“We anticipate we are seeing slightly lower conversion rates in Canada than we see in the U.S.,” McCarthy told investors.

As Netflix moves towards higher quality video streams, the amount of data consumed increases as well.  In Canada, that eats into broadband usage allowances, and fast. As soon as customers start receiving warnings they are nearing their monthly usage limit, or receive a broadband bill with overlimit fees, Netflix is likely to lose that customer.

Cable and phone companies in Canada are already warning customers that online video is a major culprit of exhausted usage allowances.  Both are also happy to remind their customers they are happy to sell them access to unlimited video — through cable or telco TV subscriptions.  Rogers owns a major chain of video rental stores as well.

What can Netflix do about usage capped broadband?  Not much, admits Hastings.

“There is a not a lot of improvement in compression techniques. But what we can do is just deliver a lower bit stream, a lower quality video experience. So, for example, not too high-def. So, that’s one possible way to partially mitigate that impact,” Hastings said.

Netflix will soon face increasing competition, especially from the cable industry’s TV Everywhere projects, and they won’t deliver a lower quality video experience.

Time Warner Cable and Comcast this month both formally introduced their respective video on demand services.

Comcast’s Xfinity online service arrives after months of beta testing.   Comcast customers can watch video selections from nearly 90 movie and television partners, including programming from HBO, Viacom, and Paramount.  Ultimately, the online video service is expected to deliver access to dozens of cable channels and individual programs from studios and networks at no charge to those who subscribe to a cable television package.

Time Warner Cable took a more modest approach last week by introducing ESPN Networks to its cable subscribers who register with the cable company’s MyServices website.  The new customer portal allows subscribers to review and pay their cable bill, add new services (but not cancel existing ones), remotely program DVR boxes, and also verifies subscriber status for future cable subscriber-only online video programming.

Netflix may soon find itself at the mercy of the cable and telephone companies which deliver broadband access to the majority of Americans.  Not only is it difficult to convince customers to pay a monthly fee for programming the cable industry may eventually give away for free, it may be downright impossible for Netflix to survive if those providers decide to squeeze the customer’s pipeline to unlimited Netflix content.

[flv width=”640″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Comcast Xfinity Ad Spot 10-2010.flv[/flv]

Comcast Ad Introducing Xfinity Online.  (1 minute)

AT&T unveiled it’s U-verse system Monday in the Triad region of North Carolina, hoping to poach customers from Time Warner Cable’s “triple play” package of phone, broadband, and cable service.

AT&T U-verse services, which are delivered over AT&T’s Internet Protocol (IP) hybrid fiber-copper network, offer an alternative to cable with a DVR that can record more programming than the competition, features and apps not available from the local cable company, and additional channels new to the region. AT&T U-verse can combine every AT&T service a customer subscribes to onto a single monthly bill.

The most popular Internet-only tier of service has somewhat anemic download speeds up to 6 Mbps for $43 a month — other packages range from $38 for 3 Mbps to $65 for 24 Mbps.

U-verse TV packages include “local-channel only” service for $19 a month (with a stinging $199 installation fee), to more than 390 channels for $112 a month, with a $29 activation fee.  Other packages include U-100 with 130 channels for $54 a month and U-200 with 230 channels for $67.  High definition channels, now numbering more than 130, cost $10 extra per month.  Want premium channels in HD?  That’s another $5 a month.

Like other providers, AT&T has tinkered with pricing to deliver the most savings to customers who bring all of their business to AT&T with a triple-play bundle subscription.

“Today’s expansion of AT&T U-verse reflects our commitment to make the investments necessary to bring consumers across the Piedmont Triad a new era of true video competition,” Cynthia Marshall, AT&T North Carolina president said in a statement. “Local residents have asked for more choices in television service and today we’re delivering.”

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/ATT U-verse introduction.flv[/flv]

Watch this comprehensive video from AT&T explaining the many types of services U-verse offers and helpful tips to prepare for service installation.  Then view an actual installation in a customer’s home who shows off the equipment.  Stop the Cap! recommends you let AT&T do all of the required wiring for you.  That’s why you are paying that installation fee!  (22 minutes)

Brubaker

But despite the company’s claims that competition will deliver lower prices for consumers, the evidence suggests otherwise.

AT&T credits a statewide video franchising bill passed in the North Carolina legislature for making U-verse possible in the state.  Company officials showed their thanks by inviting the two state legislators instrumental in shepherding AT&T’s agenda through the General Assembly to be on hand to take credit for introducing cable competition in the state.  They also publicly thanked them in their press release.

Seventeen term House Rep. Harold Brubaker (R-Randolph) congratulated AT&T for its accomplishments.  Brubaker received $4,000 in campaign contributions from AT&T in the first quarter of 2010.

The representative from Asheboro co-sponsored the 2006 Video Service Competition Act which stripped local oversight of cable operators and made AT&T’s entry into North Carolina effortless.  For other would-be competitors, especially municipalities seeking to build their own fiber networks, Brubaker has been far less helpful.  Most recently, he voted against an effort to bring broadband service to Caswell County in areas incumbent provider CenturyLink has ignored for years.

Adams

“Prior to the legislation, you had geographic areas where you operated in, so it kind of like took the walls down. The legislation took the walls down to allow for more direct competition for the consumer. Competition is great.  The consumer’s the one that benefits,” said Brubaker.  “AT&T’s presence in the market will very definitely save customers money.”

Rep. Alma Adams (D-Guilford), another co-sponsor, said AT&T’s arrival was exactly what she hoped for when she supported the legislation.

“As policymakers, our goal was to increase investment in North Carolina and give consumers more choices and innovative new services,” said Adams. “Today’s announcement makes that goal a reality for Triad residents.”

Adams added that AT&T U-verse also provided a safety valve for consumers who want an alternative to incumbent provider Time Warner Cable.

“Even if they like a particular company, they always like to know that there’s some other opportunities out there that they can look at as well, so they can do some comparing,” she said.

[flv width=”480″ height=”380″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Important Information about ATT U-Verse system.flv[/flv]

AT&T delivered more time and attention to North Carolina legislators at their launch event than they ever will on U-verse.  AT&T segregates Public Access, Educational, and Government channels on a single U-verse TV channel that makes for tedious viewing.  Watch this demonstration from the California Public Utilities Commission.  (4 minutes)

AT&T announced the service would initially be available in limited areas of Forsyth, Davidson, Guilford, Rockingham and Alamance counties, and we do mean “limited.”  Many Triad residents who checked to see if the service was available in their area found it was not.  In fact, AT&T refuses to disclose exactly how many customers in the region can actually sign up for the service.  We couldn’t find anyone who could order the service when it officially launched.

“There will be small pockets around most of the entire area,” Chuck Greene, AT&T’s regional director for the Piedmont Triad told the News-Record. “Once we complete the build-out, it will include parts of Davidson, Caswell and Randolph.”

AT&T lobbied hard to sweep away earlier provisions in local video franchises that committed providers to rapidly expand service to every possible customer in their respective service areas.  Under the Video Services Competition Act, AT&T can take its sweet time, perhaps for years before service becomes widely available across the region.  Some areas will never receive the service.

Time Warner Cable welcomed competition from AT&T U-verse.

“For a long time, Time Warner Cable has faced competition from satellite and dish providers,” Scott Pryzwansky, the company’s local public affairs manager, wrote to the News-Record. “We continue to invest in our network and remain committed to bring the best products and services to the Triad. We are confident we will maintain positive relationships with our customers.”

Time Warner Cable has little to fear from AT&T’s arrival.  Pryzwansky said Time Warner Cable has not lowered its pricing in any of the markets where it faces AT&T U-verse competition.  Both AT&T and Time Warner Cable have raised prices at least annually for their respective subscribers.  The only exception in North Carolina has been in Wilson, where municipal provider Greenlight has kept Time Warner Cable from increasing prices.

Time Warner Cable maintains a special website to cope with competition from AT&T U-verse and satellite providers. Hilariously, the site quotes a piece from DSL Reports about U-verse price increases. Time Warner subscribers might not want to venture too far beyond that piece, because editor Karl Bode reports on the cable company's own rate hikes as well. (Click image to visit TWC site)

Stop the Cap! reader Sam in Greensboro thinks AT&T’s arrival is much ado about nothing.

“AT&T prices their U-verse service nearly the same or more as Time Warner Cable, especially after the introductory rate expires,” he says.  “Few people are going to be bothered switching back to Time Warner after the year is up, so they’ll be paying the same high prices for cable service to AT&T instead of the cable company — a distinction with no difference.”

Sam won’t bother with U-verse because he is disgusted with AT&T’s lobbying efforts to stop consumer broadband reform and Net Neutrality.

“It’s like dealing with the devil,” Sam writes.  “Why would I want to pay AT&T my money so they can turn around and spend it working against my interests as a consumer?”

The only good thing about U-verse’s arrival is that it may stall Time Warner Cable from trying another Internet Overcharging scheme in the area.

“Time Warner has to think twice about another usage cap and overlimit fee ‘experiment’ in the Triad if customers can simply flee to U-verse, although knowing AT&T they’d love to have the same rationing of the Internet they force on their wireless customers,” Sam said.

[flv width=”636″ height=”373″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/TWC Fights Back U-verse.flv[/flv]

Time Warner Cable maintains a sometimes-bizarre web campaign to convince customers not to switch to U-verse or satellite.  We’ve put together the various videos so you can watch them all at once.  (4 minutes)

Like Time Warner Cable, AT&T does not offer a-la-carte cable programming, either.  Customers can only choose from large packages of programming, not individual channels.

Triad area cable customers told local media they were tentatively glad U-verse is competing, but many are taking a wait and see approach as to whether they’ll actually see any savings.

WFMY News 2 spoke with cable customers today. One man said he feels like a “hostage” to his cable company because they have a monopoly on TV, Internet and phone bundles. A woman said cable and satellite companies drive her “crazy,” so she gave up and now simply rents movies.

“I am happy, but it’s hard times. I have three children. We live on one income,” Jamie Rettie, a Time Warner Cable customer told News 2. Whether she switches to AT&T or not, she’s said she’s hoping for a change in her bill.

“Hopefully they’ll keep competing against each another and have better and better prices for their services,” she said. “(I’ll) wait out my contract and we’ll see what happens.”

Some residents, like Thomas, are left picking the lesser of two evils:

“I don’t know who’s worse at their game, as Time Warner Cable and AT&T are both evil corporate entities that care only about their bottom line,” he writes. “Search the Internet and understand this service limits the amount of TV’s that can be used at one time.”

[flv width=”640″ height=”500″]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Greensboro Media Cover U-Verse Launch 9-13-10.flv[/flv]

Watch several news reports from Triad area TV stations about the introduction of AT&T U-verse.  In order, we include reports from WXII, WGHP, and WFMY-TV.  (7 minutes)