DSL Again

I'm back on the quest for DSL. It's only been a couple of days since I last posted about the possibility of getting DSL and I'm still without the service, but there is hope. Broadband is a necessity, just like food and water. A couple of articles have me hoping that sometime this year I will come out of the third world conditions that I'm living in and be one of the many who can get high speed internet service.

AT&T completes BellSouth buyout

• AT&T and BellSouth each owned equity stakes in Cingular. However, AT&T now has full ownership over the nation's largest wireless carrier. Cingular will transition over to the AT&T brand sometime in early 2007. Also, now that AT&T has complete management control over Cingular, the company said there are opportunities to expand on AT&T's three-screen strategy to deliver content over the television, PC and wireless handsets.


• By adding the operations of BellSouth's nine-state territory, AT&T now provides local telephone service to 22 states.


• A concession AT&T agreed to with Federal Communications Commission commissioners will make broadband Internet services available throughout all of its residential territories by Dec. 31, 2007. New broadband customers will be able to order high-speed Internet service at a reduced rate of $10 per month.


• Another FCC compromise calls for AT&T to expand its U-verse Internet Protocol television service in BellSouth's territory. The company said it already planned to introduce U-verse in 19 million households throughout its residential service territory by 2008. However, AT&T said it now has agreed to offer U-verse in 1.5 million households in BellSouth's territory by the end of 2007.

Sanford proposes broadband initiative

Gov. Mark Sanford said Wednesday he wants $2 million in next year’s state budget to help extend high-speed Internet access to the state’s rural communities.

His proposed budget for 2007-08 will recommend creating a Broadband Advisory Committee within the Department of Commerce to oversee efforts to provide people in rural communities with Internet access other than dial-up.