Abstract

The Media Monopolies Muscle In

This article reports the large controversial merger of the telephone company, Bell Atlantic Corp., with cable manufacturing firm, TeleCommunications Inc. According to the corporate press release, a proposed $26 billion union of these firms would, supposedly, be a perfect merger in this so-called information age, as this might set in motion construction of a national information superhighway. What has arrived is the moment when communications companies are staking out positions in a war that has yet to be declared, a war for control of the electronic information delivery systems of the future. Long confined by regulators to their traditional turf, telephone companies, cable television companies and other telecommunications outfits are eager to jump into one another's businesses before their potential competitors do.