[kalleboo]

I never understood the point of splitting up AT&T geographically. Were they expecting turf wars to explode on the borders between them?

In some European countries, when the former telco monopolies were split, they were split vertically - so there was one "copper company", then the phone service company, etc. The copper company would generally be heavily regulation with local loop unbundling, requirements to be fair to anyone who wants to sell service over the network, etc.

[toast0]

The big deal was the vertical split between local (baby bells) an long distance (at&t). It then became possible to easily switch your long distance carrier, which lead to intense competition and lower prices. Local exchange service remained a monopoly, but most jurisdictions had fairly strict tariffs for rates. Later, the telecom act of 1996 opened up to competitive exchange carriers using the existing lines and buildings; would have been nice if the FCC had enforced that for internet too :(