The Telecommunications Act of 1996 is a mile stone in the Telecom industry, just 12 short years after the break up as AT&T; we are no finally beginning to see healthy competition. Long distance companies can provide local service, cable companies can offer long distance and long distance can offer cable. Anyone can be involved in the ever growing Telecommunications Network. Although its success or its failure is really yet to be determined, in a way if you don't have the money to provide how can you?
             The act sees the telecommunications network as a network of interconnected networks. Telecommunications providers are required to interconnect with anyone who wants to where ever they want. It also requires that incumbent local exchange carriers or ILECs lease part of their network to competitors at cost provide wholesale discount to competitors any service that the ILECs provide and charge reciprocal rates in termination of calls to their network and the networks of local competitors. It also requires that the companies that came out of the Bell System to meet certain requirements before entering the long distance market. This I believe is a good thing, due to the fact that we do not need another monopoly in the long distance arena. They should not be punished for their uprising in the game but they should be penalized for leaving consumers at one point with no choice but to use their services. It also opens up the door for them to now move forward in the telecom industry.
             On the failure side of the act, several mergers in the telecommunications field had to take place especially in the local service end. This is where those little companies that wanted to take part in the act could not because they could not afford to play the game any longer (ex. GTE, NYNEX and Bell Atlantic merged to be Verizon). Local service providers are natural monopolies. Where else could you go in New Jersey for local service? If you don't have ...