Potential allies like Johnson, however, may be having second thoughts about taking up AOL’s banner. AOL’s commitment to Internet “openness” appears sharply at odds with the company’s actions last week when it slammed shut the door on its rivals in a separate cyberdustup. Last week Microsoft introduced its own version of AOL’s hugely popular instant-messaging software–programming that allows people to spot friends online and chat in “real time.” But AOL blocked Microsoft users from sending its customers instant messages, citing Microsoft’s unauthorized access to its system, hardly the kind of neighborliness that AOL has been espousing in the cable business. AT&T gleefully charges AOL with “hypocrisy’’ and “sabotaging” open communication on the Internet.
The conflict over messaging is a mere skirmish compared with a separate full-scale Web war between AT&T and AOL. At stake is just how much choice Web surfers have in picking a company to provide them with speedy access to the Internet via cable modems. AT&T wants to be the dominant provider of those services and is spending $140 billion to amass a network of cable-TV systems that will ultimately provide Net connections 100 times faster than what you get today over the telephone. AOL is worried that its 17 million subscribers will run off with the fastest modem in town, so it’s trying to persuade local governments to force AT&T to allow competitors onto the speedy networks at a cut-rate price.
Both sides are deploying the full arsenal of a modern political campaign. They’re spending millions on lobbyists, television and newspaper advertising, and staged protests in key areas, like Los Angeles; Portland, Ore., and Miami. Each side has named its coalition in grass-roots-friendly fashion: AOL’s is dubbed OpenNet, while AT&T’s is called Hands Off the Internet. The battles are being waged on the local level because AOL has injected the issue into the municipal votes that AT&T needs in order to complete its merger with cable giants TCI and MediaOne. AT&T is confident it will get the necessary regulatory approvals and says that local governments lack the authority to require it to open its cable lines to rivals.
For the moment, however, AOL’s strategy seems to be working. Earlier this month Florida’s Broward County joined Portland, Ore., in ordering AT&T to open up its cable networks to competitors, and San Francisco is expected to vote this week.
AT&T is fighting back. Its general legal counsel, Jim Cicconi, says the AOL camp “is looking for a free ride on the back of someone else’s investment.” AT&T recently staged a rally outside city hall in San Francisco, hiring students to dress up as chess pieces holding signs that read DON’T BE A PAWN IN AOL’S GAME.
But the betting in wired circles is that AOL will eventually haggle its way onto AT&T’s lightning-fast digital pipeline. Still, it will take several years for all these high-speed networks to come of age, and most likely just as long for the warring giants to resolve their access battle. All the petitions and instant messages in the world won’t change that.
