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From: t...@y1.jdyson.net (John S. Dyson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: Is Al Gore The Father of the Internet?^
Date: 19 Sep 2000 04:22:37 GMT
Organization: http://extra.newsguy.com
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In article <87aed5t5i9....@barrow.com>,
	Floyd Davidson <fl...@ptialaska.net> writes:
> t...@y1.jdyson.net (John S. Dyson) wrote:
>>
>>AT&T has always been a stalwart for universal service.  AT&T is
>>not an angel, but Al Gore was only one, unnecessary component
>>of the internet revolution.  IMO, the genius was the initial
>>hypertext work.  FTP don't cut it, man... :-).
>>
>>AT&T pioneered universal graphics image delivery in the early '80s.
> 
> And AT&T didn't then, and may not now, have a clue as to what to
> do with it.
>
Actually, they did.  The correlation between what we were working
on and the internet today is astounding.  The problem with AT&T
wasn't vision -- it was with marketing.  Additionally, AT&T had
ideas that were too many years ahead of their times.  The perfect
example was the significant contribution that AT&T made to cellular,
and then pulled out of the market.  It bought back in at a great
loss...  Marketing sucks there, and sometimes it was very depressing
(as a very front line developer.)

If you knew what I worked on years before things happened, you'd
be surprised (it wasn't JUST me -- I mean the real initiatives
that really happened.)  There was some suspicion of purposeful
sabotage by some upper AT&T execs.  (I don't know how much I
can say before getting sued.)

One little anecdote:  I was involved in an upper mgmt initiative
to review the desirability of HDTV... (Note that AT&Ts interest
was strategic, but not to sell HDTV's)  It caused a furor when
I claimed that it would take HDTV about 15yrs after introduction
to become 50% of the market, without external stimula...  (That
was in 1987-1988.)  We had already reviewed (and other groups
also) the various practical methods for delivery, and the complex
scheme that is quite similar to MPEG today was deemed most
practical.  The only, low-tech schemes that I could personally
come up with were the multi-channel, psuedo-digital schemes.  Alas,
there appeared to be some memory of my comments about the growth of
HDTV (again, which were found to be true.)  Note that I backed
up my claims with examples and reasons, based upon consumerism
and psychology.  Footnote:  I wanted HDTV very badly, but probably
ended up making AT&T take a second look, slowing down progress.
Some groups like Barry Haskell's (we checked him out for producing
some technology for us) had some technology, but we were working
on the structure necessary to make it real (some parts of AT&T
HATED to do product-type design.)  Those guys were real expert
in their field though.

With some vision on the part of mgmt, and creative marketing, an
intelligent person could have helped solve the problems.  Instead,
since marketing was so useless, the simple engineering view (and
observation of obvious consumer behavior) prevailed.  I had little
control, only being a full-time contract person, who was writing a white
paper for the president and his people.  (At that time, I was lucky
to be a contract person, yet still involved in strategic work and
review -- people kept looking at my badge and whispering...  They
weren't used to contract people in high level meetings (D, ED, VP) .)
I didn't do that stuff all of the time, but it was fun!!!

(PS, the only reason why I got to do that stuff was my very wide
 interdisciplinary interest and abilities -- with no political
 involvement in the AT&T hierarchy -- I could transcend mgmt levels
 without the issue of subordination...  Also, my boss was a
 very well known AT&T person who was known as being quite visionary.
 As the years have gone by, the day-to-day work life isn't as
 important as my real life, and now I do what I want to.)

Marketing sucked at AT&T.  Algor didn't invent the innovation, and
was lucky to be there where almost any young functionary could have
been, and succeeded.  I have known many successful middle managers,
and Gore doesn't appear to be that good -- but he sure spins himself
very well.  (Gore is no functional middle manager, he is very far
away from being a competent executive.)  Gore is excellent at
spinning himself, and emotionally appealing to people.  (An intelligent
honest person, who is in politics wouldn't be so anti-human as he
appears to be.)

All that said about emotional appeal, Reagan did it very well also, but
in a very different, more simple and honest way.  Gore is not nearly
as smooth, but he does seem to be able to do the politically correct
thing and present his feminine side better than GWBush.  We (our
society) do have a hard-on against manly men now, and that doesn't
bode well for us at all.

John