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Automotive News & Views GM News, New Models and Market Share
8456 messages, Last post on Nov 26, 2009 at 4:07 PM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: steve_ (Jul 10, 2009 7:57 am) Rent? Was there not option/provision to buy your own?
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Replying to: xrunner2 (Jul 10, 2009 8:10 am)  A few (rich) people got special phones and got the local telephone utility to install them. Otherwise it was, if not illegal, practically impossible to hook up your own devices to Ma Bell's system. All that rent over the years - how do you think they were able to afford Bell Labs? Wiki has the gory details. The door cracked open to answering machines and non-AT&T phones in '68. |
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Replying to: steve_ (Jul 10, 2009 8:15 am) One thing that the deregulation of AT&T created: generally crappy hardware. Compared to the well-designed and ruggedly-built Western Electric OEM AT&T phones, the vast majority of hardware out there today for landlines is junk. AT&T spent a lot of research time on developing their phones with an audio bandpass of 300 Hz to 3kHz for maximum voice intelligibility. Most cheap phones today use a condenser mic which has a much broader frequency response range.
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Replying to: steve_ (Jul 10, 2009 8:15 am) Recall that the "rent" option came after phone companies and AT&T unbundled the cost of the phone. Phone companies provided phones to subscribers as part of having telephone service and cost of phone was hidden in monthly bill. When rent option came, one could then buy your own phone OR rent from Bell operating companies that belonged to mother AT&T. Back to GM. Believe that GM name is about 100 years old and AT&T name is 120. Phonetically, AT&T being a 100 year old name/brand/logo still sounds/looks strong and contemporary. General Motors could simply refer to themselves as "GM" in the future to have a more contemporary/current name. Maybe the White House car/GM czar or Obama will input on this. |
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Replying to: colloquor (Jul 10, 2009 8:31 am) I do recall that those old Western Electric phones were practically indestructible. Speaking of the possible new GM green logo and other company names, the name Western Electric sounds so 1800 ish or early 1900s. Other similar old sounding company names were Western Union and Westinghouse. Hopefully, new GM logo or new name won't be something stupid like "New GM".
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Most importantly for GM, Camaros are selling faster than the factory can make them. That's the sort of problem any carmaker could use. In spite of the heavy use of cheap plastic in the interiors.
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The 'green' logo is a rumor, Detroit News said no logo changes. All the blather about Buicks and older drivers. Whenever I see an older driver in a Buick it usually is an older model year, like a 1996 Skylark/Century. I have not seen a late model LaCrosse/Lucerne/Enclave with tiny old /man lady peeking over dashboard. And, these newer cars are usually moving with flow of traffic. I see many beige Toyotas putting along at 45 on expressways/tollways in Chicago area, OTOH. Or when light turns green these same drivers accelerate as slow as a horse and buggy. [and most of them are middle aged people]
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Replying to: tomcatt630 (Jul 10, 2009 8:50 am) That's assuming "GM" doesn't get changed. The rumor mill is working overtime on that one too. |
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Replying to: xrunner2 (Jul 10, 2009 8:40 am) |
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Replying to: steve_ (Jul 10, 2009 6:54 am) Actually, no I don't hate to be a cynic. It's fun sometimes. 
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