“AT&T Corp.” on The Daily Caller

Illinois Republican Rep. Aaron Schock is Alex P. Keaton all grown up. Intensely focused on economics, finance, and achievement from a very young age, Schock, 29, has been on the fast track to success since the fifth grade. (more)

Reports are circulating that there is a significant chance–80 percent according to one source–that T-Mobile will soon offer the Apple iPhone. Assuming that information is accurate, a T-Mobile iPhone would be a game changer for the wireless industry, and a boon for companies and business professionals that want the iPhone. (more)

For iPhone fans, it really was too good to be true. A pair of Apple executives had just described the latest model of the iPhone — the 3GS — onstage at the company’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June 2009. The audience loved it. The 3GS was twice as fast as its predecessor, it included a camera that shot video, and the updated iPhone operating system enabled multimedia messaging and tethering — the ability to use the phone as a modem. Just one problem: While many customers in Europe and Asia could enjoy all those features, AT&T, the iPhone’s sole US carrier, wouldn’t allow video messaging or tethering at launch. In other words, the most advanced features wouldn’t be available to AT&T customers. What’s more, some current iPhone users who wanted to upgrade wouldn’t get the subsidies that new customers enjoyed. Incensed iPhone fanatics vented their fury on Twitter. “AT&T has been one disappointment after another.” “Is AT&T trying to squeeze more money from us poor suckers?” And they punctuated their complaints with a hashtag — the Twitter convention for grouping conversations — that became an eight-character protest slogan: #attfail. (more)

SAN FRANCISCO — Bill Neukom sat in the front row of AT&T Park on a cool Friday night earlier this season making eye contact with his San Francisco Giants players and urging them on as they came and went from the dugout. (more)

The last great free-market regulatory decision of the 20^th century was engineered by a Democrat, former FCC Chairman William Kennard, when he refused to drag the new and promising consumer broadband market into what he called the “whole morass” of telephone style regulation. (more)

Verizon Wireless unveiled the latest addition to its a successful line of Droid smart phones on Wednesday afternoon — preempting Apple’s eagerly anticipated iPhone 4 launch by a day. (more)

AT&T just issued a statement addressing the massive iPhone 4 pre-order sales yesterday. The company said that sales of the iPhone 4 were 10-times higher than the first day of pre-ordering for the iPhone 3GS last year. (more)

Customers eager to buy Apple’s new iPhone 4 experienced massive and widespread difficulties when attempting to pre-order the smart phone on Tuesday, the day it went on sale. (more)

Many coffee shops try to discourage people from buying a cup of coffee and then lingering for hours to use the free Internet access. Starbucks will soon encourage them to stay as long as they want. (more)

Desiree Rogers, the former White House social secretary who left that job after a couple crashed a state dinner, has a new job in Chicago. (more)

IPhone users should be advised to save their nickels and dimes. (more)

Roger Witter’s good intentions landed him in jail late Tuesday. (more)

Speaking to Hampton University graduates last week, President Obama ignited a debate when he told the students that a 24/7 media environment, and technology such as the iPod or iPad, can be a distraction, “rather than a tool of empowerment.” Putting aside the mixed signals delivered by the Blackberry-loving president who gave the Queen of England an iPod; is our current media environment a source of empowerment? (more)

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) — Tiger Woods is thanking Hank Haney for his six years as swing coach. He is not saying, however, who his next coach might be. (more)

Just before the House passed the healthcare reform bill, Speaker Nancy Pelosi infamously remarked that “We have to pass the bill so you can find out what’s in it.” It’s been nearly six weeks now and we’re finding out that what’s in it isn’t necessarily good for health care. (more)

Immediately after President Obama signed his health-care bill into law, several large companies disclosed to investors just how big the tax hit from it would be. AT&T, for instance, said that the law’s tax increases alone would cost the company $1 billion. (more)

“Billions of more documents” will be have to be filled out by small businesses for the IRS so that a “spendthrift Congress can shake a few extra bucks out of” them to pay for ObamaCare. They will have to spend countless hours to “gather information,” such as about the person they buy a used car from, and the mom-and-pop landlords who lease space to them, even if the small business has to spend more money gathering the information than the IRS will collect in taxes as a result.  (The new health care law will raise far more revenue by taking away medical-tax deductions of “15 million very sick people” with “major medical expenses” starting in 2013.) (more)

“A government big enough to give you everything you want is strong enough to take everything you have.” — Thomas Jefferson (more)

Broadband and Web service companies are beefing up their lobbying forces in Washington as the multibillion-dollar battle over Internet regulations gathers momentum. (more)

Google has just announced that they will now begin factoring page speed in their search algorithm rankings.  That means the faster a website loads, the higher up they show up in Google searches.  Sluggish sites on the other hand will be knocked down the search rankings even if they have the most relevant information.  While I believe that Google’s latest actions are rational and that it serves consumer interests since no one wants a slow results, it does raise an interesting dilemma for “Network Neutrality” advocates who propagate the myth that all websites should operate at the same speed. (more)