Within one week, AT&T announced a plan to use Time Warner’s television content to drive rival customers to its products. It’s just one of several announcements from the new conglomerate that show the government was right: AT&T is determined to use its economic and political power to expand its reach and dominate markets.
On Thursday, AT&T
unveiled a service called WatchTV, a “skinny bundle” of 31 television channels, many of them under AT&T’s control after the Time Warner merger, as well as on-demand content from those channels. Subscribers to AT&T’s two new unlimited data plans get WatchTV for free, and the pricier plan includes HBO, the crown jewel of the Time Warner merger. Non-AT&T customers who want WatchTV can get it for $15 per month—but without access to John Oliver and
Silicon Valley, which would
cost another $15 through HBO Now.
AT&T considers this an expansion of consumer choice, a new option for cord-cutters seeking cheap streaming TV. But in reality, AT&T is using its exclusive access to HBO and other Time Warner programming to push people to sign up for its phone plans. It’s no coincidence that AT&T also quietly
announced price increases for the unlimited data plans it’s trying to attract people to.