AT&T-Verizon: The inevitable duopoly?

Federal antitrust regulators think two national cell phone carriers are not enough.  But building a third wireless competitor of equal power may be impossible.

FORTUNE -- The cell phone industry is imperiled by a duopoly, according to the antirust watchdogs at the Department of Justice. First regulators killed AT&T's $39 billion deal to buy T-Mobile. Now the Justice Department is taking a hard look at Verizon's plan to buy $3.6 billion MORE

Lights out for LightSquared?

Regulators have stymied Phil Falcone's ambitious wireless startup, LightSquared. The courts are unlikely to treat him any more kindly.

FORTUNE -- When billionaire Phil Falcone first cooked up the idea for creating the wireless company known as LightSquared, he dreamt of creating a 21st century version of Nextel. The key to Nextel's success in the 1990s had been a slick strategy: first, it bought up airwaves used by taxicab dispatchers, then MORE

Telecom's big hang-up

America's big telcos are struggling to survive the implosion of the local phone business. Now, the latest figures show revenue from cell phone calls is beginning to disappear too.

FORTUNE -- Back in the 20th century, selling phone calls to Americans seemed a practically perfect business, growing during good times and bad -- and turning AT&T into the nation's most widely held stock. Selling phone calls in the 21st century is proving a MORE

Rural America's (other) great broadband hope

Can so-called Super Wi-Fi bring high speeds and low costs to rural Americans? xG Technologies thinks so.

NB: This is the second story in a two part series about rural broadband access in America. To read the first part, please click here.

FORTUNE -- Engineers have long dreamed of using cheap wireless networks to do an end-run around the companies that now provide Internet access and cell phone service. Those dreams have MORE

A very different kind of dish network

Thanks to a new satellite blasting into space this week, broadband access in rural America and southern Canada is about to get a lot better.

FORTUNE -- Slow and expensive options for connecting to the Internet may seem like an inevitable downside to country living, but rural Americans are in for a pleasant surprise. Cheap bits, delivered by satellite, are about to flood rural North America.

A new satellite, now sitting atop MORE

The SportsCenter rebellion

ESPN's deal to pay $15 billion for Monday Night Football could incite a revolt against the cable industry's basic business model.

FORTUNE -- The idea that American television viewers should be free to buy just the TV channels they want has always proven a pipe dream. It's a silly idea, cable and satellite operators have convinced politicians and regulators: selling channels in packages funds a wider variety of programming, actually leaving MORE

AT&T is overlooking its best argument for the T-Mobile merger

The Department of Justice and AT&T have one thing in common: neither side wants to talk about the real rationale for the T-Mobile takeover.

FORTUNE -- When AT&T bet $39 billion that it could acquire T-Mobile -- including $6 billion it won't get back even if regulators kill the deal -- it gambled on a clever strategy that suddenly seems too clever by half.

AT&T (T) advertised the benefits of the merger MORE

Both sides could lose in Verizon strike

Verizon's unions face problems that picket lines simply can't fix.

FORTUNE -- The union representing the 45,000 Verizon Communications' (VZ) employees who went on strike yesterday says that the company is using "Wisconsin-style tactics" in an effort "to strip away 50 years of collective bargaining gains for middle class workers and their families."  The striking workers also made a point of highlighting the hefty $6 billion in profit they estimate Verizon will make MORE

The truth about the MetroPCS train wreck

What exactly happened to the cellular industry's hands-down hottest stock?

FORTUNE -- How could yesterday's seemingly small miss in MetroPCS' (PCS) second quarter earnings end up whacking 37% off the stock and causing panic across a wide swath of the cellular industry? Shares in competitors Leap Wireless (LEAP) and Sprint (S) got pummeled -- down 21% and nearly 7%, respectively. Meanwhile the stocks of the two biggest cellular carriers, AT&T (T) and Verizon MORE

Good news, mobile phone users

Brain tumor rates in Japanese atomic bomb survivors are often used to scare cell phone owners. The real story turns out to be far more reassuring.

FORTUNE - Tumors in the brains of Japanese civilians who survived Hiroshima and Nagasaki seem to tell a frightening tale, the story of how a cancer epidemic can remain hidden for several decades and then suddenly metastasize. The atomic bombings thus provide a perfect explanation MORE