(www.internetnews.com via NewsEdge) AT&T is willing to adhere to the Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) network neutrality principles for 30 months after the official closing of its proposed merger with BellSouth, according to AT&T's latest filing with the FCC.
The concession is part of a long list of items that AT&T put forth in hopes of winning over the two Democrats on the FCC who are opposing the merger.
The Department of Justice approved the deal last week with no strings attached.
FCC Chairman Kevin Martin also supports unconditionally approving the merger, but he lacks a majority among the three Republicans on the panel.
The current 2-2 deadlock at the FCC forced Martin to re-open the proceedings for public comment and reschedule the merger vote for November 3.
AT&T's original response to the new proceedings only conceded the 'possibility of further conditions' relating to network neutrality.
After the first letter was sent to the FCC, AT&T sent a second letter 'within an hour' making further concessions on network neutrality.
An AT&T spokesman blamed the second letter on a 'word processing error.'
'This is all fairly curious since network neutrality is a major point,' Mark Cooper, research director of the Consumer Federation of America, said. 'Maybe they realized the merger wouldn't fly without it.'
In last year's approval of the AT&T-SBC and Verizon-MCI mergers, the FCC required AT&T and Verizon to follow the agency's network neutrality principles for two years after the merger closed.
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