Do the Math

IPTV might have been the one overarching theme at NxtComm, but at&t CEO Randall Stephenson left no doubt about where at&t is anchoring its strategy. "To succeed you have to be a wireless centric company," Stephenson said. "The wireless decision is the first decision a consumer makes."

"Everything else comes after that, because the wireless is the most personal communications device and goes everywhere with you," Stephenson said. Of course, he fairly quickly added that at&t is not neglecting its wireline broadband strategy.

But there's an important principle here. If one totes up the actual revenue any telecom provider can generate from video (ARPU is nice, but gross margin for an entertainment product has to be sliced in half to figure out what "gross revenue" actually is for a service provider), and then compares that to what a service provider can lose from current voice and data, the potential loss from voice and data is a larger number than the potential gains from new video services.

That isn't an argument against providing video. It is an argument for not getting defocused on core data and voice revenues. That's where the money is.