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Here is what ATT is doing in my neighborhood, with a little of my own conjecture thrown in.
Fact: ATT added to the fiber network.
Fact: They expanded U-Verse (their fiber services) into my neighborhood and started selling it months after they started sending cards in the mail touting its features.
Fact: They sent out (contracted third-party) sales teams to sign up new users and convert existing DSL users to fiber. We signed up. The U-Verse internet package we signed up for was about $30/mo, 12MB/s. (We're paying a few dollars more than that for 3MB/s now on DSL.)
Fact: A few days later, two days before the scheduled install, they called and said they had to reschedule the install for the end of the month (which was three weeks later)but no date was given.
Fact: We never got an install date. The only people that got an install were those who called back a couple of times to ask why they hadn't been contacted with an install date. Those of us who were too annoyed by the situation to make the first move still don't have U-Verse, and we still haven't heard anything else from U-Verse.
Conjecture: ATT oversold their brand new upgrades right out of the gate. Perhaps they wanted to keep a certain number of people on copper and the numbers didn't work out after the sales force came through. Perhaps they stretched their install techs too thin and knew they couldn't get to everyone. Who knows?
All I know is we still have 3MB/s DSL, and honestly I don't care much. With the new caps, my DSL speed is almost self-regulating. It's enough for what I do, and surprisingly it's also enough to get really good quality from Netflix, and I only do that a couple hours a week (if that). My roommate watches videos and listens to podcasts, but it's mostly lower-bitrate stuff, and he doesn't do it often. His Hulu habits have decreased as their ads increased.
One thing I have to say, though, is that while some people I know (IRL) scoff at my speed, my DSL has been rock-solid. I've been back in Nashville since Feb 2010, and there has only been one internet outage in that time, and it lasted about 2-3 hours. The speed is consistent; I can test it at any time of day and get about the same results. My friends who brag about their superfast Comcast (cable) internet also gripe about frequent slow-downs and "rush hour" issues.
And I don't have a plethora of ISPs to choose from. The only other truly viable line-based candidate would be Comcast. There are a couple of 3G "home hotspot" options but I wouldn't call those preferable at all, especially considering their cost.
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