I noticed that a blog post from last month about FreeConferenceCall.com was getting an unusually large number of hits, so I decided to find out why. In that blog, I had speculated that FreeConferenceCall.com might be next in line to feel the wrath of AT&T (formerly SBC) following the latter’s suit against Futurephone.

Thirty seconds of Googling found this post from an AT&T Wireless subscriber who found his calls to FreeConferenceCall.com blocked:

On March 10th, I tried to join an ePluribus Media conference call through freeconference.com, using my Cingular cell phone. I could not connect to the number. A recording told me it had been blocked and that I should contact Cingular if I wanted more information. I did, and was told that a “business decision” had been made, blocking that number. As American carrying the assumptions about networks I’ve described here, I reacted to that “explanation” in a particularly negative fashion. I was further outraged when told that it was Cingular’s “right” to block the number under the service agreement I had signed.

My interest piqued, I tried to call FreeConferenceCall.com from my own AT&T Wireless phone and, indeed, the number was blocked.

At first I was outraged. But then it dawned on me that this might just be the real future of phones in the United States. With a nearly unified AT&T, and the telecom deregulation act of 1996 almost completely undone, one really can’t expect anything else. Someone over at AT&T obviously made the decision that the fiscal ramifications of blocking FreeConferenceCall.com justified the potential risk and negative publicity. Whoever she is, good for her. She has the power and she’s not afraid to use it.

You go girl! But now that you have started, I would humbly suggest that you follow your decision to its logical conclusion and block every other number that might have a negative financial impact. To begin with, you should block the contact center lines of Sprint, Verizon Mobile, T-Mobile, and every other competing cellular provider. Why should your customers be able to call the competition from an AT&T Wireless phone? After all, they might switch their service to that provider, and that would REALLY cost. When that’s done, you could make a list of every other AT&T competitor and block their numbers too.

Then, at least, you would save your subscribers the ignominy of believing that they have a choice. The boss is back. We may as well get used to it.