[budanski]

This is insane. Bell Labs is responsible for a HUGE number of America's technology innovations since 1920 (this is only a fraction of the things Bell Labs has invented or first-developed): Fax (1920) Movies with synchronized sound (1926) Television (first transmission, 1927) Radio astronomy (1931) Speech synthesizer (1937) Calculators (1940 and later) Photovoltaic (PV) cell (1940s) Scrambler for speech (1943) Transistor (1947) Teleprinter (1949) Microwave research (1950s) TransAtlantic cable (1956) Electronic music (1957) LED (1962) CO2 Laser (1964) Charge-coupled device (1969) UNIX (1970) C language (1970) Fibre optics (1976) 32-bit CPU (1980) Cellular phone (1980) Breakup of AT&T (1984) Wireless networking (1990) 56k modem (1991) Electron lithography (1996) Voice over IP (1998) Plastic transistors (2000) Increasing foreign involvement (2002-2006) Sold to French (2006) We're selling this??? What are we, crazy? Sadly, I think so...

Once the merger is complete it, all listed will now be claimed by the french... or at least on Alcatel's website under company history ;)

[dayglored]

> Once the merger is complete it, all listed will now be claimed by the french... or at least on Alcatel's website under company history ;)

Sadly, I don't doubt you're right.

Throughout my life, the guys at Bell Labs (and at JPL, and a few other outstanding facilities) have been my heroes (I'm an engineer with a physics degree, now working as an engineering consultant and sysadmin).

It toasts my shorts to think that the French will claim these marvelous American achievements, simply because our stupid government sold out. The Founders are spinning in their graves. Grrr-rrr.