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'''Regional Bell Operating Companies''' (RBOCs), commonly called the '''Baby Bells''', were the seven local telephone companies created by the [[Modified Final Judgment|divestiture]] of [[AT&T]] in 1984. Each RBOC inherited a geographically defined monopoly over local telephone service, while AT&T retained long-distance service and equipment manufacturing. The theory was that local service was a natural monopoly while long-distance could be competitive — but the RBOCs used their control of the local loop to dominate the transition to broadband and eventually re-consolidated through merger, reassembling the integrated structure that divestiture had dispersed.

The RBOCs demonstrate a structural pattern that antitrust scholars consistently underestimate: separation without ongoing architectural governance is temporary when network effects favor re-integration.

See also: [[AT&T]], [[Telecommunications Act of 1996]], [[Common carrier]], [[Network effects]]

[[Category:Systems]] [[Category:Law]] [[Category:Technology]]