You gotta like the irony in this situation: Comcast buys AT&T Cable to become the prodominant provider of cable television in the U.S. Fast forward to 2005 and what's left of AT&T is being paired with SBC with the emphasis on creating a new IPTV infrastructure to compete against Comcast.

Comcast reaches 21,477,000 households today. SBC estimates that its new services could reach 18,000,000 of the current SBC-AT&T 36 million households in nearly three years. Comcast's numbers are here-and-now while SBC's indicate a market potential.

AT&T execs say the company can deliver 1,000 or more channels of TV within 18 months, and their video plans include targeted TV advertising, TV via cell phone and video on demand.

Yahoo, which has been working with SBC on search technology and advertising, will continue working with AT&T.