f panicking for no reason. But his punch line was clear: If Armstrong wanted him to pass on the income that would flow from the Hot Network, he'd have to tell Somers himself. I decided to wait until the next morning to call Armstrong. The next day's Wall Street Journal was worse than I feared. In addi- tion to describing the Hot Network as "hard-core" and "explicit," the story quoted Time Warner cable's programming chief as saying that it "doesn't comport with the values our company wishes to exhibit." Comcast, according to the article, also passed on carrying the Hot Net- work. In fact, Comcast and Time Warner did carry similar explicit programming on some of their systems, but the story went on to de- scribe AT&T's decision as "a marked contrast from policies of the for- mer Tele-Communications, Inc. which eschewed programming that featured explicit sex or extreme violence." The Journal went on to characterize our programming decision as a desperation move. I hated the article, but I thought it might help convince Armstrong to stand behind his decision of the night before. When I called in to the office, however, I discovered that Somers was no longer in Denver, but in New Jersey. He had already been in to see Armstrong. When I had my call transferred to Armstrong's office, he said, "You know how when you feel like crap, everything looks like crap? That's how it was last night when you called. This morning I feel better, and I don't think we should let one lousy article panic us. Somers has Tough Calls plans in place to give customers unprecedented control over adult pro- gramming. You should get together with him to discuss it, and then we should talk again." Somers had demonstrated the advantages of having access to a corporate jet. I usually flew commercial. Be True to Your Values In the first two weeks following the Journal story, AT&T received 2,243 complaints about its decision to carry the Hot Network. Over IOO shareholders said they would sell their stock. Over 300 customers threatened to cancel their s