ote Hin- dery downplaying the cultural differences between TCI and AT&T. "Messrs. Zeglis and Hindery said they didn't think cultural differ- ences would be a barrier to working well together," Cauley wrote. "Mr. Hindery played down the notion that cable companies still act like buccaneers, adding that TCI's operations are similar to those of the phone company. The two executives noted they will have a collabo- rative approach to running things." Eventually, Armstrong had to settle the issue. He took Zeglis and Hindery to lunch at a nearby restaurant, where they presented their points of view. Hindery said that he had great respect for Zeglis, but that Zeglis didn't add any value to the cable business and Hindery had no intention of reporting to him. Zeglis said that he didn't care who ran the cable business, but someone had to have the responsibility for integrating customer offers. History had shown how difficult that was even when line executives reported to the same boss. It would be im- possible if there were no reporting relationship at all. Armstrong said he would have to think about it. On September 28, Armstrong blinked. Calling his top advisers to- gether in the boardroom, he went over his thinking. The investment bankers had been telling him that an IPO for a $33 billion company would be difficult to sell. Furthermore, investors were concerned that we were proposing to put a sick business (long distance) into the tracker. Saying that there's a difference between being bold and being dumb, he decided to keep long distance out of the tracker and fix it. We could still go to market with bundles. Hindery would report di- rectly to Armstrong. Tough Calls Casting Is Everything At stake here was not which executive should be in charge or who should report to whom. The central question was much larger: What was the nature of the company's consumer long-distance business? Armstrong had been clear about one thing: Consumer long-distance service was a commodity. Whether years of price competition had made it SO or