ts network. Level 3 was starting up at roughly the same time but with an even more ambitious plan. Williams Communications was never a top-tier player, though its net- work gained a fair number of customers, especially other carriers. In 1999, it sold an interest in itself to SBC, which had national ambitions; SBC would thus use Williams' network for its own branded services. Its 32,000-mile back- bone was complete by the end of 2000, and Williams spun the company off to its shareholders. But in 2001, it started spinning off operations, such as its enter- prise services unit. And as the company continued to lose money, CEO Howard Janzen tried to downplay the glut of fiber that had developed. "You won't find many industries that can match the growth we're seeing as new broadband applications drive demand," noted Janzen. "I believe we'll find marketplace fears about bandwidth glut are unfounded. There is strong and continued growth in the Internet and data traffic market and recent studies by industry ana- lysts cite Internet growth rates approaching 100 percent per year" [7]. That quarter, the company lost $250 million on revenues of $283 million. It filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in April 2002; that quarter's losses totaled $293 million. Its shares were cancelled as it emerged from bankruptcy later that year, renamed Wiltel Communications; it was then acquired by Leucadia National Corporation, a diversified investor that had acquired 44% of the company some months earlier. The total value of the stock swap was less than half a billion dollars. Metromedia Sold Cellular and Long-Haul, Created MFN The Metromedia name has a long and storied history. It has not SO much referred to a corporation as to a single person, John Kluge, and the many enter- prises he has operated. Kluge is often listed as one of the world's richest people. For many years, starting in 1946, his privately held company focused on broad- casting, owning among other things a New York City television station. He sold the station to Rupert Murdoch when 