switching (using Tymnet switches) across the SWBT platforms. When we split from AT&T in the early 1980s, we have to switch over 4000 private lines to a cheaper vehicle, and that was packet switching the traffic onto our internal packet network, thus saving a ton of money for private lines.
We then migrating to marketing and selling the packet network to others who wanted to use the technology too. The good ol', wild west days of the internet, eh? Another one of my SWBT jobs was national / local, where SWBT could enter markets as a competitive CLEC too, outside our normal marketplace, w/ the same rules as other CLECs had in that marketplace too (could pick and chose which contract provisions a CLEC could use).
My biggest memories was from teaching the voice world (the telephone company) what in the world was data, and imagine the disbelief we ran into, when 'data' was such a foreign concept to the voice world/telephone company, and trying to explain it to the voice people. Never heard of it they've heard of analog, voice, of course, but not this.
We had to literally change the entire voice world of the telephone companies in how they operated, being all of the way from removing impeders, which filtered out extraneous noise on a network (data traffic actually) so we could put in the full fledged packet networks across the board. Different systems of measurement too, for billing had to be developed too, as the concept of calls lasting literally forever (a PVC for example) was unknown too (they of course had 'private lines' for lease). A different concept all around.
You and I were one of the few lucky ones, being in on the ground floor when all of these technologies were being implemented, a very lucky experience few will ever get, now-a-days.
Take care!
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Maintain that sense of humor. 