CHOICE - Most consumers have many more options for wireless service than they do for land-line service.

To be sure, the decline in revenue from traditional land-line service is not limited to AT&T.

There are no current plans to extend land-line service to the surrounding steep mountains where Ms. Skhakhane lives, government officials here say.

In this sense, Isan has led advanced nations where land-line service is now being superseded by cellular technology.

But consumers still have few choices in land-line service.

In most cases, he added, features like caller ID and voice mail are considered standard in wireless plans but as extras on local land-line service.

The couple had spent about $45 a month for land-line service and $25 a month for cellphone service, for a total of $70.

Telekom Srbija formerly held a monopoly on all land-line services in Serbia until 2010, when Telenor Serbia became the second land-line operator in the country.

Verizon had argued that the recession, fierce competition, the telecommunications slump and the substitution of wireless service for land-line service constituted such an external event.

Cellphone networks were clogged or went down, and many people lost even land-line service at home or in the office.