The acquisition target is 'Time Warner Inc.', primarily a television and film company, whose products and subvisions include HBO and Cinemax, the TV networks CNN, TBS, Turner Classic Movies, TNT, and various joint ventures with US sports leagues, and Warner Bros, which now includes DC Comics/DC Entertainment. Meanwhile, AT&T is largely a telecom and satellite broadcast company, which under its various subsidiaries offers bulk telecom interconnect, and satellite television, and is a wired and wireless ISP.
Therefore, this sounds more like vertical integration of an infrastructure-and-ISP company buying a media company in much the same vein as Comcast acquiring full ownership of NBCUniversal in 2013, or Verizon acquiring AOL -- which in 2001 bought Time Warner, then AOL got spun out in 2009 -- and Yahoo.
The part that bothers me about each of those acquisitions is that none of those utility companies are well-liked by their customers (instead being the most hated companies). The fact that they all have the ability to acquire these other large entities which aren't reviled shows that they really are scalping their customers. And it isn't just Comcast or AT&T or Verizon, it's all of them. That is highly irregular for them to all be so despised and successful.
Therefore, this sounds more like vertical integration of an infrastructure-and-ISP company buying a media company in much the same vein as Comcast acquiring full ownership of NBCUniversal in 2013, or Verizon acquiring AOL -- which in 2001 bought Time Warner, then AOL got spun out in 2009 -- and Yahoo.