I was in my late teens at the time. My memory is that I felt like the tech was definitely going happen in some form, but I rolled my eyes heavily at the idea that AT&T was going to be the company to do make it happen.

If you’re unfamiliar, the phone connectivity situation in the 80s and 90s was messy and piecemeal. AT&T had been broken up in 1982 (see https://www.historyfactory.com/insights/this-month-in-busine...), and most people had a local phone provider and AT&T was the default long-distance provider. MCI and Sprint were becoming real competition for AT&T at the time of these commercials.

Anyway, in 1993 AT&T was still the crusty old monopoly on most people’s minds, and the idea that they were going to be the company to bring any of these ideas to the market was laughable. So the commercials were basically an image play. The only thing most people bought from AT&T was long distance service, and the main threat was customers leaving for MCI and Sprint. The ads memorable for sure, but I don’t think they blew anyone’s mind or made anyone stay with AT&T.