TELECOM Digest     Tue, 16 Jan 2007 23:25:00 EST    Volume 26 : Issue 16

Inside This Issue:                           Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    Man's Cell Phone Ignites in Pocket; Burns Him and Hotel Room (AP Newswire)
    Local Carriers Drag Feet on Number Portability (Patrick Townson)
    Verizon Spins Off Some Operations in FairPoint Deal (USTelecom dailyLead)
    The iPhone User Experience: A First Look (Monty Solomon)
    Re: Want an iPhone? Beware the iHandcuffs (Lisa Hancock)
    Re: Newbridge 3624 Console Port - Pinout? (Reed)
    Re: What's in a Name?: That Which We Call an iPhone (ranck@vt.edu)
    Re: Interview With Prosecutor on the 'Child Porn' Case (Rick Merrill)
    Re: Easy411 (Fred Atkinson)
    Re: NY Times Plans Major Job Cutback (Garrett Wollman)
    Re: NY Times Plans Major Job Cutback (Lisa Hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com)

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Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2007 22:01:30 -0600
From: Associated Press News Wire <ap@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Man's Cell Phone Ignites in Pocket; Burns Him and Hotel Room


Man's cell phone ignites in pocket
Fire burns the hotel and causes severe burns over half his body

VALLEJO, California - A cell phone apparently ignited in a man's
pocket and started a fire that burned his hotel room and caused severe
burns over half his body, fire department officials said.

Luis Picaso, 59, was in stable condition Monday with second- and
third-degree burns to his upper body, back, right arm and right leg,
Vallejo Fire Department assistant chief Kurt Henke said.

Firefighters arrived at the residential hotel Saturday night to find
Picaso lying on the bathroom floor after a malfunctioning cell phone
in his pants pocket set fire to his nylon and polyester clothes, Henke
said.

The flames spread to a plastic chair, setting off a sprinkler that held 
the fire in check, he said.

Authorities declined to name the phone's manufacturer and model.

The fire and water caused $75,000 damage to the room and a business on 
the ground floor, Henke said.

Copyright 2007 The Associated Press.

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily. And, discuss this and other topics in our forum at
http://telecom-digest.org/forum (or)
http://telecom-digest.org/chat/index.html

For more news and headlines, please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/AP.html

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 15 Jan 2007 22:04:36 -0600
From: Paul Dsvidson, USA Today <usatoday@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Local Carriers Drag Feet on Number Portability


By Paul Davidson, USA TODAY

If you're ditching your home phone to go wireless only, your local
phone company has your number.

The problem, Sprint Nextel (S) and T-Mobile (DT) say, is the local
phone giants don't want to give that number up.

In a recent petition to the Federal Communications Commission, the two
cellphone carriers say local phone companies are making it difficult
for consumers to transfer land-line numbers to wireless phones. And
they say that's dissuading many people from using mobile phones
exclusively.

About 10% of U.S. households have no land-line phone, a figure that's
been rising 1 to 3 percentage points a year, Yankee Group says. Many
are single, lower-income and young — 67% of cord-cutters are under
35, Yankee Group says.

Industry analysts had expected the practice to become more widespread
after the FCC in 2003 forced phone companies to let customers transfer
home numbers to their cellphones. The FCC also allowed consumers to
take their numbers with them when they switch wireless carriers. But
the cord-cutting contingent has grown slowly, largely because of the
number-switching hassles, says Ovum analyst Roger Entner.

T-Mobile and Sprint say local phone companies make them provide dozens
of arcane bits of information on complex forms. If anything is
slightly awry, the form is rejected.

Number transfers typically take a week to 10 days but can drag on for
weeks or, in rare cases, months, they say. About 30% of customers give
up, and many keep their home phone service. Wireless carriers lose a
customer or the extra calling revenue they would have gotten if the
subscriber had dropped home service.

"Customers get frustrated, and we lose customers," says Sara Leibman,
federal regulatory-affairs director for T-Mobile.

In contrast, numbers are generally transferred between cellphone
providers within 2 or 3 hours, T-Mobile and Sprint say. They suggest
the red tape is designed to help the local companies retain customers,
and they want the FCC to streamline the process.

AT&T spokeswoman Claudia Jones says the local phone giant believes
"consumers are entitled to change service providers in a reasonable
time frame." Verizon and Qwest say they meet industry
standards. Verizon's David Fish says the company has pared the
information required on the forms.

FCC rules theoretically require transfers to be done in four days, but
a form with errors can cause indefinite delays.

Entner says Verizon Wireless (VZ) and Cingular face similar holdups
but haven't complained as they're mostly or wholly owned by Verizon
and AT&T, respectively. Verizon Wireless spokeswoman Debra Lewis says
the transfers are "not an issue." Cingular, whose name changes to AT&T
today, referred questions to AT&T's Jones.

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily. And, discuss this and other topics in our forum at
http://telecom-digest.org/forum (or)
http://telecom-digest.org/chat/index.html

For more news and headlines, please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/internet-news.html

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 12:34:56 CST
From: USTelecom dailyLead <ustelecom@dailylead.com>
Subject: Verizon Spins Off Some Operations in FairPoint Deal


USTelecom dailyLead
January 16, 2007
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/fWlofDtusXkibzCibuddnELB

TODAY'S HEADLINES

NEWS OF THE DAY
* Verizon spins off some operations in FairPoint deal
BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH
* BT taps Nortel, Siemens as Ethernet equipment suppliers
* T-Mobile offers exclusive white Pearl
* Telstra aims to extend broadband reach
* Avaya buys Ubiquity Software
* Analysis: Cisco concentrates on video
* Dolans boost offer for Cablevision by $3 a share
* Report: Vodafone, Reliance consider Essar buy workaround
USTELECOM SPOTLIGHT
* Manage Customer Facing Business Processes for Service Providers Thursday,
 Jan. 18, 1 p.m. (ET)
HOT TOPICS
* Cisco files iPhone trademark suit against Apple
* Apple hopes to sell 10 million iPhones in 2008
* AT&T sets Cingular rebranding in motion
* Podcast: Alcatel-Lucent looks ahead
* Embarq eyes network expansion
TECHNOLOGY TRENDS
* Entrepreneurs behind KaZaA, Skype team for Web-based TV service
* Arris inks deal for Norway's Tandberg Television
* Handset sales to increase in 2007

Follow the link below to read quick summaries of these stories and others.
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/fWlofDtusXkibzCibuddnELB

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 17:51:52 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: The iPhone User Experience: A First Look


The iPhone User Experience: A First Look

Bruce Tognazzini
AskTog, January 2007

A collective gasp was heard around the world following the January,
2007, MacWorld Conference, when Steve Jobs pulled the wraps off the
long-rumored iPhone.  He proclaimed it a revolutionary product with a
brand-new "multi-touch" interface as breakthrough and breathtaking as
the mouse interface of the 1960s.

Is iPhone as revolutionary as claimed?  Is the multi-touch interface
truly breakthrough as claimed? Yes and no. Let's take a look.

http://www.asktog.com/columns/070iPhoneFirstLook.html

------------------------------

From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Re: Want an iPhone? Beware the iHandcuffs
Date: 15 Jan 2007 18:42:25 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com


Monty Solomon wrote:

> If "crippleware" seems an unduly harsh description, it balances the
> euphemistic names that the industry uses for copy protection. Apple
> officially calls its own standard "FairPlay," but fair it is not.

> Here is how FairPlay works: When you buy songs at the iTunes Music
> Store, you can play them on one -- and only one -- line of portable
> player, the iPod. And when you buy an iPod, you can play
> copy-protected songs bought from one -- and only one -- online music
> store, the iTunes Music Store.

There are conflicting views on this subject.  On the one hand,
consumers want flexibility in playing their music, on the other, music
companies and musicians want -- quite legitmately -- to protect their
copyrights.

On a recent discussion on recs.art.tv, many people thought quite
passionately that performed music was somehow in the public domain and
listeners had an unlimited moral "right" to download whatever and
whenever they wanted, and to share it at any time.  This of course is
nonsense.  The US Constitution clearly provides for copyright and
patent protection of creative works.

With digital media, it's real easy to make perfect bootleg copies and
widely distribute them.  That's simply not fair to the music business
or musicians.  (Whether we like or dislike the music business is
totally irrelevent.)

On the other hand, if someone goes out and properly buys some music,
regardless of the medium (78 or iPod), they ought to have some
reasonably usage on multiple players, just as they do with computer
software.  If I buy a computer program, I can put it on as many
machines as I want (home, office, car, etc.) as long as it's single
usage.  So, if I buy some music, I should be allowed to freely
duplicate it as I see fit for my tape player, for example.

I'm not happy that the electronics industry keeps introducing new
stuff so fast that other stuff is quickly obsolete.  I have a nice
collection of cassette tapes I want to keep.  I even have plenty of
phono records I want to keep.  Many people have lots of 78s.

But at the same time, consumers have this addiction to rush out and
buy the latest fad.  People actually camp out overnight at electronics
stores for the newest release of something!  (Don't these people have
lives???)

[public replies please]

------------------------------

From: Reed <reedh@rmi.net>
Subject: Re: Newbridge 3624 Console Port - Pinout?
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 03:01:50 GMT


Keith Thelen wrote:

> Hello all!

> The subject pretty much says it all -- I have a Newbridge "MainStreet"
> 3624 channel bank which I need to reconfigure, but I have not been
> able to obtain the proper console cable for it, nor have I found the
> info needed to make one in my searching. Does anyone have the pinouts?

> TIA,

> Keith Thelen
> Kanabec Systems
> http://www.kanabecsystems.com/
> Mac + PC consulting for East Central Minnesota

There is a PDF or manual at
http://www.tda600.com/Manuals/Newbridge/Newbridge%203624%20Channel%20Bank%20Installation%20Manual.PDF

Pinout is on page 109 of 526, Chap 11

------------------------------

From: ranck@vt.edu
Subject: Re: What's in a Name?: That Which We Call an iPhone by Any Other Name
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 16:43:40 +0000 (UTC)
Organization: Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia, USA


Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote:

> What makes these trademark shenanigans all the more peculiar is that 
> at the same MacWorld show this week Apple introduced another product 
> called Apple TV, which it first demonstrated last year under the name 
> iTV. (Just as an aside, one reader pointed out, "Look at the Mac 
> Mini, the Apple TV, and the new AirPort extreme, all the same size 
> and Bob's version of Apple's multimedia PC is stacking up, for less 
> than $1,000.") Well, it turned out that Elgato Systems makes a 
> product called EyeTV (pronounced "iTV" obviously), which is a line of 
> Macintosh video capture devices -- some with tuners -- so Apple 
> backed off and changed the product name to Apple TV.

> So Apple changed its marketing, diluting its whole "iThis" and "iThat"
> naming strategy in deference to Elgato, a company they could buy with
> a weekend's earnings from the iTunes Store, but chose to go toe-to-toe
> with Cisco, a company that's bigger, richer, and just as mean as Apple
> any day.  If an iTV can become an Apple TV, why can't an iPhone become
> an Apple Phone?

Or, perhaps Apple didn't want to take on ITV, a very large media
conglomerate based in England?  I don't know the relative size of ITV
and Cisco, but it's unlikely Apple would want to wage two big
trademark battles at once.

Bill Ranck
Blacksburg, Va.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 13:55:43 -0500
From: Rick Merrill <rick0.merrill@NOSPAM.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Interview With Prosecutor on the 'Child Porn' Case


> For a video link of ABC News on this case, please go to:
> http://abcnews.go.com/Video/playerIndex?id=2796316

> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: First, for anyone still reading this, I
> do suggest you look at the above video for more details. And it would 
> seem to me the _only_ reason police insisted on the watered down
> charge of 'distributing pornography' was so they did not have to go
> away empty-handed. As any police officer would tell you, it is quite
> essential to neutralize anyone who might otherwise try to sue you for
> false arrest charges. Myself, I would have pleaded not guilty and
> stood on that position until hell froze over (which it almost has here
> today in Independence, sheets of ice on everything after the weekend
> ice storms), but in any event I would have given them nothing, nada,
> no matter how long it took or how much it cost. And one favorite trick
> of pedophile hackers, as we learn in the video, is to keep their _own_
> computers clean at all times, storing their stuff on _someone else's_
> computer instead, as apparently happened in this case. And, IMO, shame 
> on Yahoo for sticking their nose into the mess.  PAT]

Apparently Yahoo, the police, and the family had No Idea that other 
people could place 'stuff' on your home computer. ALL free porn sites 
try to get you to load Trojan exe files! These were all so-called adult
sites that the boy in question had accessed. Also, the family had no AV 
and No router.

This is definitely a "cautionary tale".

------------------------------

From: Fred Atkinson <fatkinson@mishmash.com>
Subject: Re: Easy411
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 09:19:25 -0500
Organization: NewsGuy - Unlimited Usenet $19.95
Reply-To: fatkinson@mishmash.com


Pat, 

	I just got a call from Jeff Wellemeyer, who is the CTO for
Easy411.  

	Here is the scoop.  They did indeed buy Easy411.  There are
different access numbers for the service.  When I complained, they
tested it not using the same access number that I used and found it to
be working.

	I had escalated it and it landed on Jeff Wellemeyer's
voicemail.  He investigated further and found that our access number
to Easy411 is indeed not working.

	He says they have not billed for Easy411 service for the last
several months so no one should have been improperly charged for the
service.  When I asked him when the service would be restored, he said
that he hoped it would be restored someday later today.

	Regards, 


	Fred Atkinson 

------------------------------

From: wollman@csail.mit.edu (Garrett Wollman)
Subject: Re: NY Times Plans Major Job Cutback
Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007 03:15:33 UTC
Organization: MIT Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Laboratory


In article <telecom26.15.6@telecom-digest.org>, <Wesrock@aol.com>
wrote:

> With newspapers required to divest their TV stations, those stations
> descended to the level of the other stations in the market.

The Commission was very selective in which newspapers it forced out of
the TV business.  The Cox family was never required to break up its
media empire in Atlanta, which included the /Journal-Constitution/,
the dominant local TV station (WSB-TV), radio, and the local incumbent
cableco.  (Some of these assets have changed hands or otherwise been
restructured since 1996.)  Lately it's been granting waivers left and
right, in the (probably correct) belief that the cross-ownership rules
could not today stand Constitutional muster, as it did in markets from
Los Angeles to Hartford where a Tribune TV station became
commonly-owned with a Times-Mirror newspaper when the two companies
merged.

--
Garrett A. Wollman   | The real tragedy of human existence is not that we are
wollman@csail.mit.edu| nasty by nature, but that a cruel structural asymmetry
Opinions not those   | grants to rare events of meanness such power to shape
of MIT or CSAIL.     | our history. - S.J. Gould, Ten Thousand Acts of Kindness

------------------------------

From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Re: NY Times Plans Major Job Cutback
Date: 16 Jan 2007 16:06:45 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com


Mark Crispin wrote:

> There's a big difference between covering every tiny town meeting, and
> no coverage or condescending coverage ("where all the girls are either
> pregnant or look like they will soon become pregnant") of the suburbs
> where most of their readership lives.

Did a newspaper actually say that?  If so, in what context?

> A newspaper that purports to be a regional paper should cover at least
> the local 5-digit population bedroom communities, and not treat them
> as if they were a 2-digit population farming community 100 miles away.

Major newspapers I've seen, including the NYT, do that pretty well.
However, they're still losing readership.

> It's been a long time since I last looked through the Sunday NY Times, but
> as I recall much of its bulk was advertising.

The bulk of newspapers has always been advertising.


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: With a bit of luck, local news from New
York City gets covered in NY Times ... maybe. They do not do a very
good job of covering local, NYC news, but they are not bad -- if a
little bit of liberal bias is okay -- on national and international
news.  PAT]

------------------------------


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End of TELECOM Digest V26 #16
*****************************