TELECOM Digest     Mon, 9 Apr 2007 19:32:00 EDT    Volume 26 : Issue 96

Inside This Issue:                           Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    Microsoft Launches Messenger on Xbox 360 (Reuters News Wire)
    Stranger's Phone Line Active in Apartment (xx-google@telefog.com)
    Direct and Indirect Military Spending (Lisa Hancock)
    CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update (communicationsdirect_daily)
    Vonage Gets Temporary Reprieve (USTelecom dailyLead)
    Re: Google's Next Frontier: Television (Neal McLain)
    Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning (Tom Horsley)
    Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning (Fred Atkinson)
    Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning (Rick Merrill)
    Re: Fred Phelps Fax Machine Antics (William Warren)
    Re: Vonage Sued to Quit Using Verizon Patents (Lisa Hancock)

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

Date: Mon, 09 Apr 2007 15:58:37 -0500
From: Reuters News Wire <reuters@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Microsoft Launches Messenger on Xbox 360


Microsoft Corp. has announced the launch of Windows Live Messenger on
Xbox 360, connecting people across Xbox 360 consoles, Microsoft
Windows-based PCs and Windows Mobile-powered devices.

With this update to Xbox 360, people can connect and chat directly
from their television using Windows Live Messenger, a network of more
than 20 billion relationships and more than 260 million active
accounts.

Beginning the week of May 7, the Xbox 360 spring update will provide
Xbox 360 owners worldwide with access to Windows Live Messenger
features, broadening the communication options on the Xbox LIVE social
network.

Copyright 2007 Reuters Limited. 

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/newstoday.html

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

From: xx-google@telefog.com
Subject: Stranger's Phone Line Active in Apartment
Date: 8 Apr 2007 23:46:15 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


Recently a friend discovered an extra active phone line in his San
Francisco apartment.  To identify the mystery line, we dialed out on
it and the caller ID for it contains the name of a stranger who lives
a block from my friend.  My friend is pretty sure that the stranger
has never lived in my friend's apartment building.

My guess is that the stranger's phone number works just fine at the
stranger's home, and that (perhaps years ago) ATT accidentally
connected the stranger's line to my friend's apartment via a wiring
error in the large ATT neighborhood wiring box that sits nearby on the
street.  We cut the wire at the jack in the apartment so my friend
wouldn't use the stranger's line by accident.  We haven't yet
contacted the stranger a block away, but we might do so.

I'd bet that this sort of wiring error happens regularly, and that the
phone company and the two subscribers in question don't notice it.

Have you ever heard of a wiring error of this sort?  Could I be
mistaken about what's going on with the stranger's phone line?


**********
1366294709


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: We hear of this error quite often. It
is an error in multiples open on the same cable run. It most often
happens in older inner-city neighborhoods (i.e. Chicago, New York, 
San Francisco) where the telephone cables go back many generations or
even a century or more, and typically in older buildings where at
some point in the past or maybe even now, there is a large, common
block or 'head' somewhere in the building with a large number of
phone terminations in one place. In telco's defense, they could not
begin to run a pair of wires to _everywhere_ and _everyone_ who has
phone service. So they run cables with hundreds of wires in each cable
around neighborhoods then splice open the cable at each location where
one or more phones are to be located. This is supposed to be a telco
SECRET and that makes it a SECURE system. Telco does not talk about
it to the public very much. So let's say we have cable #905 running
through the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, and pair #6097 (of that cable)
serving your house.

Now when your phone was first installed, maybe the inside plant
decided to assign some other pair of wires, but the outside plant (a
different bunch totally) gets to your house to do the work and he
finds some screwed up mess of wires in your basement or wherever the
termination box is located so he decides to find some other idle pair
of wires, let's call them #6097 as above. We _suppose_ he at least
tested the pair to make sure they were idle, but who knows.  When he
chose that pair he is supposed to consult a directory or map of the
cable-run and go to every other place on the 'run' where the cable had
been terminated, or spliced-into and 'open' them up or remove them
from any inside terminations along the way. He is then to note on this
map, or computer printout or whatever what he has done.  "I hooked
user to pair #6097 on cable 905." Normally that would mean the 'red
and green' wires of the two-wire pair. Its a kind of 'musical chairs'
situation: half as many actual wires as there are telepone users and
instruments; keep swapping the pairs around as needed, make sure no
user gets left without a working 'pair'. 

This gets sufficiently complex that the general public knows nothing
about it so telco claims and advertises it is SECURE. Now the end user
goes along, la-tee-dah, using his phone, all just fine. Telco does not
bill him for his calls based on his _telephone number_ (which we will 
refer to as the 'commonly known as' name for those wires on cable 905
and pair 6097.) They bill him for the calls on that cable and pair
number. Your '_phone number_' is just the commonly used alias for those
wires. 

Now one day, telco user is snoopy and discovers a 'yellow and black'
wire terminated in the box on his wall, apparently going nowhere. If
he knew about this sort of thing, he would know that yellow/black
wire(s) were actually pair 6098 on the same cable. He hears dial tone
because that pair of wires (the multiple) had not been properly
terminated (or clipped and disconnected) from his neighbor somewhere
else on the cable run. Or maybe, the lazy installer had 'borrowed'
the other half of the 6097/6098 combo from the neighbor to start with.
Typically a residence gets _two_ wire pairs ([red/green][yellow/black])
to start with, but in older very transient neighborhoods the phone
company records get confused and telco gets short of working wire
pairs so sometimes pairs get swapped around and borrowed from, and
these 'open multiples' (see above) get mixed up. 

That, in a nutshell from the nut-emeritus here in Kansas, is how your
friend came to discover a stranger's phone active in his apartment. 

Your friend, being the benevolent sort, would't dream of hooking up
a phone to that 'stangers wire pairs' and making any calls on that
line. If your friend used that 'strangers wire pairs' to make any 
phone calls, either naughty or nice which brought the police or the
phone company bill collectors, they would wind up going to the 
Stranger's door seeking recourse. That's because telco's SECRET and
SECURE system identified the Stranger as the phone call-maker. If the
Stranger called telco to complain about the dozen or so 900 calls on 
his line, the telco service-rep (Miss Prissy) would wring her hands
and assure Stranger that he 'must have made the calls'. If police 
'dumped the logs' on the PHONE NUMBER they'd also make certain 
assurances to Stranger if you get my drift (although we do not expect
anything better of police who probably talked to Miss Prissy also).
Telco's records are correct; telco does not make mistakes, their
ways of doing business are quite SECURE. 

So it _can_ be a serious problem unless everyone does their job
correctly; ie. outside telephone installers making _sure_ the wire
pairs are all correct, with no open multiples along the way. You do
not see this problem much in newer developments or neighborhoods with
mostly single houses, etc, where telco records are newer, 'more comp-
uterized', or better kept. It is almost always a problem in older
neighborhoods with people stacked on top of each other, and a century
of phone service, etc. By the way, if your friend were the perfectly
evil type person, he would make a nice looking 'tap' and place it
on the Stranger's wire pairs and listen to it forever, or if Stranger
had a dial-up modem on that line, watch his modem calls. That's often
times how police do it.  PAT]

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

From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Direct and Indirect Military Spending
Date: 8 Apr 2007 20:56:18 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


I would like to expand what I mentioned earlier about the Defense
Department supporting the early growth of the Internet and its
precedessors.

I divide military spending into two categories, direct and indirect.

What I call Direct would be for direct military purchases, like guns,
tanks, and the like.  That may or may not have civilian benefit.  The
Jeep certainly did, originally developed as a military vehicle, it
found widespread civilian use to this day.  Certain engines in tanks
were later used in civilian commercial vehicles.  The makers of Tang
beverage drink claim this, I don't know if the claim is true.

An example would be IBM's SAGE computer used for invasion radar
control tracking.  This was not something civilians bought.  However,
IBM learned a great deal from developing the project which helped in
subsequent civilian products.

What I call Indirect would be generally supporting a product
purchaseable by anyone, but getting a boost by the defense purchase.
I call the Internet predecessor part of this.  Or, products purchased
by defense contractors to enable them to do a contract.

An earlier example would be IBM's first computer, the 701.  It was a
civilian product with no direct military involvement.  But it was
purchased mostly by companies and organizations with defense business,
such as fighter jet aerospace companies or nuclear research labs.

The old Bell System was a major defense contractor, in both plain
communication systems and advanced electronics, such as fire control.
I am not sure if any of the many products Bell Labs/Western Electric
did in WW II or later inspired a civilian product or benefit.  AFAIK
almost all civilian telephone entities were expressly developed for
such purpose.  (Perhaps the 4 ESS, the toll switching machine was done
for Autovon first???)

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

Subject: CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update - April 09, 2007
From: communications <communicationsdirect_daily@communicationsdirectnews.com>
Reply-To: communicationsdirect_daily-owner@communicationsdirectnews.com
Date: Mon,  9 Apr 2007 10:28:37 EDT


********************************
PricewaterhouseCoopers Presents
The CommunicationsDirect Daily Update
For April 09, 2007
********************************

KDDI to Go MVNO in United States
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23685?11228

     Jiji Press has reported that Japan's KDDI intends to launch an
     MVNO operation in the United States, running on the back of the
     Sprint-Nextel network. The service will differentiate itself by
     offering Japanese language handsets and low-cost calls to Japan with
     both postpaid contracts and pre-pay services. Significance: ...

In Your Eye
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23680?11228

     If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words is a video
     message worth? A startup called Eyejot may help give us the
     answer.  Seattle-based Eyejot bills its technology, also named
     Eyejot, as the first comprehensive client-free online
     video-messaging platform for both personal and business
     communications. The technology ...

MasterCard: On a Phone Near You
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23676?11228

     MasterCard launched a free service this week allowing cardholders
     to use their cell phones to find the nearest ATMs in the U.S.,
     Canada, Australia and much of Europe. The service, called
     MasterCard Nearby, also provides branded information such as
     merchant locations and directions.  'MasterCard Nearby'
     offers a new way for ...

UTC Tells FCC To Take Next Frontline 700 MHz Step
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/130/23673?11228

     700 MHz hopeful Frontline Wireless LLC got some help from the
     Utilities Telecom Council (UTC) in its quest for recognition of
     its broadband public-safety plan at the Federal Communications
     Commission.  In a letter to FCC Secretary Marlene H. Dortch, UTC
     President/CEO William R. Moroney asked that Frontline's
     proposed service ...

Funding Roundup
http://communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/23672?11228

     Mobile entertainment and media is where the money is in this
     week's VC funding round up.  Cellfish Media LLC: The New York
     City-based producer of ringtones and other mobile content has
     added $10 million to its first round of funding, bring its total
     haul to $60 million. The company claims it's the largest
     funding round to ...

CommunicationsDirect Editor <telecom_direct_editor@us.pwc.com>

Copyright (C) 2007 PricewaterhouseCoopers.

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

Date: Mon, 9 Apr 2007 12:31:19 CDT
From: USTelecom dailyLead <ustelecom@dailylead.com>
Subject: Vonage Gets Temporary Reprieve


USTelecom dailyLead
April 9, 2007
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/gCjkfDtusXpnpLCibuddeAFW

TODAY'S HEADLINES


NEWS OF THE DAY
* Vonage gets temporary reprieve
BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH
* SK Telecom sees positive future for Helio
* BT unveils broadband price cuts
* NextWave snaps up IPWireless
* Cable & Wireless racks up Virgin Media broadband deal
* Will Frontline emerge the winner for digital spectrum?
* Sprint to focus on future, will not appeal GSA contract
USTELECOM SPOTLIGHT
* Register for NXTcomm today!
HOT TOPICS
* Vonage barred from adding new customers
* AT&T offers free HD programming
* Level 3 buys select AT&T assets
* FCC adopts new pretexting rules
* Verizon supports DSL customers with new PC service
TECHNOLOGY TRENDS
* Akimbo takes VOD service to PCs
* WiMAX broadband technology a boost for music industry
* Analysis: Cisco, Microsoft becoming competitors
* Review: Enterprises yet to embrace open-source VoIP
REGULATORY & LEGISLATIVE
* Telecoms say new FCC privacy rules are bad for consumers
* Martin takes an open approach

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

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

Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2007 15:58:23 -0500
From: Neal McLain <nmclain@annsgarden.com>
Subject: Re: Google's Next Frontier: Television


I wrote:

> Google's Next Frontier: Television
> By Jon Brodkin, Network World, 03/27/07

But I didn't include the link to the rest of the article.  Here it is: 
http://tinyurl.com/2od78e

Two paragraphs in this article caught my attention:

> Google has already tested an auction-based system for
> selling commercial space for a small cable TV company in
> Northern California.

> The job ad for the Google software engineer position says
> candidates should have experience with emerging TV
> standards and set-top box operating systems. “I would
> imagine [Google has] been working at the request of a
> [cable] service provider to figure out how, within their
> set-top box environments, they would deliver ... a
> targeted advertising experience,” [media analyst Greg]
> Ireland says.

Well, maybe that's Google's plan.  Or maybe Google has something
simpler in mind: to figure out how to deliver a "targeted advertising
experience" to small cable systems, rather than trying to customize
advertising for individual households.  For many small cable systems,
*any* local TV advertising would be a new experience.

As I noted in a previous post on this subject, many small cable TV
systems don't use the advertising slots ("avails") in non-broadcast
advertising-supported programming networks.  The cost of doing so
exceeds the potential revenue. http://tinyurl.com/2fwduo

The only forms of local advertising these systems offer are text and
static images: the crawl on The Weather Channel (during
"local-on-the-eights") and character-generator channels that cycle
through static screens.

If a cable system doesn't use the avails, the network's spots (typically 
those instant-response "call-this-800-number-right-now" ads) pass 
through by default.  Whatever revenue these spots generate goes to the 
network, not the local cable system.

Google can change this, and it looks to me like they might be gearing up 
to do it.

Exactly how they're doing it is unknown, but I imagine it would use a 
web-based interface.  In its simplest implementation, Google would 
maintain a database containing:

- The channel lineup of every participating cable system.
- The avail schedule of every ad-supported non-broadcast network.
- Some means of activating ad insertion at the cable company's headend. 
(This might require new headend equipment, but I'm sure Google could 
take care of that.)

With this implementation, the cable operator could schedule any ad
spot into any avail simply by logging in to a secure website.

Taking things one step further, the ad agencies -- or even advertisers
themselves -- could schedule ads without the cable company having to
do anything.  If two or more advertisers want the same avail, an
automatic auction would ensue.  The cable company might not even know
about it (although, of course, it could check the schedule on that
secure website).  Google would collect the revenue and send the cable
company a monthly check.

In my view, the real significance of such a scheduling system lies in
the opportunities it creates in small communities -- places with
populations in the 5,000-10,000 range.  Such communities are large
enough to have a local commercial infrastructure (car dealership;
furniture store; lumber yard; weekly newspaper; Wal-mart; possibly a
community college), but they don’t have a local television
broadcast station.  Independence, Kansas comes to mind: population
around 10,000, with about 4000 households.

Businesses in these communities are prime candidates for advertising
on cable.  But if the local cable company doesn't offer ad insertion
into non-broadcast networks, their only options are those
text-and-static-image channels.

If Google's plan works as I think it will, insertion costs will fall
dramatically, making it possible for small cable companies to
participate.

Of course, the ads themselves would have to be created before they
could be inserted.  I think this problem will take care of itself: if
insertion costs drop significantly, the advertisers themselves will
fund the production costs.

Local advertisers (the furniture store, the lumber yard) can contract
with a local production house.  (And if a local production house
doesn't exist, somebody will certainly start one.)

National advertisers that support their local dealers through
cooperative advertising programs will be able to extend these programs
to local cable.  To illustrate what I mean, here's a hypothetical
example -- a Chevrolet spot:

- When this spot runs on a broadcast station covering a large area, it 
says "see it at your local Chevrolet dealer today."

- When this spot runs on Cable One in Independence, it says "see it at 
Romans Motor Company, on West Main Street right here in Independence."

Maybe that's not the "targeted advertising experience" that Greg
Ireland imagines, but it's a lot simper and cheaper to implement.

Neal McLain


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: That is exactly how it is done here. It
is done that way for the Toyota dealer in town and the Chevvy dealer. 
Except it does not include the phrase 'right here'; it says Romans
Motor Company, (street number) West Main, Independence, Phone
(number). PAT]

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

From: Tom Horsley <tom.horsley@att.net>
Subject: Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning
Organization: AT&T Worldnet
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2007 10:42:59 GMT


On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 18:27:09 -0500 Chloe Albanesius
<pcmag@telecom-digest.org> wrote:

> Blame Video

Nah, blame Comcast :-).

If using "too much" bandwidth is a problem some users are causing, the
obvious technical solution is simply to throttle the bandwidth to that
user. Comcast servers assign the IP address, Comcast servers know
which IP goes to which user. Surely the router technology exists to
delay delivery of packets to particular IP addresses, thus reducing
the effective bandwidth, but this would all require technical
competence -- an attribute hardly ever found in cable companies :-).

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

From: Fred Atkinson <fatkinson@mishmash.com>
Subject: Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning
Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2007 09:10:18 -0400
Organization: NewsGuy - Unlimited Usenet $19.95


On Sat, 07 Apr 2007 18:27:09 -0500, Chloe Albanesius
<pcmag@telecom-digest.org> wrote:

I would be interested in knowing how much bandwidth that Comcast
actually has to the Internet.  If they have too little, that might
explain why they are so hot to do this.

Is there anyone from Comcast that can get us an answer to that
question?

And I agree with the customers when they called to work out the
problem with customer service that they should have been given some
finite information and not been told that there was nothing wrong with
how much bandwidth they were consuming.  To that end, I believe that
Comcast has erred in their ways.  I would like to see the results of a
class action suit on this.  I suspect that Comcast would probably
lose.

Regards, 

Fred 

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

Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2007 14:55:45 -0400
From: Rick Merrill <rick0.merrill@NOSPAM.gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Comcast Bait and Switch, "Unlimited" Has a New Meaning


Chloe Albanesius wrote:

> By Chloe Albanesius

> Man your PCs. The bandwidth hogs are revolting and Comcast is the
> recipient of their virtual torches and pitchforks.

> Customers across the country have been contacted by the telecom giant
> with a warning to curb excessive bandwidth consumption or risk a
> one-year service termination. Comcast, however, is refusing to reveal
> how much bandwidth use is allowed, making it impossible for customers
> to know if they are in danger of violating Comcast's limit.

> The move has driven customers to sign up with other service providers.

> "Comcast and I are not on speaking terms," said Frank Carreiro, a West
> Jordan, Utah resident who had his Internet service terminated by
> Comcast in January.

> Carreiro said he received a message from a Comcast Security Assurance
> representative in December, who warned him that he was hogging too
> much of the company's bandwidth and needed to cut down. When Carreiro
> contacted customer service about the call, they had no idea what he
> was talking about and suggested it was a prank phone
> call. Unconvinced, Carreiro contacted Comcast several more times, but
> was again told there was no problem.

> A month later, he woke up to a dead Internet connection.  Customer
> service directed him to the Security Assurance division, which
> Carreiro said informed him he would now be without service for one
> year.

> Carreiro said he told Security Assurance that customer service had
> cleared him of any wrongdoing, but Security Assurance reportedly told
> him that customer service is not kept abreast of bandwidth issues for
> security purposes. Comcast also refused to tell Carreiro how much
> bandwidth he would have been allowed to use to avoid service
> termination.

> "It was a very frustrating experience," he said.

> Carreiro has since switched to DSL service from Qwest, which became
> available in his neighborhood in late February. Again connected to the
> Web, he has taken his fight to the blogosphere with an online journal
> http://comcastissue.blogspot.com detailing his troubles.

> Admitted "Internet junkie" and Chattanooga resident Cameron Smith also
> had his service cut off in January for one year. "They said there
> wasn't a limit [for downloading] but that I was downloading too much,
> about 550 gigs. I backed off to about 450 gigs, but they still
> suspended us."

> Smith has since switched to DSL service from BellSouth AT&T. "I don't
> like it," he said, but it is the only other high-speed option
> available in Chattanooga and he refuses to ever return to Comcast
> again.

> Smith also pondered the possibility of a class-action lawsuit against
> Comcast, but has been delayed by funding issues. "If I could afford
> it, then I would do it in a heartbeat because it's a bait-and-switch
> with their customer service," he said.

> As of press time, repeated calls to Comcast were not returned, nor
> were messages left for Comcast Security Assurance or e-mails sent to
> that department's manager, Jay Opperman.

> In a February statement regarding Carreiro's case, Comcast said that
> "customers who are notified of excessive usage typically consume more
> than 100 times the average national Comcast bandwidth usage" and
> apologized for "for any miscommunication that this customer may have
> received about this process."

> What About the Others?

> Several other top U.S. service providers admitted to monitoring
> network traffic and contacting bandwidth hogs, though none were aware
> of any customers who had actually been denied service.

> "We do not disconnect customers," said Mark Harrad, senior vice
> president of corporate communications at Time Warner Cable. But the
> company does "employ various network-management tools to ensure
> excessively high users are not allowed to degrade the online
> experience of other customers."

> Harrad said that "excessive use varies" depending on whether it is a
> peak traffic period, how many "top talkers" are online at the same
> time and what is occurring with regular network traffic patterns. "It
> is not so much an issue of exceeding a speed limit as a pattern of
> behavior over time," he maintained.

> At Verizon, "it is in our terms and conditions that you cannot
> generate excessive amounts of Internet traffic and you cannot host any
> kind of server," said Bobbi Henson, director of media relations.

> But Verizon does not have any "set measurements" on how much is too
> much, Henson said. "We look at it in the aggregate. We will monitor
> [the network] and if we see an issue, we'll try to rebalance the
> traffic before pulling a customer's service."

> Henson is not aware of any incidents when Verizon has had to notify a
> customer about excessive use or cancel their service because of
> bandwidth issues.

> Cox Communications provides data on its Web site
> http://www.cox.com/policy/limitations.asp about how much bandwidth a
> user is allowed to use under the company's three service plans.

> "Cox does not spend a large amount of time enforcing byte caps,
> however, we do communicate with customers when their usage is so
> egregious as to impact the performance of the network for others,"
> said David Grabert, director of media relations.

> Having clear guidelines posted online "makes for fair and clear dialogue 
> when issues arise," Grabert said. 

> Blame Video

> Across the country, consumers are spending a significant amount of
> their time online viewing video content, according to a March report
> from the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) that examined what
> users are doing with their bandwidth.

> Of the more than 2,000 adults CEA surveyed in late 2006 and early
> 2007, researchers found that 70 percent were accessing content via
> online streams. Of that 70 percent, 49 percent connected to the Web
> for news content, 33 percent went online for movie downloads and 28
> percent were gaming, the report said.

> "Some of these people who are bandwidth hogs are [Comcast's] best
> broadband customers," said Adam Thierer, director of the Center for
> Digital Media Freedom at D.C. think tank Progress & Freedom
> Foundation.  By angering this base, "you're just given your
> competitors a way to step in" and steal customers.

> "What mystifies me is why no one is willing to propose tiered pricing"
> for broadband, he said. "Obviously, one potential reason is that it is
> wildly unpopular with people. There is something about the
> all-you-can-eat, buffet-style pricing that people just love. I think
> with broadband, we've just already become accustomed to the idea that
> is should be offered at a flat rate."

> Comcast sent the following response:

> "More than 99.99% of our customers use the residential high-speed
> Internet service as intended, which includes downloading and sharing
> video, photos and other rich-media. Comcast has a responsibility to
> provide these customers with a superior experience, and to address any
> excessive or abusive activities usage issues that may adversely impact
> that experience."

> "The customers who are notified of excessive use typically and
> repeatedly consume exponentially more bandwidth than an average
> residential user, which would include, for example, the equivalent of
> sending 256,000 photos a month, or sending 13 million e-mails every
> month (or 18,000 emails every hour, every day, all month). In these
> rare instances, Comcast's policy is to proactively contact the
> customer via phone to work with them and address the issue or help
> them select a more appropriate commercial-grade Comcast product."
> 
> Copyright (c) 2007 Ziff Davis Media Inc.

Maybe he should revert to dial-up because they are not allowed to
terminate phone service without "due process."  (Because phone is now
viewed by the courts as a 'right')


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Instead, why didn't they slow him down
on line to a more managable speed?  I am sure they could do that; just
temprarily (or full time) slow his output/input to something they
could deal with.  PAT]

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

Date: Sun, 08 Apr 2007 12:31:19 -0400
From: William Warren <w_warren@comcast.net>
Subject: Re: Fred Phelps Fax Machine Antics


> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Nina is a known person. Apparently, it
> has been resolved thus far this way: if Fred goes into Sweden, he will
> be arrested as a public nuisance or a 'hate monger'. Being a public
> nuisance or a hate monger is not an extraditable offense as of yet. PAT]

Pat,

OK, I'm not getting through here, so I'll be more explicit. Nobody is 
going to extradite anyone just for being a jerk; that's not the way to 
go here.

I suggest the King of Sweden ask the Swedish government to complain to 
the Department of State of The United States about these fax messages. 
Where royalty is concerned, there is still a different set of rules, and 
the State Department is the best place to ask for help: noblesse oblige.

William

(Filter noise from my address for direct replies)


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: No, you got through okay; if Fred goes
to Sweden where they can deal with him they will; until then, they
have tried diplomacy; it has failed, even with a different set of
rules. Now, I do not know if they have tried the _State Department_ or
not; they have tried most others en-route, from the lowliest government
on that side to the lowliest government on this side through higher-up
governments on both sides. Fred made it plain in a fax response to 
them: when they passed the law 'forbidding Bible teaching' he quit
caring either way. And the 'higher up governments' here in the USA
seem to feel its a 'free speech' issue rather than a 'nuisance' issue.
Maybe the readers on the net who comprise our 'high court' will feel
differently when they counsel Fred.  PAT]

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

From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Re: Vonage Sued to Quit Using Verizon Patents
Date: 8 Apr 2007 18:51:16 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


Jim Stewart wrote:

> I disagree.  I installed a fully functional 8-user timeshare system
> on a PDP 8 with 12k words of memory back in 1972.   The early
> Unix and Decsystem 10's were amazingly efficient for the resources
> available then.

I don't know the relative performance of a PDP 8 or GE system, but I
can't help but wonder that a computer of 1972 was much more powerful
than of 1962 given the massive progress in electronics.

Also, I'm not sure if the PDP 8 could do batch processing--handling
high volumes of punched cards, mag tapes, high speed printing, at the
same time it was handling time sharing.  Handling both batch and on-
line was a desired quality but not always possible.

Also, I believe the simultaneous GE users numbered about 30 or more
(judging by the size of the rooms they showed) as opposed to 8.

> I've always been amazed that not a single science fiction writer *got*
> the internet.  All of the SF saw the future as monolithic central
> computers.

The "Internet" is a network of networks, far more sophisticated than
mere timesharing.

In the early 1960s, it was considered quite amazing to dial into a
computer and have it run BASIC programs or look up stuff from a data
file.  The interface in those days was quite slow--10-15 characters
per second on a simple typewriter, and of course it was all by very
curt command prompts.  If you were accessing a data base computer, you
would type in a single command followed by coded search arguments
carefully coded, e.g. SEATBL1JDSX4355.  If any of the arguments were
wrong you back back a bland "INVALID COMMAND" message and had to
figure it out for yourself.  That's all computers in the early 1960s
had the storage and speed to support, very bare bones.

Accordingly, it was above and beyond to expect computers to take to
each other with variable content in a conversational way in those
days.

Gradually interfaces got more sophisticated.  CRT screens with some
formats came out.  More links between computers were established.  But
this came in the 1970s and evolved gradually.

Real Time service was much more expensive than batch.  One needed much
more memory, CPU speed, and disk space than for batch and all of that
stuff was still extremely expensive.  The programming was
sophisticated, much more complex than batch.

Per the history book "Computer" a good deal of Federal money funneled
through Defense Department grants allowed that to evolve for direct
and indirect military projects.

Ironically, in those days, such funding was considered evil and
students pressured their schools to reject any and all of it.  This
kind of thing was probably under the protestor's radar.  But the fact
remains that defense spending helped a great deal to build the
Internet.  (And also helped a great deal to develop electronic
computers much faster than otherwise from commercial needs alone.)  I
find this ironic in that a number of today's Internet users are
passionate peace protestors and their very medium was paid for by the
military.

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


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