TELECOM Digest     Sat, 8 Oct 2005 19:47:00 EDT    Volume 24 : Issue 459

Inside This Issue:                            Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    Want to Check Your Email in Italy? (Sofia Celeste)
    US Appeals Court Rejects Rehearing on RIM-NTP Case (Peter Hodgson)
    Flash Drives Make any Computer Personal (Brian Bergstein)
    Dispute Leads to Woes For Thousands of Internet Users (Andy Sullivan) 
    Talking About Web 2.0 (Ryan Singel)
    Bank of America Warns Customers About Stolen Laptop (Brian McMillian)
    An Obscene Web Site? (Reuters News Wire)
    Device That Interfaces Between Phone/CallerID and Serial Port? (anon1)
    Re: United States Says No! Internet is Ours! (John Levine)
    Re: Electric Powerlines to be Used For Broadband (Jim Haynes)
    Re: Vonage and the 500 Minute Plan (DevilsPGD)
    Re: Finally Cutting the POTS Cord (Brian E Williams)
    Re: Telecom Update #500, October 7, 2005 (Joseph)

Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet.  All contents here are copyrighted by Patrick Townson and
the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other
journals or newsgroups, provided the writer's name and the Digest are
included in the fair use quote.  By using -any name or email address-
included herein for -any- reason other than responding to an article
herein, you agree to pay a hundred dollars to the recipients of the
email.

               ===========================

Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be
sold or given away without explicit written consent.  Chain letters,
viruses, porn, spam, and miscellaneous junk are definitely unwelcome.

We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we
are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because
we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands
against crime.   Geoffrey Welsh

               ===========================

See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details
and the name of our lawyer; other stuff of interest.  

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

From: Sofia Celeste <csm@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Want to Check Your Email in Italy?
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 20:38:55 -0500


http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1004/p07s01-woeu.html

Want to check your e-mail in Italy? Bring your passport.
An antiterror law makes Internet cafe managers check their
clients' IDs and track the websites they visit.

By Sofia Celeste | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

ROME - Looking out over the cobblestone streets of Rome's Borgo Pio
neighborhood, Maurizio Savoni says he's closing his Internet cafe
because he doesn't want to be a "cop" anymore.

After Italy passed a new antiterrorism package in July, authorities
ordered managers offering public communications services, like
Mr. Savoni,to make passport photocopies of every customer seeking to
use the Internet, phone, or fax.

"This new law creates a heavy atmosphere," says Savoni, his desk
cluttered with passport photocopies. He is visibly irritated, as he
proceeds to halt clients at the door for their ID.

Passed within weeks of the London bombings this summer, the law is
part of the most extensive antiterror package introduced in Italy
since 9/11 and the country's subsequent support of the Iraq war.

Though the legislation also includes measures to heighten
transportation security, permit DNA collection, and facilitate the
detention or deportation of suspects, average Italians are feeling the
effect mainly in Internet cafes.

But while Italy has a healthy protest culture, no major opposition to
the law has emerged.

Before the law was passed, Savoni's clients were anonymous to him.
Now they must be identified by first and last name. He must also
document which computer they use, as well as their log-in and log-out
times.

Like other owners of Internet cafes, Savoni had to obtain a new public
communications business license, and purchase tracking software that
costs up to $1,600.

The software saves a list of all sites visited by clients, and
Internet cafe operators must periodically turn this list into their
local police headquarters.

"After 9/11, Madrid, and London, we all have to do our utmost best to
fight terrorism," says a government official who asked not to be
named.

Italy claims that its new stance on security led to the arrest of
Hussein Osman, also known as Hamdi Issac -- one of the men behind the
failed bombing of the London underground July 21.

"Hamdi was well known to our security people and had relatives here
with whom he communicated, in some form," says the government official
in an e-mail interview.

But Silvia Malesa, a young Internet cafe owner in the coastal village
of Olbia, Sardinia, remains unconvinced.

"This is a waste of time," says Ms. Malesa in a telephone
interview. "Terrorists don't come to Internet cafes."

And now, would-be customers aren't coming either, say Savoni and
Malesa. Since the law was enacted, Savoni has seen an estimated 10
percent drop in business.

"So many people who come in here ask 'why?' and then they just leave,"
Savoni says.

Most tourists who wander in from the streets, he explains, leave
their passports at home or are discouraged when asked to sign a dis-
claimer.

Savoni says the new law violates his privacy, comparing it to
America's antiterrorism law that allows authorities to monitor
Internet use without notifying the person in question.

"It is a control system like America's Patriot Act," he says.

Groups like the American Civil Liberties Union have criticized the
Patriot Act because it permits the government to ask libraries for a
list of books someone has borrowed or the websites they have visited.

Under Italy's new antiterror legislation, only those who are on a
black list for terrorist connections are in danger of having their
e-mails read, according to the government official.

Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu has declared Italy will stop at
nothing to fight terror.

"I will continue to prioritize action to monitor the length and
breadth of the country, without ever underestimating reasonably
reliable reports of specific threats," said Mr. Pisanu in a Sept. 29
interview with Finmeccanica Magazine. Pisanu has also called for
developing sophisticated technology to combat terror on Italian soil.

"There is no doubt that, to achieve maximum efficiency, we need
the support of the best technological applications," Pisanu affirmed.

As a result, Pisanu has formed the Strategic Anti-terrorism Analysis
Committee, which aims to examine and take action against all terror
threats.

Due to new measures, more than 25 Islamic extremists were arrested on
Italian soil in 2005, according to the Interior Ministry. The ministry
also reported that they are conducting "rigorous surveillance" of
high-risk areas of terrorist activity and over 13,000 strategic
locations in Italy. On Aug. 12 and 13 alone, a reported 32,703 checks
were carried out on suspicious individuals.

Despite the inconvenience, most Italians seem relatively unfazed by
the law.

"If I am not doing anything wrong, fundamentally nothing is going to
happen to me," says Mauro Pallotta, a young artist, after checking his
e-mail at Savoni's cafe.

www.csmonitor.com | Copyright 2005 The Christian Science Monitor.

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.

Read Christian Science Monitor on line daily along with New York Times
at http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/nytimes.html

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

From: Jeffrey Hodgson and Peter Kaplan 
Subject: US Appeals Court Rejects Rehearing of RIM-NTP Case
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 20:49:48 -0500


By Jeffrey Hodgson and Peter Kaplan

A U.S. appeals court refused on Friday to reconsider a patent
infringement ruling against Research In Motion Ltd. in a case that
could halt U.S. sales of its popular BlackBerry wireless e-mail
device.

The Canadian firm had asked that all the judges on the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Federal Circuit rehear and reconsider the ruling of a
three-judge panel first issued in December.

The case goes back to 2002, when patent holding company NTP
successfully sued RIM in a lower court. That first ruling found RIM
infringed on 16 claims tied to five NTP patents.

NTP won an injunction in 2003, stayed pending appeal, to halt
U.S. sales of the BlackBerry and shut down its service in the United
States.

A December appellate ruling concluded that RIM infringed on 11 NTP
patent claims, but scaled that back to seven in August.

RIM and NTP had reached an agreement in March to settle the dispute
for $450 million. That deal fell apart in June, but RIM has said it
would ask for court action to enforce the agreement.

NTP said in a statement that the latest appeals court ruling means the
case will go back to a lower court for "re-confirmation" of the
injunction. An NTP lawyer said the firm would move quickly to get the
case back before the lower court.

Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM said it now plans to seek a review of the
case by the U.S. Supreme Court.

RIM SHARES DROP

RIM's stock fell almost 4 percent, or $2.42, to $64.55 on Nasdaq on a
volume of more than 22 million shares. The stock at one point touched
$60, its lowest level since September 2004.

In Toronto, the stock dropped C$3.20 to C$75.95.

Canaccord Capital analyst Peter Misek said in a note to clients the
ruling was negative, but expected, and that a review by the
U.S. Supreme Court would be "another long shot."

"In the end, we think that NTP's negotiating position improves on the
news, which could warrant a settlement further in NTP's favor --
perhaps adding a few hundred million dollars on top of the original
$450 million," the note said.

"As a worst-case scenario, we could see RIM pay close to $1 billion."

Paradigm Capital analyst Barry Richards, who owns the stock, said he
thought investors were overreacting given that a rehearing was always
unlikely.

While RIM acknowledged Supreme Court reviews are uncommon, it said it
"continues to believe this case raises significant national and
international issues warranting further appellate review."

Meantime, RIM said it will ask the Federal Circuit to stay further
proceedings in the case until the U.S. Supreme Court makes a decision
on a review.

RIM said on Friday that if the ruling does go back to the lower court,
it expects the court will rule on its request to enforce the
agreement. It said it also expects the lower court would consider
recent patent office rulings.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office recently completed a
re-examination of eight NTP patents and issued initial rulings
rejecting 100 percent of the claims.

RIM has noted the ruling is not final, and NTP has said it plans see
the full re-examination process through, which could take years.

Some analysts have noted that until that process is complete, the
patents remain valid in the eyes of the court and could support an
injunction shutting down the BlackBerry service.

Copyright 2005 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.

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

From: Brian Bergstein <ap@telecom-digest.org> 
Subject: Flash Drives Make any Computer Personal
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 20:51:18 -0500


By BRIAN BERGSTEIN, AP Technology Writer 41 minutes ago

Students at Eastside Preparatory School in Kirkland, Wash., are
getting class materials in a new way this year: on a tiny flash-memory
drive that plugs into a computer's USB port.

Small enough to wear on a necklace, this "digital backpack" can hold
textbooks, novels, plays, study aids, the dictionary,
graphing-calculator software -- almost anything, really.

Falling prices in computer memory have made these little flash drives
 -- also called pen, thumb or key drives -- into enormously powerful
tools that are on the verge of changing the concept of "personal"
computing.

With a gigabyte of flash memory now available for less than $100,
these inexpensive digital storehouses can hold not just important data
but also entire software programs. The information they carry can be
encrypted and accessed speedily, a benefit of faster microprocessors.

What this all means is that computer users are no longer at the mercy
of the machine that happens to be nearby. Everything we need to
interact with computers -- even down to the appearance of our home
PC's desktop -- can be carried with us and used on almost any
computer.

"What's your personal computer, anyways?" computing pioneer Bill Joy
said in a speech that touched on the trend at a recent conference. 
"Your personal computer should be something that's always on your 
person."

A few years ago Jay Elliot was looking for a way to help doctors move
medical information securely and decided that flash memory -- which
has no moving parts, unlike hard-disk storage -- was the perfect
solution.

But as memory prices kept falling, he realized there was room for more
than just data. So he invented Migo, software that lets removable
storage devices such as USB drives and iPods essentially function as
portable computers.

Plug a Migo-enabled device into a computer and enter your password,
and a secure session launches in which you can send and receive e-mail
and work on documents, with the background desktop and icons from your
own PC rather than the ones on the host computer.

When you're done and remove the drive, all traces of what you did are
removed from that computer. The next time you plug the drive into your
home computer, data on each are synchronized.

Multiple people can share one USB device, with separate
password-protected profiles for each. So when Elliot recently went on
vacation, he, his wife and two sons each called up personalized
desktops on a hotel computer -- all through a drive smaller than a
cigarette lighter.

"People are carrying very expensive devices with them, but they only
use 4 or 5 percent of their capability. What a waste," said Elliot,
who heads Migo's maker, PowerHouse Technologies Group Inc.

Instead, he said, the model should be that "your data goes with you,
in whatever form you want it. You just find a place to use it."

Another reason this flexibility is now possible is that software
makers and flash-drive manufacturers relatively recently settled on
technological standards that let programs be stored and run off the
tiny drives.

Two hardware vendors, SanDisk Corp. and M-Systems Inc., formed a
separate company, U3 LLC, to license and facilitate that technology.

Now a spate of U3-enabled drives have hit the market, preloaded with
everything from photo-management software to the Firefox Web browser
and instant-messaging programs.

Skype Technologies SA's Internet phone software is also available,
meaning almost any computer can be used to make free calls over Skype,
even if the computer owner never bothered to download Skype.

"The next time you go to install software that's going to be locked to
the hard drive, your first reaction is going to be `Man, I want this
on my U3 so I can have this anywhere,'" said Kate Purmal, U3's CEO.

The only big missing element for now is Microsoft Corp. software.

Although its popular productivity programs such as Excel or Word are
common on office PCs, traveling workers still might not find the
programs on a home or public computer.

So the ability to launch Microsoft software from a flash drive could be a
big help. Microsoft and USB companies are still discussing potential
licensing arrangements.

In the meantime, though, several new devices are emerging to take
advantage of this shift in computer use.

For example, by tweaking the tiny processor in its flash drives to
enable copyright protections, SanDisk created a drive called the
Cruzer Freedom that lets students download reams of educational
materials when they plug the device into a PC. Because each drive has
a particular numeric identifier, teachers can put assignments and
materials online that are accessible only to members of their classes.

That enabled Eastside Prep's new flash-drive project in Washington. 
Mark Bach, who heads the upper school and teaches at Eastside, plans
to use the drives to disseminate primary source documents and other
materials he's gathered for a unit on regional history.

As the drives' memory expands even further in coming years, he expects
to augment the text with video.

"It becomes very, very malleable, and very creative on the part of the
teacher, because the teacher can go beyond textbooks," he said.

For the business world, startup Realm Systems Inc. soon plans to roll
out its own USB-based "mobile personal servers," with several
gigabytes of memory for a few hundred dollars a pop, that could be
plugged into any PC to let mobile employees do their computer-related
work.

The Realm device will have a fingerprint reader to restrict access. It
also clears its tracks from the host PC for privacy.

Of course, any portable storage device with significant memory,
whether it's a "smart" cell phone, a digital assistant or an MP3 music
player with a miniature hard drive, can do this trick of making any
computer personal.  That's more reason to believe the PC will soon
fade into the background.

International Business Machines Corp. researcher Chandra Narayanaswami
offers a good illustration of how we'll know it's happened:

When you check into an average hotel room and find -- alongside the
alarm clock, hair dryer and DVD player that once were bring-your-own
items but now are as standard as the furniture -- a cheap PC for
guests to plug into, as our truly personal computing environment
travels with us.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The
information contained in the AP News report may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written
authority of 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.

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


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I may be mistaken but I do not think it
is just a simple matter of plugging one of these 'pen drives' into a 
USB port. I have one -- I do not use it a lot, it is 62 MB, and about
the size of my thumb. As I recall, when I first installed it,I had to
additionally run a CD which loaded the required 'drivers' onto the 
host computer to get it (host) to recognize the USB ports and to get 
the 'pen drive' formatted, etc. Have they gotten easier and quicker to
use in recent months? Although being able to carry the little device
away in my shirt pocket to use elsewhere _is_ a good point, having to
do a few extra steps to configure the host computer to recognize a USB
slot and accomodate the pen drive takes away some of the enthusiasm
for me.   PAT]

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

From: Andy Sullivan <reuters@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Dispute Leads to Internet Woes for Thousands of Users
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 20:53:38 -0500


By Andy Sullivan

Thousands of Internet users struggled to send e-mail and keep their
Web sites running on Thursday after a dispute between two service
providers left large portions of the Internet unable to talk to each
other.

Computer technicians scrambled to shore up their networks after Level
3 Communications Inc. refused to accept traffic from rival Cogent
Communications Group Inc., rendering large portions of the Internet
unreachable by others.

"We weren't able to get to our e-mail systems, we weren't able to get
to our externally hosted chat systems," said Bob Serr, chief
technology officer at Chicago instant-messaging provider Parlano
Inc. "Some customers say they've had trouble getting to our Web site."

The rift meant that thousands of customers -- including individuals
who use Time Warner Inc.'s Road Runner cable-modem service -- were not
able to view Web sites and send e-mail to servers located on the other
company's network, violating the Internet's premise as a universal,
borderless network of computers.

The dispute affects roughly 15 percent to 17 percent of the Internet,
Cogent CEO Dave Schaeffer said.

"The usability and value people get out of the Internet is highly
dependent on its ability to be ubiquitous and affordable, and I think
what Level 3 is attempting to do is undermine both of those core
principles," he said in an interview.

TOO MUCH COGENT TRAFFIC

Like other large, wholesale Internet service providers, Cogent and
Level 3 handed off traffic from one network to each other free of
charge, until Level 3 said that it was handling too much Cogent
traffic.

"We felt that there was an imbalance and we were disadvantaged in that
relationship and we were ending up with what amounts to free capacity,"
Level 3 spokeswoman Jennifer Daumler said.

Cogent's Schaeffer said Level 3 was simply trying to get Cogent to
raise its prices, which at $10 per megabit are far below the market
average of $60 or so per megabit.

Larger customers of each company have been little affected by the
dispute because they usually sign agreements with several different
wholesale providers.

But customers who rely entirely on either provider for their Internet
connections would not be able to reach any Web sites or servers on the
others' network, those involved in the dispute said.

That would include law firms, community colleges and companies like
Parlano, which face lost business and angry customers from the outage.

"It's kind of a game of chicken to see who's going to blink first, and
to see whose customer base wants connectivity to the other customers'
more," said Alan Mauldin, an analyst at TeleGeography Research in
Washington.

Parlano's Serr said he would stick with Cogent as his provider for the
time being because he saw Level 3's move as "strong-arm tactics."

Road Runner said its customers have not been able to visit Web sites
and send e-mail to Cogent customers.

"We are working to find alternate pathways so our customers can be
connected with these Web sites as soon as possible," Road Runner said
in a statement.

Representatives for America Online Inc., EarthLink Inc. and Microsoft
Corp.'s MSN service said their customers have not been affected by the
dispute.

Cogent ran into a similar dispute with America Online several years
ago but it was resolved amicably, AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham said.

Cogent said it was offering Level 3 customers affected by the dispute
a year of free service if they wished to switch providers. Level 3
said it was working with its customers to ensure they could reach the
entire Internet.

"Level 3 is working with their customers and Cogent needs to work with
its customers," Level 3's Daumler said. "If Cogent wants to make its
customers happy they've got to figure out a way to get that
connectivity to the Internet."

Copyright 2005 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.

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

From: Ryan Singel <wired@telecom-digest.org>
Subject: Talking About Web 2.0
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 20:56:25 -0500


By Ryan Singel

SAN FRANCISCO -- No one may be able to agree on what Web 2.0 means,
but the idea of a new, more collaborative internet is creating buzz
reminiscent of the go-go days of the late 1990s.

Excitment over emerging new publishing theories -- and the whiff of a
resurgence of startup financings -- this week drew throngs of geeks
paying $2,800 a head to the sold-out Web 2.0 Conference in San
Francisco. Eight hundred people jostled in the doorways of early
workshops devoted to tagging, innovations in search and raising
venture capital.

Web 2.0, according to conference sponsor Tim O'Reilly, is an
"architecture of participation" -- a constellation made up of links
between web applications that rival desktop applications, the blog
publishing revolution and self-service advertising. This architecture
is based on social software where users generate content, rather than
simply consume it, and on open programming interfaces that let
developers add to a web service or get at data. It is an arena where
the web rather than the desktop is the dominant platform, and
organization appears spontaneously through the actions of the group,
for example, in the creation of folksonomies created through tagging.

The theory has been percolating for some time. But it intensified last
week when O'Reilly published an essay on the topic, as well as a
graphic outlining the key categories of this new medium.

Ross Mayfield, the CEO of SocialText, a company that sells
collaborative wiki software to enterprises and that is hosting the Web
2.0 wiki, had a simpler definition for conference goers.

"Web 1.0 was commerce. Web 2.0 is people," Mayfield said.

The day was not without skeptics.

In a freewheeling conversation with Web 2.0 conference organizer John
Battelle, InterActiveCorp CEO Barry Diller, who recently purchased
Ask.com, dismissed the idea that citizens with blogs and video editing
software were major threats to the entertainment industry.

"There is not that much talent in the world," Diller said. "There are
very few people in very few closets in very few rooms that are really
talented and can't get out."

"People with talent and expertise at making entertainment products are
not going to be displaced by 1,800 people coming up with their videos
that they think are going to have an appeal."

That clear-headed observation didn't set well with some, including
media critic Jeff Jarvis, who promptly blogged the talk and labeled
Diller with the deadly moniker, "Web 1.0."

By whatever the theory, Web 2.0 is shaking up the status quo in web
publishing, and feeding a surge of dealmaking.

Small Web 2.0 companies are already being snapped up by internet
giants.

Google acquired Dodgeball, a mobile phone social networking
application, and recruited one of the princes of mash-ups, Paul
Rademacher of Housingmaps.com, from his job at DreamWorks Animation
SKG.

Yahoo snapped up Flickr, a community photo sharing application that
relies heavily on tagging, and on Tuesday, bought Upcoming.org, an
user-driven events tracking service.

Wednesday afternoon's LaunchPad presentation, featuring 13 companies giving
six minute pitches, drew throngs, including venture capitalists smelling
money to be made from the cleverness of young programmers, and
representatives from internet giants trying to determine whether their
business models were as doomed as bloggers have prophesied.

The crowd was so large that hotel staff had to break down the
partitions separating three conference rooms to accommodate everyone.

The presentations included a demo of the well publicized, but as yet
unreleased, Flock browser, that aims to make Firefox into a two-way
communication tool.

Ian McCarthy of Orb showed the crowd how his software would let them
stream media from their desktop using any web-enabled device, without
having to worry about the format or bit rate of their movies or music.

Zvents.com unveiled its event finder (which currently covers only the
San Francisco Bay Area) and claimed it was far better than the service
Yahoo had purchased the day before.

Rollyo, short for roll your own search engine, officially launched at
the demo, unveiling a service that lets users build their own specific
search engines for travel or politics using Yahoo's search API.

Longtime RSS player Pub Sub unveiled its initiative, Structured
Blogging, to help bring the fabled Semantic Web into being.

Structured Blogging allows bloggers to easily add structured meta-data
to blog posts, such as movie reviews or event listings, so they can be
easily found, read and syndicated by other sites.

The ad-hoc XML (no standards body has yet decided on what elements
should be in such data) would make possible a search for book or
product reviews that only returned real reviews, instead of the
current jumbled listing of commerce sites and spammers that search
engines currently provide.

But the crowd reserved its largest applause and its gasps of envy for
Zimbra, a company which debuted its open-source enterprise software in
early September.

The software, called a collaboration suite, performs the same server
based calendaring and e-mail of Microsoft's Exchange Server.

Zimbra CEO Satish Dharmaraj wowed the crowd with his demo of his
Ajax-powered web client, which would display the calendar when mousing
over a date mentioned in an e-mail and call a number through Skype
when clicking on a phone number in a message.

Zimbra already has devotees working on the code and translating the
interface into Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch.

Dharmaraj knows he's facing a tough battle taking on a flagship
Microsoft product, but thinks that Web 2.0-style collaboration and the
efforts of the open source community might be his savior.

"I would not like to take on the big boy by myself," Dharmaraj told
Wired News. "I would love to take Microsoft on with IBM and Google and
Apple on my side."

Copyright 2005, Lycos, Inc. Lycos is a registered
trademark of Carnegie Mellon University.

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.

*** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material the
use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. This Internet discussion group is making it available without
profit to group members who have expressed a prior interest in
receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the
understanding of literary, educational, political, and economic
issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. I
believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material
as provided for in section 107 of the U.S.  Copyright Law. If you wish
to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go
beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright
owner, in this instance, Trustees of Carnegie Mellon University.

For more information go to:
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml

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

From: Robert McMillan <IDGNews@telecom-digest.org> 
Subject: Bank of America Warns Customers After Laptop Theft
Date: Sat, 8 Oct 2005 16:48:18 -0500


Robert McMillan, IDG News Service

Users of the Bank of America Corp.'s Visa Buxx prepaid debit cards are
being warned that they may have had sensitive information compromised 
following the theft of an unencrypted laptop computer.

In a letters sent to Buxx users and dated September 23, the Charlotte,
North Carolina, bank warned that customers may have had their bank
account numbers, routing transit numbers, names, and credit card numbers
compromised by the theft. Visa Buxx is a prepaid credit card for
teenagers that the Bank of America (BofA) stopped selling in January.

The laptop, which belonged to an unnamed Bank of America "service
provider" was stolen on August 29, said Diane Wagner, a BofA
spokesperson. The bank was notified of the theft on September 9, and
began sending out the letters after a two-week investigation, she
said.

Though the information on the laptop would not have been easily
accessible to thieves, it was not encrypted, Wagner said. The bank has
been monitoring the affected accounts and has not yet observed any
signs of fraud. "We have no evidence that an unauthorized person has
accessed or even reviewed that customer information," she said.

Wagner refused to offer many other details on the theft, which was
reported Friday in the San Francisco Chronicle. She would not name the
service provider, say how many BofA customers had been affected, or even
confirm that the theft had occurred within the United States.

This is not the first time BofA has had to notify account holders of
identity theft. In March, it confirmed that information on about 60,000
of its customers had been stolen by an identity-theft ring.

The March disclosure came just a month after BofA revealed that it had
lost digital tapes containing the credit card account records of 1.2
million U.S. federal employees.


Copyright 2005 PC World Communications, Inc.

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.

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

From: Reuters News Wire <reuters@telecom-digest.org> 
Subject: An Obscene Web Site?
Date: Sat, 8 Oct 2005 16:47:54 -0500


Iraq-corpse Web site operator held for obscenity

The American operator of a Web site which posted grisly pictures of
people killed in the Iraq and Afghan conflicts was arrested on
obscenity charges unrelated to the war photos, police officials in
Florida said.

The Polk County sheriff's office said Christopher Michael Wilson was
arrested on Friday and faces one count of wholesale distribution of
obscene material and 300 misdemeanor charges relating to the Web site
and pornographic photos.

The charges were unrelated to the photos of corpses from Iraq and
Afghanistan, which the site states were provided by U.S. troops in
exchange for free access to pornographic material.

Several of the graphic pictures showed men wearing what looked like
U.S.  military uniforms, standing over charred corpses, mutilated
bodies and severed body parts.

Many were accompanied by captions making light of the corpses. One
photo of a charred body was dubbed "Cooked Iraqi."

The Pentagon has said it found no evidence any of the photos were
posted by soldiers.

Wilson was being held in jail under a $151,000 bond, the Polk County
sheriff's office said.

"In my 33 years of law enforcement experience, this is one of the most
horrific examples of filthy, obscene materials we have ever seized,"
Sheriff Grady Judd said in a statement. He did not elaborate.

Judd said the investigation was continuing and any pertinent
information would be shared with the U.S. Army Criminal Investigations
Division.

Judd told the Orlando Sentinel newspaper his investigation was not
spurred by federal authorities.

Wilson lives in Lakeland, Florida, but hosts the site out of
Amsterdam, Netherlands, according to an article last month in the
Online Journalism Review of the Annenberg School for Communications at
the University of Southern California.

The controversy sparked by the photographs of war dead followed the
publication a year and a half ago of photos showing U.S. soldiers
abusing Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib jail. That scandal prompted
international condemnation of the United States.


Copyright 2005 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.

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

From: anon1@sci.sci
Subject: Device That Interfaces Between Phone/CallerID and Serial Port?
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 19:01:34 -0700
Organization: UseNetServer.com


I'm looking for a device that connects between my telephone line
and the serial (RS232) port on my computer, capturing caller-ID on
incoming phone calls and using that information to determine whether
to ring my phone immediately or put up various touch-tone menus
the caller must traverse.

What is the correct jargon for such a device? (So that I might do a
Google search and find the info I seek.)

What is the best newsgroup for asking about such a device?

Does anybody here happen to already know of any Web sites that list and
describe such devices?

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

Date: 7 Oct 2005 23:49:31 -0000
From: John Levine <johnl@iecc.com>
Subject: Re: United States Says No! Internet is Ours!
Organization: I.E.C.C., Trumansburg NY USA


> I think the problem with doing that is that the root servers hold a
> database of top level domain servers. It doesn't change rapidly, but
> it does change. Unless you could get a feed of the official file
> from IANA, ...

It's easy to get a feed of the root zone.  Fill out a form from
Verisign, fax it back, and you too can FTP a copy from their server
whenever you want.  BTDTGTZF

If you wanted to run your own root with a copy of the same data, you
could.  But there's no point, since the real roots work just fine.

R's,

John



[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: But although the 'real roots' work just
fine, as you note, someone starting their own competing root server 
could bypass all the silly requirements of things like ICANN couldn't
he?  In addition to copying all the data now in use, he could also 
start his own domains, could he not?  He could start a domain for
example called '.abracadabra' or whatever name and it would not be
subject to any rules but his own. Or am I missing something here?
Maybe he would then sell re-direction and aliases from his '.domain'
and point them to the existing .com and .net  as '.tf' does now.  PAT]

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

Subject: Re: Electric Powerlines to be Used For Broadband
Reply-To: jhaynes@alumni.uark.edu
Organization: University of Arkansas Alumni
From: haynes@alumni.uark.edu (Jim Haynes)
Date: Sat, 08 Oct 2005 01:30:57 GMT


> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Thanks for that good explanation.

> it was interesting that he was able to 'communicate by voice' over 
> those wires which served as our burglar alarm system; he said it was

I knew some guys in the Chicago suburbs circa 1965 who had their own
private telephone system among them.  They had learned it was possible
to lease burglar alarm lines very cheaply from the telephone company;
and in fact when you leased one you got an ordinary wire pair that
worked just fine at voice frequencies.  So that was what they used for
their distribution.  Eventually the phone company got onto what they
were doing and connected large capacitors across the pairs, which put
an end to their scheme. 

jhhaynes at earthlink dot net

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

From: DevilsPGD <spamsucks@crazyhat.net>
Subject: Re: Vonage and the 500 Minute Plan
Date: Fri, 07 Oct 2005 21:18:38 -0600
Organization: Disorganized


In message <telecom24.457.3@telecom-digest.org> Henry Cabot Henhouse III
<sooper_chicken@hotmail.com> wrote:

> When I signed up with Vonage in December '03, I did the 500 minute
> plan, which was perfect.  I seem to recall that all local calls - in
> our case in Los Angeles within the 323 area code -- were included and
> did not eat up any of the 500 minutes.

> Last month was the first time we've ever exceeded 500 minutes -- most of 
> those for local 323 calls. I was charged for calls over and above my 500 
> minutes, the call detail shows local calls being billed at the 3.9c per 
> minute.

> I poked around the Vonage website and can't find any reference to
> local calls being included.  Does anyone know a site that may have the
> older Vonage website in storage?  An email to Customer Service
> resulted in a stock reply, pointing me to a bunch of faq's - none of
> which seem to answer my question.

At one point Vonage had a plan that included unlimited local calling,
and 500 minutes of long distance.

It's still offered in Canada, but was discontinued in the US when the
unlimited plan dropped to $24.99 (which was the original price of the
unlimited-local-calls plan)


In message <telecom24.458.14@telecom-digest.org> Daniel AJ Sokolov

<sokolov@gmx.netnetnet.invalid> wrote:

> Am 07.10.2005 07:16 schrieb Henry Cabot Henhouse III:

>> When I signed up with Vonage in December '03, I did the 500 minute
>> plan, which was perfect.  I seem to recall that all local calls - in
>> our case in Los Angeles within the 323 area code -- were included and
>> did not eat up any of the 500 minutes.

>> Last month was the first time we've ever exceeded 500 minutes -- most of 
>> those for local 323 calls. I was charged for calls over and above my 500 
>> minutes, the call detail shows local calls being billed at the 3.9c per 
>> minute.

>> I poked around the Vonage website and can't find any reference to
>> local calls being included.  Does anyone know a site that may have the
>> older Vonage website in storage?  An email to Customer Service
>> resulted in a stock reply, pointing me to a bunch of faq's - none of
>> which seem to answer my question.

> Do you have the "Unlimited Local Plan" for 24.99? It includes unlimited
> Local and Regional Calling plus 500 Long Distance minutes.

> Take a look at this:
> http://web.archive.org/web/20031201145749/http://vonage.com/

> It is a snapshot from December 1st, 2003.

IIRC, that plan was not grandfathered, all users were upgraded to the
unlimited calling plan which is the same price.

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

From: BrianEWilliams <sorry_no_email@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Finally Cutting the POTS Cord
Date: 8 Oct 2005 05:56:38 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


Sorry for the top post, but I just want to thank both of you for your
very helpful response.  I will report back my results when my POTS ends
Oct 22.  BTW, this is a single family home, and my neighbor's home has
the standard RJ-11 plugs whereas mine has this funky setup.

John McHarry wrote:

> On Wed, 05 Oct 2005 11:52:19 -0700, Brian E Williams wrote:

>> http://tinyurl.com/9jqae

>> Above link is a picture of the inside of my outside telecom box here
>> in the USA.  I want to route my Vonage VoIP service to my internal
>> phone network, so first I am going to disconnect the internal network
>> from the POTS provider as a test.  I am guessing that I just flip
>> those little connectors up and then pull out the solid blue and
>> blue-white wires, being careful to keep them arranged for easy
>> reconnection.

> That doesn't look like a standard demarc to me. Maybe you are in a
> multifamily dwelling, or maybe I am out of date. The demarcs I am
> familiar with use an RJ-11 plug on your side to plug into a socket on
> the telco side. This allows you to test whether a problem is inside
> wiring or telco by unplugging your whole inside plant and plugging in
> a known good phone.

>> Is there anything else I need to worry about?  Also, is having four
>> wires standard for a single line?  Maybe that is how I can do three
>> way calling and call waiting, but I never thought about it before.

> Four wires are standard for residential wiring. As PAT notes, only red
> and green are used for the first line. This allows a second pair for a
> second line, or a ground connection for grounded ringing (mostly used
> in old two party lines).

> As PAT also notes, getting the telco hooked up across your VOIP
> service is ungood. The trouble with doing your connection at the
> demarc is that telco has access to it and may, possibly inadvertently,
> reconnect themselves.  Also, some telcos leave disconnected lines
> connected to the switch and able to call 911, much like an unassigned
> cell phone. You might be better off to cut into your house wiring
> before the first tap and either disconnect the telco there, or move it
> over to line two, so you could use their 911 service in an emergency.

> I don't know how many terminals you intend to bridge onto your Vonage
> box, but, if it is like the Packet8 DAT310, it may have trouble
> driving some of them. I can ring two phones just fine, but there
> doesn't seem to be quite enough talk battery to keep my speakerphone
> happy. Of course, that may be more the phone's fault for being overly
> greedy.

> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: What I do here is the Bell System
> demarc box is on the wall of my house outside with _two_ lines there
> from telco but I only use one. I have tape around the modular
> connector of the second, unused line. I have a small PBX unit inside
> my house, in a closet near my computer area. From the outside demarc,
> I bring the one working pair there into my house on my own wires, and
> into the PBX where it becomes 'dial 9' for outgoing local calls. Then
> I have my Vonage (VOIP) adapter box near the computer with a
> connection into the broadband cable line. I go from there with my
> personally owned modular cable to another input on the PBX, where it
> becomes 'dial 8' for long distance calls. Both lines (Vonage VOIP) and
> telco also go through a two-line splitter to which I have a caller ID
> device and an extra loud ringer (in my old age and feeble condition I
> am also a wee bit hard of hearing these days as any of you who
> telephone me know when I periodically ask you to repeat yourself. Then
> I have several pairs running from the PBX back down the cable to the
> outside and back to the telco demarc box where _everything_ telco
> related has been disconnected except for the aforementioned one
> incoming line.

> So to make a local call from any extension, it travels down the pair
> to the demarc, back in to the PBX, and dial 9 sends it back out the
> cable to the demarc and off to telco. To make a long distance call from
> any extension it travels down the pair to the demarc, back in to the
> PBX where dial 8 sends it across the room to the VOIP box and the
> broadband internet. To call around my house, it travels down the pair
> to the demarc, back inside to the PBX where dialing 100 through 105 or
> 0 Zero treats the call as needed, ships it back through the cable to
> the outside demarc where it gets distributed to where it should go. PAT]

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

From: Joseph <JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Telecom Update #500, October 7, 2005
Date: Sat, 08 Oct 2005 14:12:48 -0700
Reply-To: JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com


On Fri, 7 Oct 2005 11:34:19 -0700, Angus TeleManagement Group
<jriddell@angustel.ca> wrote:

> CELLCOS OPPOSE EARLY NUMBER PORTABILITY: Replying to a CRTC request
> for ways to speed up wireless number portability, the Canadian
> Wireless Telecommunications Association says that preparing alternate
> scenarios would be costly and time-consuming, and that the original
> plan to implement WNP nationally by September 2007 is "both aggressive
> and reasonable." (See Telecom Update #497)

> ** The major cellcos agree, saying that an earlier target 
>    date would create many technical problems and would be 
>    unfair to consumers.

To which I say "Ha!"  The Cellcos are going to drag this out for as
long as possible.  The US Cellcos also dragged their feet for WNP also
and had the deadline for implementing it postponed at least a couple
times.  They made the same arguments that the Canadian cellcos did
that it will cost them lots of money and that it will be "unfair" to
consumers.  Unfair to consumers is pure bullshit.  If they bothered to
pay attention to the model that WNP has had in other countries such as
the UK and the US they'd see that the sky did not fall and that far
fewer people abandoned their present service than they had
anticipated.  The only reason cellcos don't want WNP is because it
would force them to clean up their act and make their services better
than they are with decent customer service and decent quality of
service.  Cellcos try lots of tricks to make things work for *them*
and not for their subscribers.  It's only because subscribers are
locked into contracts for as long as two years that many do not leave
their present carrier since leaving before the end of the contract
will make them pay early termination fees of as much as $200.  Also
many do not leave since they are business people and have their
clientele know them by their present mobile number.  It'd be a real
PITA for them to have to notify all that they've changed mobile
companies and have a new number.  No, WNP will help subscribers force
the cellcos to clean up their act.  Of course they would prefer that
it go away.

And from the same issue #500, Angus TeleManagement Group <jriddell@
angustel.ca> wrote:

> ROGERS SIGNS 18,000 PHONE SUBSCRIBERS: Rogers Communications says its
> cable-based local phone service, launched on July 1, now has more than
> 18,000 subscribers. (See Telecom Update #488)

And this is one of the reasons Rogers *killed* the CityFido programme
since it would canibalize their VoIP business.

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


TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecomm-
unications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in
addition to various telecom forums on a variety of networks such as
Compuserve and America On Line, Yahoo Groups, and other forums.  It is
also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup
'comp.dcom.telecom'.

TELECOM Digest is a not-for-profit, mostly non-commercial educational
service offered to the Internet by Patrick Townson. All the contents
of the Digest are compilation-copyrighted. You may reprint articles in
some other media on an occasional basis, but please attribute my work
and that of the original author.

Contact information:    Patrick Townson/TELECOM Digest
                        Post Office Box 50
                        Independence, KS 67301
                        Phone: 620-402-0134
                        Fax 1: 775-255-9970
                        Fax 2: 530-309-7234
                        Fax 3: 208-692-5145         
                        Email: editor@telecom-digest.org

Subscribe:  telecom-subscribe@telecom-digest.org
Unsubscribe:telecom-unsubscribe@telecom-digest.org

This Digest is the oldest continuing e-journal about telecomm-
unications on the Internet, having been founded in August, 1981 and
published continuously since then.  Our archives are available for
your review/research. We believe we are the oldest e-zine/mailing list
on the internet in any category!

URL information:        http://telecom-digest.org

Anonymous FTP: mirror.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/archives/
  (or use our mirror site: ftp.epix.net/pub/telecom-archives)

RSS Syndication of TELECOM Digest: http://telecom-digest.org/rss.html
  For syndication examples see http://www.feedrollpro.com/syndicate.php?id=308
    and also http://feeds.feedburner.com/TelecomDigest

*************************************************************************
*   TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from                  *
*   Judith Oppenheimer, President of ICB Inc. and purveyor of accurate  *
*   800 & Dot Com News, Intelligence, Analysis, and Consulting.         *
*   http://ICBTollFree.com, http://1800TheExpert.com                    *
*   Views expressed herein should not be construed as representing      *
*   views of Judith Oppenheimer or ICB Inc.                             *
*************************************************************************

ICB Toll Free News.  Contact information is not sold, rented or leased.

One click a day feeds a person a meal.  Go to http://www.thehungersite.com

Copyright 2004 ICB, Inc. and TELECOM Digest. All rights reserved.
Our attorney is Bill Levant, of Blue Bell, PA.

              ************************

DIRECTORY ASSISTANCE JUST 65 CENTS ONE OR TWO INQUIRIES CHARGED TO
YOUR CREDIT CARD!  REAL TIME, UP TO DATE! SPONSORED BY TELECOM DIGEST
AND EASY411.COM   SIGN UP AT http://www.easy411.com/telecomdigest !

              ************************

Visit http://www.mstm.okstate.edu and take the next step in your
career with a Master of Science in Telecommunications Management
(MSTM) degree from Oklahoma State University (OSU). This 35
credit-hour interdisciplinary program is designed to give you the
skills necessary to manage telecommunications networks, including
data, video, and voice networks.

The MSTM degree draws on the expertise of the OSU's College
of Business Administration; the College of Arts and Sciences; and the
College of Engineering, Architecture and Technology. The program has
state-of-the-art lab facilities on the Stillwater and Tulsa campus
offering hands-on learning to enhance the program curriculum.  Classes
are available in Stillwater, Tulsa, or through distance learning.

Please contact Jay Boyington for additional information at
405-744-9000, mstm-osu@okstate.edu, or visit the MSTM web site at
http://www.mstm.okstate.edu

              ************************

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

Finally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as
yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help
is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of fifty dollars
per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above.
Please make at least a single donation to cover the cost of processing
your name to the mailing list. 

All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the
author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only
and messages should not be considered any official expression by the
organization.

End of TELECOM Digest V24 #459
******************************