TELECOM Digest     Mon, 24 Oct 2005 15:10:00 EDT    Volume 24 : Issue 483

Inside This Issue:                             Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    Wilma Batters Florida; One Death Reported Thus Far (Mike Schneider)
    Wilma's Force Surprises Key's Residents (David Royse)
    Disputes Between TRAI and Department of Telecom (Ravi V. Prasad) 
    Once It Was Direct to Video, Now It's Direct to the Web (Monty Solomon)
    Cingular Introduces E-Mail Access on Cells (Monty Solomon)
    Media Companies Go Too Far in Curbing Consumer Activity (Monty Solomon)
    Cellular-News for Monday 24th October 2005 (Cellular-News)
    More on San Francisco and Oakland Numbering (Mark Roberts)
    Local Numbers of Form XX0- (was Re: San Francisco/Oakland) (Wesrock@aol)
    Re: What is Area Code 113? (Fred Atkinson)
    Re: San Francisco and Oakland Exchange Numbering (Joseph)

Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
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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: Mike Schneider <ap@telecom-digest.org> 
Subject: Wilma Batters Florida; One Death Reported Thus Far
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 12:06:00 -0500


By MIKE SCHNEIDER, Associated Press Writer

Hurricane Wilma plowed into southwest Florida early Monday with
howling 125 mph winds and dashed across the state to the Miami-Fort
Lauderdale area, shattering windows, peeling away roofs and knocking
out power and communications to millions of people. At least one death
in Florida was blamed on the storm.

By 11 a.m., Wilma's winds had dropped to 105 mph and the hurricane was
centered out over the Atlantic, about 15 miles northeast of West Palm
Beach. But the big storm was still slamming the state. Hurricane-force
winds of 74 mph or more extended up to 100 miles from the center, and
tropical storm-force winds over 39 mph stretched up to 260 miles.

The same storm that brought ruin over the weekend to resort towns
along Mexico's Yucatan Coast came ashore in Florida as a strong
Category 3 hurricane, but within hours had weakened into a Category 2
with winds of 105 mph.

As it made its away across the state, it flattened trees, tore off
screens, broke water mains, littered the streets with signs and downed
power and communication lines , and turned debris into missiles.

"We have been huddled in the living room trying to stay away from the
windows. It got pretty violent there for a while," said Eddie Kenny,
25, who was at his parents' home in Plantation near Fort Lauderdale
with his wife. "We have trees down all over the place and two fences
have been totally demolished, crushed, gone."

In Cuba, rescuers used scuba gear, inflatable rafts and amphibious
vehicles to pull nearly 250 people from their flooded homes in Havana
after Wilma sent huge waves crashing into the capital city and swamped
neighborhoods up to four blocks inland with 3 feet of water. In
Cancun, Mexico, troops and federal police moved in to control looting
at stores and shopping centers ripped open by the hurricane, and
hunger and frustration mounted among Mexicans and stranded tourists.

Wilma, Florida's eighth hurricane in 15 months, came ashore in Florida
at 6:30 a.m. EDT near Cape Romano, 22 miles south of Naples, spinning
off tornadoes and bringing a potential for up to 10 inches of rain, the
National Hurricane Center said.

Wilma was moving northeast at about 25 mph, up the Atlantic coast. By
early Wednesday, it was expected to be off the coast of Canada, but
forecasters said it may not bring heavy rain because its projected
track was far off shore.

"I looked out our place and I saw a bunch of stuff flying by," said
Paul Tucchinio, who was riding out the storm in a condo three blocks
from the beach in Naples. "It sounds like someone threw a bunch of
rocks against the boards. It's wicked."

The storm flooded large sections of Key West and other areas and knocked
out power to up to 2.5 million homes and businesses as it raced across
the state and buffeted heavily populated Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm
Beach counties on the Atlantic coast with gusts over 100 mph. Key West
was about 35 percent under water Monday morning. 

A gust was clocked at 104 mph at the National Hurricane Center in
Miami, causing howling even in the bunker-like building.

In Weston, near Fort Lauderdale, Kim DuBois sat in her darkened house
with her two children and husband, with the power out and the storm
shutters up. For light they used a battery-powered pumpkin lantern
they bought for Halloween.

"I could hear tiles coming off the roof," she said. "There are trees on
cars and flooding at the end of our street." She added: "Really what I'm
afraid of is tornadoes."

A man in the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Coral Springs died when a tree
fell on him, Broward County spokesman Carl Fowler said. Wilma killed
at least three people in Mexico and 13 others in Jamaica and Haiti as
it made is way across the Caribbean last week.

More than 33,000 people were in shelters across the state. But no
mandatory evacuations were ordered along Florida's heavily populated
east coast. An in the low-lying Florida Keys, not even 10 percent of
the Keys' 78,000 hardy, storm-tested residents evacuated, Sheriff
Richard Roth said. Wilma prompted the fourth hurricane evacuation of
the Keys this year.

About 35 percent of Key West was flooded, including the airport, said
Jay Gewin, an assistant to the island city's mayor. No travel was
possible in or out of the city, he said. U.S. 1, the only highway
connecting the Keys to the mainland, was flooded.

Key West Police Chief Bill Mauldin said the flooding was severe -- "more
extensive than we've seen in the past."

Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother, warned: "Don't be fooled by the 
lull" as the eye passes.

President Bush signed a disaster declaration for hurricane-damaged areas
and promised swift action to help the victims.

"We have prepositioned food, medicine, communications equipment, urban
search- and-rescue teams," he said. "We will work closely with local and
state authorities to respond to this hurricane."

While the Federal Emergency Management Agency was bitterly criticized
for its sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina, this time the agency had
people working side by side with state emergency officials, said David
Paulison, acting FEMA director.

"We are going to make sure that we have good visibility on anything
that's going on the ground to make sure we ... understand exactly what's
happening," he said on CBS.

State and federal officials had trucks of ice and food ready. FEMA was
prepared to send in dozens of military helicopters and 13.2 million
ready-to-eat meals.

Weary forecasters also monitored Tropical Depression Alpha, which
became the record-breaking 22nd named storm of the 2005 Atlantic
season. Alpha, which drenched Haiti and the Dominican Republic on
Sunday, was not considered a threat to the United States.

After battering the Mexican coastline with howling winds and
torrential rain, Wilma pulled away from the Yucatan Peninsula on
Sunday as a Category 2 storm and strengthened in the warm waters of
the Gulf of Mexico. Wind shear that was expected to rob Wilma of some
strength did not materialize.

A tornado touched down Monday in Brevard County, damaging an apartment
complex. No one was injured. Wilma's arrival also was announced by at
least four tornadoes Sunday night -- including one near Kennedy Space 
Center at Cape Canaveral -- that damaged some businesses but caused no 
injuries.

Elaine Kelley, a 43-year-old waitress, was staying in her daughter's
condo near the water in Everglades City, a village of about 700 people
on the southwest coast. After wading through thigh-deep water to get
to a nearby hotel, she said she wouldn't make the mistake of staying
through a hurricane again.

"I'll never go through another one," a wet and shivering Kelley
said. "I didn't expect anything like this. I was watching roofs blow
off all over the place."

One serious injury was reported in Florida on Sunday: A 12-year-old
girl suffered a fractured skull in Wellington when falling hurricane
shutters struck her head, said Palm Beach County Sheriff's spokesman
Paul Miller.  She was hospitalized in critical condition.

In Europe, crude oil slipped below $60 as traders expected Wilma to
avoid already battered Gulf of Mexico oil production installations.

___

Associated Press writers Allen Breed in Naples, Erik Schelzig in
Marathon, David Royse in Key West, Fla., Melissa Trujillo in Oakland
Park, and Ron Word and Brent Kallestad in Miami contributed to this
story, along with observers in Plantation, and Fema Village, elsewhere
in south Florida. 

___

On the Net:

National Hurricane Center: http://www.nhc.noaa.gov

Copyright 2005 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.

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

From: David Royse <ap@telecom-digest.org> 
Subject: Wilma's Force Surprises Keys Residents
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 11:50:42 -0500


By DAVID ROYSE, Associated Press Writer

Some residents of the Florida Keys were rethinking their refusal to
evacuate for Hurricane Wilma on Monday after the storm isolated them,
submerged streets under water up to 5 feet deep and turned out their
lights.

No travel was possible in or out of Key West. Jay Gewin, assistant to
the mayor, said 35 percent of the city was flooded, including the
airport, and U.S. 1, the lone highway connecting the islands to each
other and the mainland, was flooded near Islamorada.

Wilma made landfall before dawn in southwest Florida as a Category 3
storm, stronger than expected, and knocked out power and
communications to the entire Keys island chain.

"A bunch of us that are the old-time Key Westers are kind of waking up
Monday morning, going 'Well, maybe I should have paid a little more
attention,'" restaurant owner Amy Culver-Aversa said.

However, she soon had a generator going and was giving out coffee, and
she expected to reopen by Tuesday.

While Wilma's eye came ashore at Cape Romano on the Gulf Coast, about
95 miles to the north of Key West, the hurricane's strongest wind was
on the south side, near the Keys.

Officials said more than 90 percent of year-round Keys residents refused
to heed evacuation orders. "They are too smart to listen to what a
experienced weatherman says on their television or radio," noted one
official, sarcastically. 

"We're not New Orleans," said Elaine Chinnis, walking her dogs along Key
West's Duval Street a few hours before Wilma struck. 

Islanders are hurricane weary - they've dealt with four this year
alone -- and hurricane savvy. But while the previous three storms
caused little damage in the Keys, Wilma was much worse than residents
expected.

Ricky Cartwright said he probably would have left if he had known how
bad the storm would be. Water up to his bed forced him to flee his
home in the middle of the night and destroyed his possessions.

"All my clothes, all my shoes, everything," he said.

Key West streets were under several feet of water four blocks inland
from the shore.

"Within 45 minutes, it went from 6 inches to 4 or 5 feet deep," said
Chris Elwell, whose new Porsche Boxster was submerged to its roof.

"It was like a train coming on both sides of me," said Key West
bartender Noah Ackerman, who tried to ride out the storm in a house
elevated on stilts but gave up and left to seek better shelter.

"All the streets are rivers," said Ackerman, who was given a ride to a
shelter by passing police. "You can see water just rushing through."

Islanders said they weren't being cavalier when they refused to leave,
they just weren't afraid of Wilma.

"It seems like we know more than the weather people," Chinnis said
before Wilma's arrival. "They seem to over-exaggerate everything."

That attitude frustrates public officials.

"We've been preaching this for decades, and you know, the government
can only do so much," said Max Mayfield, director of the National
Hurricane Center in Miami. (and commenting on the failure of most
residents to evacuate the area) "I don't know how we motivate people,
when the residents know so much more about this than the rest of us."

Throughout town, residents went about their business 'as usual',
wading through several feet of water in many cases. Two residents were
hoisting a gasoline-powered generator into place while a third was
tinkering with a battery-powered radio trying to get it running.  

___

On the Net:

City of Key West: http://www.keywestcity.com/  (Web Site was out of
order and unreachable at 12 noon Monday.)

Copyright 2005 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 articles from Associated Press please go to:
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/AP.html

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

From: ravi.v.prasad@gmail.com
Subject: Disputes Between TRAI and Dept of Telecom
Date: 24 Oct 2005 08:58:24 -0700
Organization: http://groups.google.com


My Article on Disputes between TRAI and Dept of Telecom in October 2005
issue of RealPolitik Magazine

Copyright: 2005, Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad

International Publishing rights in all media with RealPolitik Magazine
Reproduction and Forwarding strictly prohibited.
International Copyright in all Media, Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad, 2005

By Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad

For several months, telecom circles have been abuzz about the bitter
battle between the Minister of Communications Mr Dayanidhi Maran and
the Chairman of the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of India
Mr Pradip Baijal. Both of them want to appropriate the credit for
decreasing telecom tariffs, for the rapid growth in the number of
subscribers nationally, and for subsidizing rural telephony.

Baijal was considered to be a protege of Mr. Arun Shourie, the telecom
minister in the previous NDA government. Maran wants to protect the
public sector Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited and Mahanagar Telephone
Nigam Limited from private sector competition and has painted TRAI to
be in the grip of private operators. Several media reports appeared
about the favours allegedly provided by Baijal to Reliance InfoComm,
and Communist Party of India (Marxist) member of parliament Mr
Nilotpal Basu called for Baijal'sdismissal. The battle became so
bitter that Maran prevented Baijal from going abroad to chair a
conference of international telecom regulators.

In May 2005, when TRAI released its recommendations on spectrum
allocations to telecom operators, Maran snubbed it, stating that TRAI
had exceeded its terms of reference. Rejecting most of TRAI's
recommendations, Maran pointedly statedthat DoT's Wireless Planning
and Coordination Wing was fully equipped to handle all spectrum issues
"efficiently and impartially".

TRAI recommended the setting up of a national interconnection
exchange, which would have greatly reduced interconnection costs of
all operators.  But this would have cut into the artificially inflated
revenues of BSNL, which had a legally mandated monopoly on
interconnection. The minister killed TRAI's proposal.

The latest dispute between the minister and TRAI is over Access
Deficit Charges. ADC is a cross-subsidy paid by private operators to
BSNL and MTNL. It is a fraction of the charges of each international
and long-distance call made by the subscribers of private operators,
and is used to subsidise the rentals charged by BSNL and MTNL from
their subscribers.

TRAI wanted to drastically reduce ADC, which was a consumer friendly
move since it would have greatly reduced the charges that subscribers
of private operators would have to pay. Legally, setting tariffs is
the responsibility of TRAI alone, and the ministry has no locus standi
whatsover. So, to protect the revenues of BSNL and MTNL, Maran
resorted to the legal legerdemain of issuing a Policy Directive to
TRAI under Section 25 of the TRAI Act of 1997, which says that the
government may issue policy directives "in the interests of the
sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State,
friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or
morality."

It is difficult to see how the reduction of ADC, a consumer friendly
move, affects the "sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of
the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order,
decency or morality".

TRAI retaliated that it would make the minister's letter (which was
marked "Top Secret") issuing this policy directive public. TRAI
asserted that under Section 11 (4) of the TRAI Act, it was required to
"ensure transparency while exercising its powers and discharging its
functions", and so it would have to make public all the confidential
directives issued to it by the government.

The Prime Minister's Office is now intervening in the matter. The PMO
has reportedly advised Maran to bide his time until Baijal retires in
a few months.

Such disputes between dominant operators / ministries and statutory
regulators are not unique to India, as seen by the prolonged battles
between AT&T and Federal Communications Commission in USA, British
Telecom and OFTEL in UK, Telstra and Australian Communications
Authority, and even Singapore Telecom and Telecommunications Authority
of Singapore.

One saving grace is that TRAI has far more powers and independence
than telecom regulators in most other countries, at least on
paper. The French and German regulators are for all practical purposes
under the thumb of France Telecom and Deutsche Telekom
respectively. Both Autority de Regulation des Telecommunications and
Bundesministerium f Post und Telekommunikation have been strongly
criticized by the European Commission on several occasions for not
even attempting to prevent abuses of dominant market position by these
two operators.

Even FCC and OFTEL, often held up to be role models for regulators,
are executive branches of government. In USA, real clout over
operators is wielded not by FCC but by the utilities regulatory
commissions in each state which have the power to penalize
operators. In UK, the Director General of OFTEL is subservient to the
Minister for Trade and Industry.

In contrast, TRAI is an independent statutory body.

(750 words)

By Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad

The author, an alumnus of Carnegie Mellon and IIT Kanpur, is an
entrepreneur and consultant in telecommunications and information
technology. He may be contacted at rp@k.st or p@r67.net


Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad
19 Maitri Apts
A - 3, Paschim Vihar
New Delhi 110 063  India

rp@k.st       r@50g.com      p@r67.net
Tel: {91}(0) 98 117 56789, 92 121 13579, 987 12 45678

Copyright: 2005, Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad

International Publishing rights in all media with RealPolitik Magazine

Reproduction and Forwarding strictly prohibited.

International Copyright in all Media, Ravi Visvesvaraya Prasad, 2005
Published in RealPolitik Magazine, October 2005 issue

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

Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 00:38:59 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Once It Was Direct to Video, Now It's Direct to the Web


By JOHN ANDERSON

IT was a late night in Seattle. It was probably raining. Scilla
Andreen was still haunting the offices of her as-yet-to-be-started
Internet movie company, IndieFlix, when the phone rang. It was -- no
surprise -- a young filmmaker.

"He thought we were a local production company," said Ms. Andreen, 43,
a filmmaker herself, as well as an Emmy-nominated costume
designer. "Or a distribution company that might buy his film."

What the young fellow had found in his efforts to support his movie --
which he'd financed by selling his late grandmother's ring -- wasn't a
distribution company, not in the traditional sense, but instead, the
latest wrinkle in the dissemination of independent film.

As cheaper technology and a seemingly inexhaustible hipness quotient
have led to more filmmakers and films being produced, theatrical
distribution has become more expensive, the outlets more cautious, and
the returns on investments more dubious. The Internet has absorbed
some of the spillover, although the bigger success stories -- notably,
the political films of Robert Greenwald ("Uncovered: The War on Iraq,"
"Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch's War on Journalism"), or "Faster," a highly
lucrative motorcycle documentary narrated by Ewan McGregor -- have
been niche movies with a core audience.

So what about more general fare with no stars, budgets or hope?
That's where IndieFlix, founded by Ms. Andreen and her business
partner, the filmmaker Gian-Carlo Scandiuzzi, comes in. Directors
submit their films, which are then posted on the Web site
(www.indieflix.com). When users log on and click to buy the films that
capture their interest, IndieFlix burns them onto a DVD and ships them
out. The price for a feature-length film is $9.95.

Ms. Andreen's motto: "Own a movie for less than a movie ticket."

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/23/movies/23ande.html?ex=1287720000&en=f5ef92e85b677ade&ei=5090

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

Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 00:48:14 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Cingular Introduces E-Mail Access on Cells


By BRUCE MEYERSON AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) -- Cingular Wireless is introducing a service for
nonbusiness users to get BlackBerry-like mobile access to their
personal e-mail accounts from AOL, Yahoo and MSN Hotmail on a cell
phone.

The new service, powered by OZ Communications Inc., is designed to
adapt the look and capabilities of a Web portal or e-mail program such
as Outlook to the limited screen size, keyboard and processing power
of a garden variety handset.

The Java-based e-mail application initially will be available to
download on existing phones starting Monday with 5 models from
Motorola Inc. and one from Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. It also is
being pre-installed on new phones, though not immediately through all
Cingular sales channels.

There's no monthly charge for Cingular Mobile Email, but users will
need to subscribe to one of the company's wireless Internet plans with
a monthly allotment of data usage. Jim Ryan, a Cingular vice
president, said a $5 monthly data plan should provide sufficient
capacity to check one's e-mail a few times daily.

Fetching e-mail on a cell phone has been possible for some time,
generally by using a mobile Web browser or a downloadable third-party
application. But the process is often cumbersome: Users need to click
through multiple menus, type in Web addresses, sign in using a
telephone keypad, and scroll about to read poorly formatted messages
on a small screen.

      - http://finance.lycos.com/home/news/story.asp?story=52543179

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

Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 00:59:11 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Media Companies Go Too Far in Curbing Consumers' Activities


By WALTER S. MOSSBERG

In some quarters of the Internet, the three most hated letters of the
alphabet are DRM. They stand for Digital Rights Management, a set of
technologies for limiting how people can use the music and video files
they've purchased from legal downloading services. DRM is even being
used to limit what you can do with the music you buy on physical CDs,
or the TV shows you record with a TiVo or other digital video
recorder.

Once mainly known inside the media industries and among activists who
follow copyright issues, DRM is gradually becoming familiar to average
consumers, who are increasingly bumping up against its limitations.

DRM is computer code that can be embedded in music and video files to
dictate how these files are used. The best-known example is the music
Apple Computer sells at its iTunes Music Store. Using a DRM system it
invented called FairPlay, Apple has rigged its songs, at the
insistence of the record companies, so that they can be played only on
a maximum of five computers, and so that you can burn only seven CDs
containing the same playlist of purchased tracks. If Apple hadn't done
this, the record labels wouldn't have allowed it to sell their music.

DRM systems are empty vessels -- they can enforce any rules copyright
holders choose, or no rules at all. Apple's DRM rules are liberal
enough that few consumers object to them. In fact, obtaining
relatively liberal DRM rules from the labels was the key to Apple's
success in selling music. But some other uses of DRM technology aren't
so benign.

http://ptech.wsj.com/archive/ptech-20051020.html

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

Subject: Cellular-News for Monday 24th October 2005
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 07:31:10 -0500
From: Cellular-News <dailydigest@cellular-news-mail.com>


Cellular-News - http://www.cellular-news.com

Vodafone Selects Ireland for Global Data Center Site
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14515.php

Vodafone Ireland's north Dublin-based data centre has been chosen by
Vodafone Group as one of three data centres that will service Vodafone
Group's worldwide data storage and systems needs. The decision to
include the Dublin data centre in the consol...

Mobiles Killing of the Payphones
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14514.php

Telecom New Zealand says that it plans to remove about 400 payphones
this year as part of a move to modernise the payphone network and
respond to the increased use of mobiles by New Zealanders on the
move. The change marks the latest in a series of c...

Are Operator Portals Ignoring Women
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14513.php

Many mobile operators have focused on launching their own mobile
portals, but these mobile portals are usually characterised by having
been developed and marketed by men -- for men, says Strand
Consults. They say that its as if the mobile operators ha...

Appeal Court Denies RIM's Motion For Stay In Patent Dispute
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14512.php

Research In Motion Ltd.'s (RIMM) request to suspend proceedings of its
ongoing patent dispute with NTP Inc. pending the BlackBerry maker's
request for a U.S. Supreme Court review was denied, according to an
NTP press release. ...

Telkom: Vodacom Group Withdraws From Nitel Deal
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14511.php

Telkom SA Limited said Friday that Vodacom Group is withdrawing from a
Nitel deal in Nigeria. ...

German Court Sees Verdict In Mannesmann Appeal Dec 21
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14510.php

A German federal appeals court will Dec. 21 rule whether to retry
Deutsche Bank AG's (DB) Chief Executive, former Mannesmann AG CEO
Klaus Esser and four others in the so-called Mannesmann trial. ...

Alltel 3Q Net Up On Wireless Revenue Gains
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14509.php

Alltel Corp. (AT) reported an 11% gain in its third-quarter net income
on surprisingly strong average revenue per user in its wireless
business. ...

Ukraine's Kyivstar says base stations up to 5,000 units
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14508.php

Ukrainian mobile operator Kyivstar's number of base
stations rose by almost 2% since October 1 to 5,000 units as of now,
the company said Friday. ...

RadioShack CFO: Wireless In Core Stores Down Vs Year Ago
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14507.php

Sales of wireless products in RadioShack Corp.'s (RSH) company stores
during the third quarter were lower than the year-ago period, but they
improved every month during the quarter, Chief Financial Officer David
Barnes said Friday. ...

UPDATE: Ericsson 3Q Net Profit Up, Gains Market Share From Nokia
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14506.php

Telefon AB LM Ericsson (ERICY) Friday posted a 22% increase in
third-quarter net profit as the Swedish telecommunications equipment
maker stole market share off some of its key rivals. ...

Singapore Tightens Controls On Prepaid Mobile Phone Users
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14505.php

Mobile phone users in Singapore who use prepaid SIM cards must
register electronically with their service providers starting Nov. 1,
the Singapore government said Friday in its latest effort to combat
terrorism. ...

Ericsson 3Q Net Profit +22% Amid Network Upgrades
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14504.php

Telefon AB LM Ericsson (ERICY) Friday posted 22% growth in
third-quarter net profit as telecommunications operators around the
world continued to upgrade and expand their networks. ...

India Raises FDI Cap In Telecom Industry To 74%
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14503.php

India's federal Cabinet late Thursday announced plans to raise the
foreign investment cap in the country's telecommunications sector to
74% from 49% in one of the biggest reform moves of the coalition
government. ...

Ericsson Says Its 3G Technology Is Used In 10 Million Handsets
http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14502.php

Mobile Systems Manufacturer Telefon AB LM Ericsson (ERICY) said Friday
more than 10 million of the world's WCDMA handsets are based on
Ericsson technology. ...

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

From: markrobt@myrealbox.com (Mark Roberts)
Subject: More on San Francisco and Oakland Numbering
Date: Mon, 24 Oct 2005 01:15:06 -0000
Organization: 1.94 meters


Thanks to the clipping files at the History Room of the Oakland Public
Library, I have been able to pin down the date that San Francisco and
Oakland went fully to 2L-5N numbers: August 10, 1947, a Sunday, at 12
midnight.

The Tribune referred to it on Saturday, which would have been August
9, of course, but it also is clear from the context that the
switchover activities began on Saturday night.  Either the Tribune's
style considered the day to begin at 12.01 am, or there was some
confusion when the story was edited.

An article in the August 7, 1947 Oakland Tribune started out:

When you're enjoying your leisure Sunday, think of the poor telephone
workers. They're going to be plenty busy.

For at exactly 12 midnight Saturday [see above for why I believe this
was really Sunday], new numbers for some 325,000 telephone subscribers
in the Oakland area and San Francisco go into effect, and Pacific
Telephone and Telegraph Company officials have prepared for trouble.

For months now, a new telephone directory, advertisements, radio
announcements, printed pamphlets and various other media of public
enlightment have proclaimed the impending change. Even "Bugs Bunny"
has been borrowed from Hollywood to do his part in helping the public
ease into the change with as few complications as possible.
[Unfortunately, there is no further explanation of the role Bugs Bunny
played in transition to 2L-5N telephone numbers.]

MANY MIX-UPS

Nevertheless, there will be mix-ups -- and plenty of them. People just
don't make a change from anything so established as telphone numbers
without a slip along the line somewhere. And, even if they do remember
the new numbers the first day, telephone officials are predicting
they'll forget the next day or the day after and let habit dictate
their dialing.

That's why an unusually large force of operators will be on duty when
heavy traffic begins around 6 a.m. Sunday. The "trouble and
interceptor" panel at the local office will have a full complement of
operators as will the regular local boards through which most of the
3,000,000 daily calls pass.

Telephone officials estimate five per cent of these calls, or about
150,000, will be incorrect.

RECORD MACHINE

In addition, a gadget known as a "mirrorphone" will be in
operation. It's the same record machine that said "No" to you when you
tried to use your phone during the recent telephone strike.  This time
it will volunteer the information that you've dialed the wrong number
and "please look in your August 10th directory for the new number."

The change is a step toward the extension of direct dialing to nearby
communities and future operator-dialing of long distance calls to
distant cities. It will affect cities on this side of the Bay from San
Leandro on the south to El Cerrito on the north.  [El Cerrito is just
south of Richmond.]

In effect, the change consists of adding a numeral, known as an
"office numeral", to the familiar prefixes, such as TEmplebar,
GLencourt or HIghgate. Thus, TEmplebar 0000 will become TEmplebar
2-0000. The KEllogg [sic], LAkehurst, LAndscape and LOckhaven
exchanges have had office numerals for some time and will not be
affected.

MORE COMBINATIONS

Addition of the numerals increases the possible number combinations on
the present dials from 60 to 600. [Does the Tribune mean number
combinations of possible exchanges? There's no further explanation of
the number.] All the combinations won't be utilized immediately, but
they'll be available when dial service is extended in the future. Too,
the new numeral will increase dialing time from an average of eight
seconds to about 11 seconds.

Technically, the change of numbers is relatively simple, and will be
accomplished with nothing more than wire and a soldering iron.  Wires
will be changed in the "decoder banks," wiring panels which receive
the combination you dial, and sets up the correct dial code which
feeds back into the right dial exchange in one-fifth of a
second. [Huh?]

Wiremen in the various offices will cut on of the decoders in an
exchange out of operation when traffic begins to slacken around 10:30
pm Saturday. Between then and midnight, they will rewire that one bank
to take care of the new numbers and put it into service when the other
decoder banks [are] cut out at midnight. That one bank will be
sufficient to handle all calls made during the early hours of the
morning while workmen are rewiring the other banks.  All the banks
will be ready for operation when the heavier traffic begins around 6
am.

[end]

=> Now here's the odd thing. Certain exchanges, such as PIedmont,
continued to have "J" or "W" suffixes after the phone numbers.  These
were, of course, the exchanges that had not yet gone to dial
service. Here's what the "How to Dial" section of the 1951 directory
explained what to do with those numbers:

    3. Dial the first two letters and the numeral of the central
       officename, then the remaining figures of the number. If
       the figures are followed by a letter, such as W, J, R,
       or M dial this letter also.

In other words, there was, for a time, 2L-5N-1L dialing to some
exchanges!

Dialing instructions in the 1949 and 1951 directories indicated that
cross-bay calling, e.g. Oakland to San Francisco, could be dialed only
from "dial individual line business telephones" (except coin
telephones). All others still had to use an operator. Calls within the
East Bay were dialed, or required the operator's assistance, or from
Berkeley LAndscape to Richmond, required dialing "911". (I referred to
this service code in a previous post; in 1948 that code was used for
calls to Hayward, but it could be dialed by 1949.)

The change to 2L-5N dialing was announced in January of 1947. A
couple of paragraphs in a Tribune story may be of interest:

   California has more than 2,635,000 telephones in use, which places
   it second in the nation for telephone usage ... It has more than
   333,000 unfilled telephone orders, also a second place record.
   
   In the Metropolitan Oakland zone, 221,907 telephones were in use
   in 1946, as compared to 167,199 in 1940, and 18,372 unfilled
   applications still remained at the exchange. [January 9, 1947]

Another Tribune story on January 28, 1947 gave the names of the
exchanges affected by the addition of a digit: ANdover (1), AShberry
(3), BErkeley (7), GLencourt (1), HIghgate (4), HUmboldt (3), OLympic
(2), PIedmont (5), SWeetwood (8), TEmplebar (2), THornwall (3),
TRinidad (2), TWinoaks (3), ROchester (7).

Other stories in the clipping file described the conversion of
Berkeley's THornwall exchange (THornwall 1 and THornwall 3) to dial
service on August 29, 1954, the final conversion in the bayside East
Bay, for THornwall 8 (formerly AShberry) on April 19, 1959, and the
last conversion in the Bay Area, in Crockett on November 11, 1969.

Alas, there were no clippings regarding the 1965 (or 1964) spinoff of
Oakland Hills numbers in the Fruitvale and Main-Piedmont rate centers
into their own switch. I ran out of time and didn't have a chance to
go through newspaper microfilms. I would assume that there would have
been some publicity for it.
 

Mark Roberts | "A man does not show his greatness by being at one extremity, 
Oakland, Cal.| but rather by touching both at once."
NO HTML MAIL |               -- Blaise Pascal

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

From: Wesrock@aol.com
Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2005 22:04:15 EDT
Subject: Local Numbers of Form XX0- (was Re: San Francisco/Oakland Exchange)


In a message dated Sun, 23 Oct 2005 01:02:21 -0000,
markrobt@myrealbox.com (Mark Roberts) writes:

> => In the 1965 directory, *two* new prefixes were listed in the
> local calling pages for the Fruitvale rate center: 531 **and** 530!

> In the 1966 directory, only 531 was listed. I did not see any phone
> numbers with 530 listed in the 1965 directory. Years later, of
> course, 530 was added to the Fruitvale-OLKDCA13 rate center-switch
> combination.

> Did someone at Pac Bell jump the gun? This is the earliest I have
> ever seen a prefix of the form xx0.

I remember of a visit to the Los Angeles area in the late 1940s
encountering a TExas 0- prefix.  (Don't recall what area it served, if
I ever knew, but there was nothing to indicate it was exceptional.)


Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com

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

From: Fred Atkinson <fatkinson@mishmash.com>
Subject: Re: What is Area Code 113?
Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2005 19:27:31 -0400


That was for Southeastern Telephone, too.  We had Southeastern while
we lived in Tallahassee, Florida for a year while mother finished her
master's degree at FSU.  They used 113 for information and 118 was for
time and temperature as well.

I used to dial some of the other codes.  Used to get some Southeastern
people, who got annoyed when kids would dial those other codes.  One
of them could be used to make someone else's phone ring without you
being on the line when they answered.

It think 110 was for long distance.  Then you had a 'circle digit'
(ours was '1' as I remembered).  But I think that if you dialed the
wrong 'circle digit', someone else would be billed for the call.  I
never tried it, though.

Fred Atkinson

Justa Lurker <JustaLurker@att.net> had written:

> Fred Atkinson wrote:

>> I seem to remember that years ago, 113 was the number for directory
>> assistance down in Florida.  But that doesn't give a clue as to why
>> it showed up on your caller ID.

> Must've been GTE territory (well, back then, it was the General System).

> In Erie PA [GTE before becoming Bell Atlantic and now Verizon of
> course] during the 1960s (possibly earlier than that), information
> was also 113 ... repair was 114 ... the fire department was 1171
> ... and you dialed 112 before the area code and number when placing
> a DDD [direct-distance dialing] long distance call.  I want to say
> that the test board was 116 but it's been a long time.  Not sure if
> there was a speed-dial code (if you will) for the business office.

In Columbia, Mo., GTE/General territory since the late 1950s, the
codes were:

112 for Long Distance access
113 for directory information
114 for repair service
115 for mobile operator
118 for time and temperature
119 for party-line ringback

112 was replaced with "1" around 1971. However, "0" access
(assisted long distance) was not available until 1986.

118 was replaced with 655 in the mid-1970s. 655 in turn was
replaced by 449-0655 (that's GIbson 9-0655) around 1986.

> For some reason, I think a lot of this went away when the GTD EAX
> replaced the old step-by-step equipment sometime in the late 60s or
> early 70s (?).

Columbia had *both* operating in parallel from 1971 to 1986 (in
different switching offices), when GTE brought in some Nortel switches
(would they have been DMS-100s by then?) and swept the old mess
out. No more progress tone just to call across town!

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

From: Joseph <JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: San Francisco and Oakland Exchange Numbering
Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2005 17:25:37 -0700
Reply-To: JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com


On Sun, 23 Oct 2005 01:02:21 -0000, markrobt@myrealbox.com (Mark
Roberts) wrote:

> There's an odd statement in May 1964 directory in the area code
> listings, "To make a direct Distance call, just dial the Area Code and
> then the telephone number". Does that mean no "1" or "211" was used?

I have no idea about 211, but prior to 1995 when the new NXX (any
digit for second number) area codes came into existance in San
Francisco you only needed to dial 7 digits for local *and* local toll
and dial *just* area code and 7 digits for calls to other area codes.
On many exchanges if you dialed 1 before a number it would not even
break dial tone!


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: An interesting thing which was
explained to me by an Illinois Bell technician sometime in the
early 1970's had to do with 'dial 1 first'. The reason we, in
Chicago and nearby suburbs did _not_ have to dial '1' in front of
any long distance calls (it was optional, do it or not as you wished)
was "because the toll-switching equipment (I assume he meant AT&T in
those days) is located right here in Chicago, therefore our
(Chicago's) switching equipment is set to make 'certain assumptions
when it sees a zero or one as the second digit dialed'; zero or
one as the second digit dialed tells the equipment to expect to
receive ten digits in total instead of just seven digits." I do
recall once or twice dialing a friend of mine on the same exchange
as 1-312-(plus 7 digits) instead of just 7 digits, and the call 
completed just fine. But, said the technician, "that only works in
cases where an area code is devoted to a single large city, such as
New York (212) or Chicago (312) and not where an area code covers
an entire state (remember, this was a 1970's conversation). I do not
know if the tech knew what he was talking about or not. I do know
that it was in the early/middle 1980's before we had any prefixes with
zero or one in the second digit place, and a few years after that 
before area codes were _not_ zero or one in the second digit
spot. PAT]

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


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