From editor@telecom-digest.org Fri Apr 16 17:20:58 2004 Received: (from ptownson@localhost) by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.11.6p2/8.11.3) id i3GLKwE16313; Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:20:58 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:20:58 -0400 (EDT) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <200404162120.i3GLKwE16313@massis.lcs.mit.edu> X-Authentication-Warning: massis.lcs.mit.edu: ptownson set sender to editor@telecom-digest.org using -f To: ptownson Approved: patsnewlist Subject: TELECOM Digest V23 #190 TELECOM Digest Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:20:00 EDT Volume 23 : Issue 190 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Howard Stern (Miikka Kiprusoff) Re: Measured Phone Service (Tony P.) Re: Measured Phone Service (johnpm@iwon.com) Re: Spam Issues (Walt Howard) Re: AT&T Wireless Announces Agressive New Offer (Paul Vader) Re: Cellular Tower Leases (Koos van den Hout) Re: Who is "VOIP News"? (Miikka Kiprusoff) Re: Norvergence in the News, Again? Yes Again! (John Bartley) For Mr. Patrick Townson Re: Norvergence (Satchel Paige) 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. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 08:53:54 +0100 From: Miikka Kiprusoff Subject: Howard Stern Reply-To: miikka@calgaryweb.net [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This message has so much to say that I am altering my usual practice of replying at the bottom to include a reply as we go along. When I reply to Miikka it will be identified as 'TDE Note' and slighly indented a little. This is a one time only exception to my rule, I think. PAT] > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I wonder if it has occurred to the > people who want to give fines to Howard Stern that he is an extremely > liberal, left wing person who of late has been giving President Bush > much grief. 'Obviously' he has to be neutralized and the best way to > do that is keep the fines rolling in. Now, I have no love lost for > Jackson or Howard Stern; her 'performance' was lewd and obscene; his > crude language is pretty awful also. But when he has been picking on > Bush repeatedly of late, and Bush's government agency begins to throw > its weight around against Howard, isn't that a bit suspicious? PAT] Wow. That's a fairly Mansonesque dose of paranoia. Maybe they also hired the 9/11 hijackers to give Bush a reason to attack Iraq. [TDE: I've never heard the term 'Mansonesque' before. It seems like it may be an adjective describing Charles Manson, is that correct? And Bush was *thinking about* attacking Iraq long before 9-11. If anything, 9-11 gave him the 'legitimate' excuse he had been lacking before. PAT] Howard Stern began attacking Bush after he was suspended from Clear Channel stations. Not before. That's an important distinction. You've got your cause and effect bass ackwards. [TDE: I was not talking about *when* he started his anti-Bush campaign, just that he started it, Bush obviously hates it and needed to 'do something about it'. PAT] But let's say you're right. Let's say the higher-ups at Clear Channel (who are, I must point out, not Stern's employers, but rather a syndicate that agreed to air his show, which is owned by ANOTHER syndicate) are definitely miffed with him about his Bush-bashing, and have decided to retaliate solely on that basis, in order to shut him up and get all this Bush-bashing off the air. [TDE: I do not think and did not mean to claim that Stern's employers (whoever they may be) got 'miffed' or anything else. I suggest that Bush is the one who is miffed, and decided to retaliate. PAT] This is a problem ... why, exactly? They own the stations. They have a right to air, or NOT air, their own choice of content (subject to FCC guidelines). If they want to squelch Stern, they have that right. YOU have the right, if you disagree with this decision, to boycott Clear Channel stations - ie: vote with your wallet. Howard Stern's free speech rights are not being trampled and I'm getting a little tired of hearing this refrain from people who don't appear to have ever read that little thing called the US Constitution. It protects you from the GOVERNMENT limiting your speech - but not from anyone else. Moreover, Stern has no "right" to say ANYTHING on Clear Channel stations. His "right" to say anything on those stations stems from mutual agreement, and if one side of that agreement decides to walk away from that agreement, tough darts. There may be some issues remaining re: Clear Channel's contractual obligations, but those are matters for lawyers and civil courts to iron out. This is not a Constitutional issue. If Stern wants free, unfettered access to the public airwaves, let him buy his own radio stations. Otherwise, he has to play by the same rules everyone else does. [TDE: Again, I never claimed that Stern or anyone else has 'free speech rights' of any kind. Any idiot knows that free speech, indeed the entire Bill of Rights only specifies what the *govern- ment* can and cannot do. PAT] Stern, and his supporters, radiate this mentality that he and he alone is the "Enlightened One" and that anyone who disagrees with him must therefore be doing so only out of irrational hatred - and must therefore be attacked. (Come to think of it, this description applies to the entire Air America lineup -- have a look-see at the vitriolic hate spewed all over their website about Arthur Liu). The simple fact of the matter is that Howard Stern hasn't the IQ necessary to successfully blow his own nose, never mind lecture me on how I should think and vote. [TDE: So we agree about that much at least. If Stern is supposed to be a good example of why people should vote Democratic in November, he seems be very poor at it. PAT] Provoking a reaction and saying something meaningful are not the same thing. Stern's yet to learn this little lesson. Clear Channel's actions are a kick in Howard's ... well, stern. One that he's long been begging for. Pardon me for not giving a damn while he cries his crocodile tears. [TDE: Oh, I don't disagree. I would suggest a plague on both their houses is appropriate. All I think I said was -- forgetting now about all the peripheral players such as Clear Channel, Air America, a theoretical Bill of Rights which does not apply to relationships between *individuals and their employers, etc* -- was that Stern gets very noisy where Bush is concerned. Bush gets very annoyed, and uses *his underlings* (i.e. FCC) to take action against Stern. Action which the underlings do not take against others of similar ilk, although logically they could if they had any backbones or male privarte parts. I do not think Clear Channel or anyone else decided to retaliate against Stern, after all he was making good money for them. If anything, prudence dictates to Clear Channel they should keep their mouths shut and stay out of it since Bush's FCC could go after them if he decided to go after those peripheral players as well. But thanks for writing me. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Tony P. Subject: Re: Measured Phone Service Organization: ATCC Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 18:23:26 GMT In article , johnpm@iwon.com says: > I am thinking about getting Vonage, but I would like to keep my POTS > line as a backup. I was thinking about downgrading my POTS service > from unlimited local calling to measured service. I live in SBC > territory and I already called them asking this question, but I'm not > sure the rep I spoke to is correct. My question is: with measured > service are all *incoming* calls unlimited? Is the measure only > placed on dialed/outgoing calls? Do they count your usage on both > incoming and outgoing calls? Thanks to all who reply. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: SBC claims that all incoming calls are > unmeasured, or 'free'. That's one thing I have never caught them lying > about. Not so with their subsidiary, Cingular Wireless, where you are > charged in both directions. If you want an e-coupon for the second > month of Vonage totally free, just ask me. PAT] It stands to reason that they can't charge you for incoming calls because you don't have complete control over who calls you. Same is actually becoming true of cell phones, and there is plenty of underutilized bandwidth out there that they could offer true unlimited cell plans for < $50 a month. But they won't - greed rules. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, you'd think so, and yes, just look at mainstream telco if you are curious what greed will get you in life. PAT] ------------------------------ From: John Subject: Re: Measured Phone Service Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 11:58:03 -0700 On Thu, 15 Apr 2004 23:58:46 -0700, in comp.dcom.telecom TELECOM Digest Editor noted in reply to "Measured Phone Service": > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: SBC claims that all incoming calls are > unmeasured, or 'free'. That's one thing I have never caught them lying > about. Not so with their subsidiary, Cingular Wireless, where you are > charged in both directions. If you want an e-coupon for the second > month of Vonage totally free, just ask me. PAT] Pat, thank you for your reply. I have a follow-up question, lets say I keep my POTS line and downgrade it to measured rate service and I add call-forwarding. If I forward the calls from my POTS line to my Vonage line, does the forwarded call count towards the measured service? I read on SBC's website that you are responsible for all toll and long distance charges on a forwarded call, but it makes no mention of measured service. Once the call hits my line and I forward it, is that the same as me picking up the phone and placing a call? Thanks again for your reply. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yes, it is the same thing, except instead of you picking up and dialing, your secretary SBC did it for you, and charged you for not only the call, but the call-forwarding action as well. However, if Vonage gives you a purely local number within your local (free) calling area (an otherwise unmeasured, untimed call, then all you would pay is whatever you otherwise pay for the call-forwarding action. PAT] ------------------------------ From: whoward@piv27.cns.ualberta.ca (Walt Howard) Subject: Re: Spam Issues Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 18:52:15 UTC Organization: University of Alberta In article , SELLCOM Tech support wrote: > I assume that spam issues are on topic since I have seen them > discussed. > I believe that we are all against spam, Most of us are. > but what about when a blackhole type site is being run in a totally > irresponsible manner? There have been several instances of that. It tends to be self-correcting, because an RBL that has too many false positives is less useful to those who use it. Keep in mind that no one forces anyone to use any RBL service. People use them if doing so cleans up their incoming mail stream. > I speak of FIVETEN. > The trash running http://www.five-ten-sg.com/blackhole.php have whole > sections of the world blocked without any real cause and they won't > remove such listings after notification. > We had a customer place an order for a phone and our reply to them was > "blacklisted by FIVETEN". > We have had cases in the past where a blackhole site thought our > address was dynamic and were quite courteous and fixed the problem > immediately. The scum at FIVETEN don't care. > Can anything be done? Their reputation for rejecting valid email may > simply negate them but they are still listed with some spam removal > company sites. Let's see here. My only other knowledge of five-ten is that for years, they have provided a M$Windows port of network time protocol software. In other words, they provide some free public service along with their commercial offerings. And then we have Steve at SELLCOM, who has managed to get on other RBL lists as well, but refers to the people at five-ten as trash and scum. His .signature is overlong and full of advertising. He has a customer who would rather continue using five-ten's RBL even though it blocks sellcom. Apparently the customer is not even concerned enough to whitelist sellcom in his email program. And we are all supposed to believe that this is all five-ten's fault. Sorry, I'm not buying that. We have heard nothing about why five-ten got into the RBL business, or why sellcom wound up in their RBL, or why this particular customer believes so much in the RBL even if it curtails their communication with sellcom. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Walt, your reference to five-ten and their offering of a Microsoft Windows Network Time program: Is that by chance the program (freeware) from 'Graham Marketing' known as 'NetTime 2.0' ? Its really a dandy little utility; hides in the background; and frequently synchs (via NTP, port 137 ?) to other 'master clocks'. For instance I have 'NetTime 2.0' on all my computers; the laptop 98 and laptop 95 are instructed to look on my LAN to Windows 2000 to get the time; Windows 2000 looks at kansas.net (which is a local master/atomic clock serving the southeast Kansas/ Independence area. I use mine in connection with TClockX (for fancy display purposes). Just wondering if it was the same software; its a great free download product. I still say 'five-ten' sounds like an old fashioned dime store of the Kresge/Woolworth variety. PAT] ------------------------------ From: pv+usenet@pobox.com (Paul Vader) Subject: Re: AT&T Wireless Announces Aggressive New Offer Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 18:48:30 -0000 Organization: Inline Software Creations John Levine writes: > If you believe the maps on their web site, it's not bad. Once they're > absorbed by Cingular, which has lots of GSM either directly or via > agreements with T-Mobile, it should be quite good. Incidentally, Cingular already has nationwide no-roaming plans. So this announcement isn't much of a surprise -- it's just a stealth announcement that all AT&T's wireless base now belongs to Cingular. * * PV something like badgers--something like lizards--and something like corkscrews. ------------------------------ From: Koos van den Hout Subject: Re: Cellular Tower Leases Date: 16 Apr 2004 15:27:22 GMT Organization: http://idefix.net/~koos/ Roy wrote: > I want to buy cellular tower leases, is there a directory of cell > tower lease owners? Thanks. From previous publications in the Digest: http://www.americantower.com/mainweb/ American Tower leases tower space. They can help, or maybe they can direct you to someone who can help in specific cases. Koos van den Hout, PGP keyid RSA/1024 0xCA845CB5 via keyservers koos@kzdoos.xs4all.nl or DSS/1024 0xF0D7C263 -?) Fax +31-30-2817051 Visit the site about books with reviews /\\ http://idefix.net/~koos/ http://www.virtualbookcase.com/ _\_V ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 11:00:18 +0100 From: Miikka Kiprusoff Subject: Re: Who is "VOIP News"? Reply-To: miikka@calgaryweb.net On Mon, 12 Apr 2004 05:08:21 -0400 Jack Decker wrote about Re: Who is "VOIP News"? > Well, the VoIP companies can't just interface to the PSTN through some > kind of black wormhole that passes through the fourth dimension. They > actually have to use a licensed CLEC to make the connection to the > PSTN. And guess what, the CLEC does pay their share of the taxes and > originating and terminating charges, all of which gets passed onto the > VoIP company. > It might be helpful to think of a VoIP company as a customer of a CLEC > (usually several CLEC's) that is simply sharing their service with > their customers. In a way it's like the Chicago hotel that Pat used > to live in, where the hotel itself had a certain number of lines > coming in and then provided service to the tenants. As far as the > phone company was concerned, the end user was the hotel, not the > individual tenants. And I think that is the case where the VoIP > companies are concerned -- they are like the hotel; they buy PSTN > connections in their own name. Then they run those connections > through a "switchboard" of sorts (actually more like an automatic PBX) > and onto the "tenants", who are actually the customers on their > private network. > That's not a perfect comparison, of course, but it illustrates that an > endpoint on a VoIP network is not really part of the PSTN. The people > who do connect to the PSTN, namely the VoIP carriers, do pay all the > taxes and fees required of them and those do get passed on to > customers. What upsets certain government officials is that instead > of being able to gouge each VoIP customer individually (and thereby > get more money), they only see the VoIP company as a customer of PSTN > services. snip > And I would also say to you, the CLEC's used by the VoIP companies do > pay taxes and fees. And from the standpoint of the PSTN, the VoIP > company *is* the end user, not each of the VoIP company's individual > customers. Yes, each individual users gets a PSTN phone number, but > that's simply a DID (direct inward) number out of a group of numbers > assigned to the VoIP company. This is why individual customers aren't > listed in the phone book, and why a VoIP customer can't take their > VoIP number with them when they move to another provider. The VoIP > customer isn't buying PSTN service, they're buying the right to use a > private VoIP network that allows them to connect to the PSTN using > connections for which the VoIP company is the customer. In Canada, I can sign up for VOIP service with "TalkBroadband", which is a full-fledged CLEC and offers number portability. See: http://www.primustel.ca Also, Vonage's Canadian offering does not yet offer number portability but they say they'll offer it soon -- presumably, they too will become a full-fledged CLEC as well. One irritation I've got with both of 'em: like most telcos up here, they have -- in the fine print -- a "network access charge" ($3.95 for TalkBroadband, $1.95 for Vonage). This is not a tax -- this goes directly into their pocket, and is charged for access to their network. Why this isn't built into the price of the basic service is completely beyond me - except that it allows them to advertise a lower price, then pull a "gotcha" on ya when you get your first bill. Sprint Canada, alas, has become the worst offender in this regard. They too sock you with a $3.95 monthly charge, which applies to all of their long distance plans. Telus does the same thing, but with a difference: with Telus, I can at least switch to another long distance company -- one that doesn't charge this fee -- and thus avoid it. With Sprint Canada local dialtone service, if you pick a different long distance carrier, your local dialtone service price rises by ten bucks a month! Sorry, veered off topic. :-) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, Sprint is infamous about those extra charges if you do not agree to accept their long distance offerings. They do the same thing in northern Kansas (now Sprint local service, formerly United Tel). Either take Sprint LD or don't take it and pay ten dollars more to make you wish you had. Of course like Bell, they blame it all on the bad old government. PAT] ------------------------------ From: John Bartley Date: Fri, 16 Apr 2004 09:57:26 -0800 Subject: Re: Norvergence in the News, Again? Yes Again! On Wed, 7 Apr 2004 12:41:22 -0600, Benjamin wrote: > I have many forums and sites, giving good and bad reports of > Norvergence. I work for one of the Banks that has been financing the > Matrix phone system. I am just curious about Norvergence. If you > could sent me any info that would be great thank you. An interesting and ungrammatical e-mail, coming from an address with no posting on USENET before, tied to a nearly blank website titled "New Fashion Pork?" Is he fishing for something uncomplementary? In any even, I can comment that the mail admins at Novergence follow a most irritatingly clueless practice. Despite the well-known fact that viruses which send e-mail are spoofing the sender's address, using addresses skimmed from USENET, here we have a notice from Norvergance telling me that a receive-only address of mine sent them an e-mail with a virus. Had their server compared the IP address in the header to the IP address range of the alleged e-mail sending address, they would have immediately known the address was spoofed. They didn't even send the one useful bit of info, the headers of the e-mail in question, which would have conclusively demonstrated where it came from. Useless. Sending such e-mail wastes their bandwidth and wastes my time, as well as demonstrating their IT practices are.. well, you all can decide. From: Date: 16 Apr 09:50 (PDT) To: Subject: Symantec Mail Security detected a repairable/quarantined virus based on a message you sent (SYM:01096960563786822730) Importance: normal Message-Id: <01af01c423d2$e8f08e40$dedea8c0@Norv.norvergence.com> X-Mailer: Microsoft CDO for Exchange 2000 X-Mimeole: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1165 Received: (cpmta 19969 invoked from network); 16 Apr 2004 09:47:54 -0700 Received: from 216.37.46.9 (HELO xlate1.mailsvcs.arrl.net) by smtp.inbound.c001.snv.cp.net (209.228.32.108) with SMTP; 16 Apr 2004 09:47:54 -0700 Received: from NORVEXCHFE.norv.norvergence.com ([65.119.208.16]) by xlate1.mailsvcs.arrl.net (8.11.6/8.11.0) with ESMTP id i3GGlo717589 for ; Fri, 16 Apr 2004 11:47:51 -0500 Received: from NORVEXCH01.Norv.norvergence.com ([192.168.100.31]) by NORVEXCHFE.norv.norvergence.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC(5.0.2195.6713); Fri, 16 Apr 2004 12:50:23 -0400 Received: from mail pickup service by NORVEXCH01.Norv.norvergence.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC; Fri, 16 Apr 2004 12:50:23 -0400 Thread-Index: AcQj0ujwWwT5tCYKTKWqpn0/LM7U5w== Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" X-Received: 16 Apr 2004 16:47:54 GMT Content-Class: urn:content-classes:message Return-Path: Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit MIME-Version: 1.0 Priority: normal X-Originalarrivaltime: 16 Apr 2004 16:50:23.0343 (UTC) FILETIME=[E90F87F0:01C423D2] Subject of the message: excuse me Recipient of the message: Mary Murphy [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: 'Mary Murphy' is always writing me, asking me to excuse her; she does not want the virii I send out, nor the spam neither, for that matter, and would I please stop sending it out. Then she sends a liberal dose of it back to me. I wonder if she ever gets time to do anything other than send email complaint letters around. So now you have heard from her also? Now and again I also get email from this 'Patrick Townson' thing telling me to quit sending him virii also. It used to drive me nuts getting email sent by myself/to myself with that crap, but anymore I don't worry about it. Come to think of it, the messages to me also had the subject line 'excuse me'. So you got a dose of it also? But Norvergence postmaster thoughtfully cleared yours out prior to passing it on. PAT] ------------------------------ From: dor@writeme.com (Satchel Paige) Subject: For Mr. Patrick Townson Re: Norvergence Date: 15 Apr 2004 13:11:23 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com Mr. Patrick Townson, I am David Rodriguez. With this post I publicly demand that you remove the previous posts that I authored (author name: Satchel Paige). I was able to remove them from the Google Groups board (www.deja.com) because that was the medium that I used to create them and to post them ... and ... because they were my posts. If the Google Groups board (www.deja.com) considered me the owner of the posts, you should too. Therefore, remove them as of today (4/15/2004). This is the second attempt to post this message. Only the removal date has been changed. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: To bring readers up to date, or for those of you who came in late, David is the young man who worked as a telemarketer for Norvergence; got fired or quit (who knows, and not my business anyway) and sent messages which frankly, besmirched the reputation of that fine, outstanding company. Norvergence said they would sue, and apparently started action against David. They also blustered (and that's all it was) about suing your Esteemed Moderator as well, but after I printed that package of public relations stuff they sent me about all their satisfied and happy customers, I did not hear any more from them. I guess Norvergence agreed to drop the suit against David as well, if he would 'diligently' make an effort to remove what they deemed were his slanderous attacks on them from their *SACRED* positions on the net. So, David, you can tell Norvergence that you did try diligently to wipe off the restroom stall known as 'Usenet' but your valiant efforts were in vain. The stench and the illiterate scribbles just won't go away. Sorry about that; even my old messages (like, circa 1980-85 are still around if anyone can find them; don't ask me to show you where to look!) are still around, and you know how pleased that makes me! :( . But if it gives you any comfort, David, a hundred years from now, people will little note nor long remember what you said or did here. Me either. PAT] ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications 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. 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