From editor@telecom-digest.org Tue Nov 2 18:46:58 2004 Received: (from ptownson@localhost) by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.11.6p3/8.11.6) id iA2NkwX23367; Tue, 2 Nov 2004 18:46:58 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 18:46:58 -0500 (EST) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <200411022346.iA2NkwX23367@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 #526 TELECOM Digest Tue, 2 Nov 2004 18:45:00 EST Volume 23 : Issue 526 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future (w_tom) Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future (John McHarry) Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future (kansasman) Re: What Happened to Channel 1? (DevilsPGD) Re: New Electronic Check Law Sinks 'Float' (Isaiah Beard) Re: New Electronic Check Law Sinks 'Float' (Rick Merrill) Re: Pre-Recorded Phone Should be Illegal (BobGoudreau@nc.rr.com) Re: Pre-Recorded Phone Should be Illegal (J Kelly) 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: Tue, 02 Nov 2004 00:57:56 -0500 From: w_tom Subject: Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future Lisa unfortunately describes short term solutions as if they were long term. Long before any business school spread sheet can measure innovation, the innovation is no longer innovative. List of companies destroyed by short term thinking -- ie management concentrating on marketing -- is long. Old style business schools taught that innovation was something that fell from the clouds or was a result of capital investment. Reality. Innovation requires capital. Too much capital can even destroy innovation. Capital never created innovation. Again innovation requires capital BUT capital does not create innovation. How long does it take to develop an innovative product? Four to ten years. Any b-school graduate should have been able to answer that without hesitation. The profits that Ford Motor finally created in 1990s had almost nothing to do with the work (or marketing) in 1990. Those 1990 profits were directly traceable to work done in 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984, 1985, and 1986. Four to ten years to produce an innovative product -- even longer for the resulting profits to appear on bean counter spread sheets. Business school graduates in marketing and accounting are necessary. They are peripheral (support) functions - about 20 or 30% of the work. Unfortunately, such people are trained to think only they are source of success. The work they do today can appear on a spread sheet this year or next. That is misleading. Same thinking that nearly destroyed IBM, HP, Apple Computer, and is destroying AT&T, GM, and Kodak, and Xerox. Business school people make good employees in peripheral company operations -- accounting and marketing. But the profit comes from long term thinking -- things done 4 and many more years previous. Real profits come from innovation that business school graduates have a long history of undermining. If the CFO becomes CEO, then historically, innovation is stifled. Demonstrated repeatedly and consistently. In the meantime, cell phone technology did not happen instantly as implied. Its been ongoing since the 1960s. Each generation has been slowly picking at the land line business. Finally, a cell phone technology has emerged that does obsolete POTS landlines -- 3G cell phones. This latest cell phone finally does everything POTS phones do -- and more. No place did I say technology is instant. Furthermore your facts are too much based on yesterday's (static) prices rather than on the true cost of the service now and in the future. Again a classic business school mistake to see things in terms of spread sheets -- that report things 4 to 10 years previous rather than on current costs that will appear as prices in the years future. You cannot use costs as demonstrated to see the future. Because cell phones costs $40 per month means they will costs as much in four years? Furthermore, the typically land line now costs about $50 per month with minimal long distance usage, taxes, long distance access charges, etc. POTS line costs will not decrease. Cell phone costs will. Your business school analysis should have made that obvious. 3G phones have finally made POTS phones obsolete. Your first point -- if people only replace things when they wear out, then we all would still be using 486s. Classic error taught by some B-schools in the 1970s. Indeed, this machine is a 486-66 and it works just fine. So why did so many replace their 486s with Pentium 233s, then with Pentium II and Pentium III 500s, then with Gigahertz Pentiums? The 486s did not wear out. In industries that are more innovative, then products are replaced because they become too obsolete. In technologies with no innovation, then people do not dispose of equipment until it wears out. This is why bean counters loved to make cars that failed after 3 years -- most every 1970 MBA designed American car. In companies dominated by business school graduates -- IBM corporate that stifled their PC division -- then the company is doomed to be a loser. IBM PC business was founded by hiding the operation from IBM MBA types (Don Estridge). Once the PC business became so profitable, then those MBA types (Cannavino) conspired to control that business. Therefore drove IBM Boca Raton into the ground using business school concepts that stifled innovation. This example is repeated constantly in dying businesses. AT&T being another classic death. But to see the death, one must use product oriented thinking -- decades -- rather than business school thinking -- four year and less perspectives. Again, to respond to your 'second': somehow you think cell phones are instant technology. The cell phone has been in development since the 1960s. Those with 'dirt under fingernails' knew this. To your 'fourth': marketing is a necessary part of the business -- a peripheral part that must not dominate innovation. When marketing types became the top manager -- Young of HP, Akers and Cannavino at IBM, Spindler and Sculley at Apple, Roger Smith at GM, Henry Ford at Ford Motor, etc -- then innovation dies and the company sees the effect a decades+ later in spread sheets. Cancer created when marketing becomes more than a peripheral business function. In another example, you don't understand what Gerstner did to save IBM. IBM was foundering when he brought with him his business experts. For years, IBM did nothing. But in Jan (forgot the year) in the Wall Street Journal were the backgrounds of five people who were promoted from the ranks to be 'above' those earlier friends. Look at those five backgrounds. At least four were slam dunk examples of people who come from where the work gets done. Therefore IBM stopped calling the mainframe a dinosaur. Instead they rebuilt the entire business around the mainframe -- including support operations you have cited. Innovation was finally permitted. Therefore the mainframe began taking business from super computers. With redundant processing, the mainframe also cut into the mini-computer server business. Product oriented managers refocused on the main frame and its so many peripheral businesses. Gerstner's original MBA subordinates were replaced by those with product oriented backgrounds. That was the turn around at IBM after floundering in the first years that Gerstner arrived. I am trying to keep this short. But to understand what I have posted, one cannot take the simplistic analysis from b-school graduates. Even the Wall Street Journal summary that touches on this IBM story was multiple full pages inside. To see how product oriented thinking turned about IBM, one must be able to, for example, describe in technical detail fundamental differences between the pre-Gerstner IBM 390 and its innovative (rather than cost controlled) replacement. The devil is in that detail which is why those with technical degrees make far better managers than those with b-school education. B-school graduates routinely stifle innovation with spread sheet analysis. Two types of managers exist. Product oriented and finance oriented. Finance oriented actually think they can create innovation by throwing capital at it. If your b-school education is still teaching this, then your school still promotes an American version of communism. The B-school graduate is the key decision maker. Under communism, your roof does not leak until the top manager says so. In product oriented systems, the manager says a roof leaks when the occupant says it is leaking. In communism, everyone works for the boss. In product oriented companies, the boss works for employees. Fundamental difference between well managed verses communist companies. In the movie Apollo 13, who is the hero? Bean counters will often say the astronauts or flight director Gene Krantz. Reality: every hero has no name. This is how America works when it is productive. The management simply provides attitude and knowledge -- the strategic objective -- and the little people effectively solve problem after problem. The little people are empowered to be decision makers -- not top management. Worse, when b-school training says the manager is the problem solver, then we have communism -- centralized bureaucracy - only the trained manager can solve problems. This causes stifled innovation. Classic example of bean counter management. Every engineer said don't launch the Challenger. They could not find a single engineer to say launch. And so bean counters made a 'management decision' by not listening to engineers. Bean counter types explicitly demanded that "a management decision" be made -- because they could not think product oriented. That should have been 3rd degree murder. But too many are now brainwashed in business school concepts as to say it was an accident. It is an accident if the decision maker first had sufficient background to understand the concepts. But those who killed Challenger astronauts did so because using business school concepts (which also meet the definition of junk science reasoning) rather than good technical facts to make a decision. Those not qualified to make decisions rejected the advise of everyone who was qualified. That should be called manslaughter. They only did as they were taught in the business schools. Therefore seven died and we forgive them? Being MBA trained is power to know how the enemy thinks. Japanese call it "Made Being in America". Yes, some business school graduates do work as product oriented thinkers -- and therefore promote innovation. They use their MBA background to help drive off the anti-innovators. They fully appreciate Clayton Christensen's "Innovators Dilemma". One need only look at steel manufacturing companies (saved by an anti-innovation US president) to see the only reason for steel's continued demise. Too many business school graduates and therefore nobody could innovate. The anti-American steel companies USX (US Steel) and Bethlehem Steel still did not use electric arc furnaces some 40 years after the innovation was used by innovative (foreign) steel companies. Companies who used 'men of steel' rather than bean counters for managers. Please show me where the bean counters could justify electric arc furnaces? Instead, bean counters used MBA cost control mentality -- economy of scale. They made more obsolete blast furnaces -- just bigger. Patriotic foreign manufacturers provided US with steel because innovators innovate rather than cost control. You think AT&T was not static? They attempted how many different solutions justified by MBA concepts? They had no idea of how to put VoIP on cable. They bought cable companies based upon spread sheet analysis only to discover, after the fact, that entire cable company infrastructure was built with the wrong cable -- using cost controls to install wrong cable. For a third time, the entire cable network had to be replaced again. Any product oriented thinker could see that. But AT&T management is anti-innovative -- which means anti-American. AT&T managers did not even sufficient technical knowledge to even read the label on cable entering their own homes. AT&T did not have the capital to replace the entire network. So AT&T sold off those cable companies at a major loss. Was it a $500 million loss? You call that trying a new business? I call it classic MBA school management techniques where "a good manager can manage ANY business" ... into the ground. It gets more damning as we think more product oriented. AT&T did not comprehend packet switching concepts. Too complex. AT&T understood circuit switch technology. So they were going to provide phone service on cable using circuit switched technology! If your jaw did not drop, then your technical background is woefully insufficient. Obviously a more expensive technology with no future. But on MBA b-school educated spread sheets, circuit switched was a less 'risk adverse' technology. Classic b-school mentality which is why every new AT&T venture was flawed from the beginning. AT&T MBA trained managers never entered a new business venture with product facts. Therefore everyone failed. One need only read David Isenberger (www.isen.com), chief scientist in AT&T Bell Labs, to see how anti-innovative AT&T was even 10 and 20 years ago. Why? Robert Allen (AT&T president) was a fast tracker and Harvard Business School trained. Innovation at AT&T could not happen. Change cannot be measured on spread sheets until long after change has happened. AT&T has long been the classic example of static -- selling off businesses to remain solvent rather than innovate. AT&T is a dead company that survives only on finance games. AT&T is classic of what bean counters do to companies. The Economist said it best. No company in the history of free market economics has ever destroyed more shareholder value faster than what AT&T did to NCR. AT&T is dying because MBAs stifled innovation at AT&T for at least 25 years. The examples would be longer than this post. Only bean counter mentalities could not see this because many stifled innovations are instead blamed on straw men such as unions, unfair laws, unfair competition, under funded pension funds, etc. Why did AT&T long distance network crash across the country for one whole day? Why did they shut down NYC long distance and NYC airports on two different occasions? (Concorde had to make an emergency landing on a runway 500 feet too short because of but another AT&T network failure directly traceable to bean counter costs controls). Why did Robert Allen go before the press at 4 PM -- before failure reasons were even known - to blame unions? He was using classic business school reasoning. Blame everyone but top management. An enemy of business schools is management education that comes from product. W. E. Deming is an enemy of business schools. How did Ford Motor show profits in 1990? They eliminated the anti-innovation (therefore anti-American) bean counter Henry Ford. (Actually we the public did that by not buying American; instead buying on free market concepts such as Toyota and BMW.) Therefore Ford began scrapping their every anti America cars. First car designed by 'car-guys' in Ford since the 1965 Mustang? 1987 Ford Taurus. First car since 1965 designed by people who come from where the work gets done. Bean counters were demoted to jobs they do best - support the innovators. Cost controls were replaced with innovation - which is why new Fords on and after Taurus cost less to build. By replacing cost controls with innovation (Quality is Job One), Ford went from new bankruptcy to record profits in something under 20 years. Quality is Job One -- means W. E. Deming management principles replaced business school myths. People with 'dirt under their fingernails' replaced cost controlling bean counters. Cost controls make short term cost reductions and long term major cost increases. (Same principle proven by Iacocca in Chrysler.) Business school graduates only see those cost reductions many years after the fact -- long after innovation has reduced those costs. I come from where the work gets done. Have seen business school graduates stifle innovation routinely - and deny they were doing so. Why? They had short term perspectives (spread sheets) and could not see innovation, because innovation takes upwards of a decade. And then more years for such innovations to appear on spread sheets. Where companies are in trouble, then use a Deming concept to see why. 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. When management says there is plenty of blame to go around, then management is 100% responsible for the failures. In AT&T and other anti-innovative companies, top management routinely blamed anyone but management. Look at the background of that management. They are trained as MBAs or lawyers -- have no experience in the core business. No wonder innovation could not happen (Same reason why First Energy almost made a Three Mile Island event in Toledo, electric shocked people in swimming pools in Ocean County NJ, failed to provide electricity to Jersey shore boardwalk concessions on multiple, consecutive weekends including 4 July, and created the entire NE blackout.) They believed a b-school mantra -- a good manager can manage any business -- which means innovation is then stifled. It is not a 'longshot' when the man has 'dirt under his fingernails'. He has the experience and technical knowledge to know. B-school graduates who could not see same instead call that a 'longshot'. 'Longshot' without much hope in success is virtually everything AT&T tried -- because AT&T management is b-school trained. Their cable purchases at excessive price, reasons for nation wide and multiple NYC long distance blackouts, destroying the management concepts that once made the Bell Labs so successful, or what they did to Unix are but classic examples of anti-innovation thinking. But then AT&T management -- business school trainees -- will deny this. They instead blamed others. Classic bean counter thinking. Myopic thinking not to see fiber as the future for landline companies. In fact, if land line companies do not hurry (because they are 10 years late), their future will be radically diminished by the lesser technologies such as cable companies. If you don't think so, then please put up facts that demonstrate otherwise. Show us how business school thinking can see the future of technology - see the future by using spread sheet analysis. The future of landline companies is clear if one has 'dirt under the fingernails'. Please show us -- using specific product examples and b-school concepts -- where another technology would save the baby Bells. An outright challenge to bean counters. Show us another technology that could save the baby Bells from going down like AT&T. Lisa Hancock wrote: > w_tom wrote: >> Common mistake when predictions are based upon business school >> concepts rather than first learning the details. > While some of what you say is true, I must disagree with other > parts. Business school concepts definitely have their place. >> Third generation cell phone technology has finally made standard >> (POTS) phones obsolete. > "Technology" is not _instant_. Just because a new technology is > perfected does not mean other technologies are "obsolete". A lot of > technocrats are so enamoured with new stuff they fail to understand > the big picture. > First, it takes time to implement new technology. For example, a > great many people out there do not have cell phones nor wish to have > one. Others have them but use them only for emergencies and have > $15/month plans. Many people get something new only when their > existing machine wears out; not everyone is enamored with the "latest > and greatest". > Secondly, new technologies must mature. Things are improving, but > many cell phone users get cutoff in mid conversation. When compact > discs were first introduced, their sound and operation needed tweaking > to get widespread acceptance so serious listeners would replace their > vinyl. > Third, new technologies have a new cost that not all consumers are > willing -- nor should -- have to pay. A consumer perfectly happy with > POTS service should not have to pay the $40/month for cell phone > service. An occassional $15/month emergency-only cell phone user > likewise shouldn't be forced to upgrade. The computer manufacturers > finally learned that people weren't so ready to upgrade their PCs so > often. > Fourth, the implementation and marketing of technology is critical. > Dilbert might make fun of the marketing types, but they are necessary. > The genius of Edison was not in the light bulb, but rather a whole > power generation and distribution network to make the light bulbs work > and earn money from them. >> The baby Bells are not dominated by myopic MBA managers whose >> education literally destroys both innovation and what little remains >> of AT&T. AT&T management has a static perspective because they view >> from anti-innovative B-school concepts. If AT&T still ran the baby >> Bells, then Nokia's predictions would have merit. But baby Bells >> (about 10 years too late) suddenly realized that they too will go >> the way of the anti-innovation AT&T. Baby Bells are finally, after >> more than 50 years, rewiring their entire network. > Being an "MBA manager" is neither good nor bad in itself. Sure, one > could point to plenty of very successful businessmen who had an 8th > grade education, just as one could point to 3-pack-a-day smokers who > lived to be 105. But most business people make good use of skills > taught in business school. > I don't agree on AT&T being "static" at all. Their management tried > quite a few different avenues, they just didn't work out, it was not > for lack of trying. Guessing wrong does not make a company "myopic", > hindsight is always 20/20, foresight is not. Over history, many > 'wrong' business predictions were perfectly reasonable and logical at > the time they were made. > When a businessman takes a longshot and wins, people call him > "shrewd". If his longshot loses, people call him other less > complimentary things. We read about the success stories with great > fanfare, but not about the many more losers. > Baby Bells most certainly did NOT wait "50 years" to rewire their > networks. A lot of people believe -- wrongly -- that the phone > network at the time of divesture was all ancient. True, some of it > was, but a very great deal of it was state of the art for its day. > Bell Atlantic was 100% ESS after divesture, and shortly later was 100% > digital, just to give an example. Trunks between offices were > advanced high capacity. >> But don't expect mobiles to replace land line just as IBM found new >> purpose in their core businesses (once IBM replaced their MBAs with >> computer guys, then IBM rediscovered innovation meaning that a main >> frame is no longer a dinosaur). > While agree mobiles won't replace totally land lines, there are a > couple of errors here. What I expect is that mobile were supplement > land lines. A suburban family with teenagers that might have had two > or even three voice lines in the house may get by with a single line, > and use cell phones for the rest. > As to IBM, IBM did not go back to its "core business", nor did it > replace its MBAs with computer guys. Actually, IBM has reduced its > core business -- manufacturing and selling computers -- and wisely > supplemented it with consulting and service bureau work which was once > a small subsidiary. The "computer guys" didn't make this transition, > but rather an outsider, the former head of Nabisco (Gerstner sp?). I > don't know if he had an MBA or not, but I think he did. >> Devil is always in the details which means the manager must have 'dirt >> under his fingernails'. > That is true. >> Without a long detailed list of advantages and disadvantages for >> each technology combined with a list of future markets and >> innovations, then one can only make predictions like business school >> graduates and that BBC article. > Not true. Predicting the future, whether it be the tomorrow's weather > or markets for new technologies, is always a gamble. There are always > variables that are a guess, plus variables no one expects. >> These latter people routinely stifle innovation because they don't >> have education from where innovation happens. Spread sheets and >> marketing mentalities are important peripheral parts of business; >> but only with a short term perspective. > Without a "marketing mentality", innovation is worthless. Without > a good cost/pricing strategy, products cannot be manufacturered nor > services provided. Having technology without a way to get it in the > hands of customers is worthless. The Watson father/son didn't know > squat about any technology, but they knew marketing. The ENIAC-Univac > people were experts in technology, but didn't know squat about > marketing. It didn't take long for IBM, using its marketing skills, > to quickly surpass ENIAC-UNIVAC's way superior tech skills. >> To see the future of land lines with a long term perspective, one >> must apply knowledge and experience of the technology. > Yes and no. In the late 1970s, the "knowledge and experience" of > computers was using punch cards as an input medium. Note that when > more modern gear (ie key-to-disk, on-line terminals, PC-DOS) replaced > the punch card, they kept the principles -- 80 column screen, auto > numeric shift, 'drum card' field setup, etc. That's what the technies > were used to. > But the techies were wrong! It turned out that the future belonged to > something entirely new -- the GUI screens and Windows that had no > connection to the punch card style whatsoever. >> Any land line company that intends to be alive in 10 years will have >> replaced or duplicated their entire network in fiber -- and learned >> new products based upon the new demands of that technology. > Who knows if fibre will be dominant in ten years? > Keep in mind there's an excess today of fibre capacity; that means > some companies that built fibre networks are losing money from lack of > use. > Don't ask me why, but Picturephone service never caught on, while cell > phones cameras and text messaging are very popular with kids. > (Punching in text on a tiny phone keypad seems ludicrous, but they > love it.) >> Standard technologies potentially on the chopping block: faxes, >> portable phones, conventional dial up phones, international shortwave >> broadcasting, and maybe even conventional letters. > It takes an awful lot for a technology to become truly discontinued. > What usually happens is that an older technology remains in use, but > yields market share to newer technologies. They still make > typewriters for example, but most such work is done on computers now. > Further, older technologies may offer a backup. (Yes, there are some > exceptions). >> Any Baby Bell that uses the bean counter concepts of cost controls >> is doomed just like Western Union and AT&T. > "Beans" are basic to a business. If you don't count your beans, you > will go out of business. ------------------------------ From: John McHarry Subject: Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future Date: Mon, 01 Nov 2004 22:41:53 GMT Organization: EarthLink Inc. -- http://www.EarthLink.net Lisa Hancock wrote: OK, up to here: > Fourth, the implementation and marketing of technology is critical. > Dilbert might make fun of the marketing types, but they are necessary. > The genius of Edison was not in the light bulb, but rather a whole > power generation and distribution network to make the light bulbs work > and earn money from them. I think the generation and distribution network was where he blew it. He championed relatively low voltage DC over Tesla's AC system, which won out. Of course, the Swan/Edison incandescent light doesn't much care. ------------------------------ From: dog4dogg@yahoo.com (kansasman) Subject: Re: Home Phones Face Uncertain Future Date: 1 Nov 2004 14:23:27 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com John Levine wrote in message news:: >> What do land lines provide? Security. Predictable service. Almost >> unlimited bandwidth. ... Virtually every building in these towns >> are being rewired with direct fiber optic cables -- from CO to every >> building. That means VoIP, massive data transfers, security, the >> reliability not provided, yet, by cell phones, and a host of other >> yet to be discovered features. > Fiber has bandwidth, but unlike copper, it can't power the phones. An > important parts of the reliability of POTS is that the phones are > powered from the phone line, so you don't depend on the power company > or batteries. > John R. Levine, IECC, POB 727, Trumansburg NY 14886 +1 607 330 5711 > johnl@iecc.com, Mayor, http://johnlevine.com, > Member, Provisional board, Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-mail That is very true, but in my house, we only keep one POTS phone (no batteries, local service) near the bed, and then rely on SunRocket VoIP the rest of the time. We are saving so much more money by not paying for regional and national phone plans, and we do not have to wait until 5 or 7p.m. when the rates go down. We also do not have to wait until 8p.m. when our cell calls are free. It just means more flexibility and organization. I love that my VoIP calls and e-mail all come to one centralized place. ------------------------------ From: DevilsPGD Subject: Re: What Happened to Channel 1? Date: Tue, 02 Nov 2004 01:21:19 -0700 Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com In message Neal McLain wrote: >> As for the channel 4 issue, my guess as to why Cable One isn't using >> it now is that they used to use it for a premium channel such as HBO >> using negative traps (which remove the signal of a given channel or >> group of adjacent channels), and they moved HBO to another analog >> channel or to digital and left channel 4 idle because reusing it for >> something else would require visiting the homes of all current >> customers who don't have HBO to remove traps ... > Good point. I've known this to happen in other cable systems as well. > However, I still think that in the specific case at hand, the > Coffeyville TV station was probably the primary reason for not using > cable channel 4. Given that channel 4 is subject to interference from > a television station (even a weak one like W04EJ), it seems unlikely > that the cable company would have used that channel for an important > service like HBO or Showtime. Could it be that there wasn't a conflict at that time? Channel 4 isn't used for anything important here, just text news last time I checked, but the picture is clear and sharp. HAM AND EGGS: A day's work for a chicken; A lifetime commitment for a pig ------------------------------ From: Isaiah Beard Subject: Re: New Electronic Check Law Sinks 'Float' Date: Tue, 02 Nov 2004 10:57:16 -0500 DevilsPGD wrote: >> Quite the reverse actually. If they send the check along >> electronically, then the original is destroyed. > Interesting -- So if I say I wrote a different dollar value on the > cheque, and the electronic copy isn't sufficient to provide proof one > way or the other, does the transfer of funds get reversed? Not sure I understand. The digital copy is going to be an electronic check image (similar in nature to what you get in online banking tools today). Basically a scanned black and white copy of the check you wrote. Do you mean what would happen if the check image wasn't of sufficient quality to be readable? I do know that the new law offers provisions where a bank must credit funds while a dispute and investigation are pending. And I would guess that if the image isn't usable or clear enough to figure out what happened, they would treat the situation as if a physical check had somehow been mutilated beyond recognition in transit (does anyone know how banks handle such a situation? I can imagine it has to have happened at somepoint). > Nothing is fool-proof to a sufficiently talented fool. I agree. It's going to be interesting. I have a check card and occasionally use electronic bill payment, but I used to prefer sending a check out in the mail to pay bills. Not because of float, but because I liked the idea that a physical, tangible paper copy of my payment was available, as well as a physical endorsement acknowledging receipt of payment on the same piece of paper, in case there was ever any dispute. Now, there's no guarantee of even that. So I guess I'll be using my Visa check card for bill payments for a while, since it claims zero liability in disputes. At least that'll be the case for a few months, until any bugs with the new check clearing system is ironed out. E-mail fudged to thwart spammers. Transpose the c's and a's in my e-mail address to reply. ------------------------------ From: Rick Merrill Subject: Re: New Electronic Check Law Sinks 'Float' Organization: Comcast Online Date: Tue, 02 Nov 2004 17:50:29 GMT DevilsPGD wrote: > Isaiah Beard wrote: >>>> IF these images were accessed it would give criminals access to an >>>> image of the customer's signature. Said criminal could then use a >>>> laser printer with 640 dpi resolution to print checks that would be >>>> indistinguishable from the photo check after a 240 dpi Scan!? >>> I'm curious, is there a requirement that the bank which accepted the >>> cheque store it for any period of time? >> Quite the reverse actually. If they send the check along >> electronically, then the original is destroyed. > Interesting -- So if I say I wrote a different dollar value on the > cheque, and the electronic copy isn't sufficient to provide proof one > way or the other, does the transfer of funds get reversed? Hopefully you have your record (or write once) copy. The thing is, would you notice if the check was changed from 10 to 100$? Many people do not check that closely. - RM ------------------------------ From: BobGoudreau@withheld on request Subject: Re: Pre-Recorded Phone Should be Illegal Date: Tue, 2 Nov 2004 11:14:50 -0500 [Please remove my email address. Steve Sobol wrote: > Lisa Hancock wrote: >> I know election phone calls are legal. >> However, I think pre-recorded phone calls, of any kind, should be >> illegal. > Me too. Not me. I actually find the prerecorded announcement calls that we choose to receive weekly from my kids' schools to be useful. I hope that you didn't literally mean "pre-recorded phone calls, of any kind", since there are plenty of cases where people actually WANT to receive such calls and make arrangements to do so. Perhaps you actually meant "UNSOLICITED pre-recorded phone calls, of any kind". Even then (and leaving aside the constitutional issues of political speech raised by campaign calls) it's not completely black and white, since I can envision various emergency scenarios (storm evacuation, water contamination, armed-and-dangerous suspect at large, etc) where public safety might be aided via mass robo-calls to the affected areas. Bob Goudreau Cary, NC ------------------------------ From: J Kelly Subject: Re: Pre-Recorded Phone Should be Illegal Date: Tue, 02 Nov 2004 13:28:08 -0600 Organization: http://newsguy.com Reply-To: jkelly@newsguy.com On Mon, 01 Nov 2004 18:06:12 -0600, J Kelly wrote: > On 31 Oct 2004 19:43:19 -0800, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com (Lisa Hancock) > wrote: >> In this election season, I have been BOMBARDED with pre-recorded phone >> calls pitching various candidates, flooding my answering machine. >> I know election phone calls are legal. >> However, I think pre-recorded phone calls, of any kind, should be >> illegal. >> The constant ringing of the phone this year was terribly annoying. >> If it had been last year, it would've been devastating. Last year at >> this time I was caring for a seriously ill person and was ill myself. >> I was in frequent touch with doctors, phamarcies, nurses, and >> families. I had to keep the phone open and answer all calls. >> To a healthy person, the constant ringing was terribly annoying. I >> would've gone out of my mind last year. >> When you're in bad pain, a ringing telephone is not a pleasant thing. >> BTW, I also received several live calls urging a deceased member of >> family to go vote, even though that person was removed from the >> election rolls quite some time ago. [In hindsight I wish I requested >> they come and assist that person to the polls.] >> When I go to the polls Tuesday, I will talk to the politicians (the >> people who stand outside and give out leaflets). I will ask them for >> their home phone numbers, but I have a funny feeling they, for some >> strange reason, won't give them to me. > I wish they would send valid Caller ID also. I get a LOT of calls > from "Dir Asst Iowa" at 515-555-4143. Almost all of them are the > Governors office begging me to please vote for Democrats. Also had at > least 20 calls from 000-000-0000 and 10 or so from 111-111-1111. > One guy did send valid CID, and it was his home phone number. > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The poor devil; probably just a hapless > volunteer working for some candidate he likes; but refreshing to see, > wasn't it? Makes you feel like voting for his candidate. PAT] Pat, it was the CANDIDATES home number. I called to bitch at them to stop calling me and I get the families answering machine at home! I hung up figuring if he has the balls to put in his actual home number, than I'll let him call and tele-spam me. I did actually vote for him even though he is in the 'wrong' party. ------------------------------ 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. 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