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Message Digest Volume 28 : Issue 11 : "text" Format Messages in this Issue: Re: "Broadband" (was Obama's Broadband Plan) Re: termination fees, Any user reviews of the Magic Jack? Vital Signs - A Note to the Wise on MySpace Helps Teenagers' Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing Re: Restoring a 302-type telephone ====== 27 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ====== Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Patrick Townson and the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other journals or newsgroups, provided the writer's name and the Digest are included in the fair use quote. By using -any name or email address- included herein for -any- reason other than responding to an article herein, you agree to pay a hundred dollars to the recipients of the email. =========================== Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be sold or given away without explicit written consent. Chain letters, viruses, porn, spam, and miscellaneous junk are definitely unwelcome. We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands against crime. Geoffrey Welsh =========================== See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details and the name of our lawyer, and other stuff of interest. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 10:21:38 +1100 From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com> To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu Subject: Re: "Broadband" (was Obama's Broadband Plan) Message-ID: <1231629698.7077.11.camel@localhost> On Sat, Jan 10, 2009 at 02:20:52AM +0000, David Clayton wrote: > On Fri, 09 Jan 2009 17:18:06 -0500, Neal McLain wrote: > > > David Clayton asked: > > > Can someone remind me when the term "Broadband" - which is a > > *specific* description of a particular usage of technology - was > > co-opted to then cover any sort of high- speed Internet service?... > > "Broadband" was used by the cable TV industry as far back as the > mid-1970s, long before the internet existed. My first job in cable TV > was in Madison, Wisconsin. The city's circa-1974 cable TV ordinance was > grandly called "The Broadband Telecommunications Franchise Enabling > Ordinance." The "broadband" network that resulted had a capacity of 12 > TV channels plus the FM band. There wasn't enough programming available > to fill even that much capacity. Which is my point, "Broadband" is using disparate services on a common medium and can be used to provide high-speed Internet, but it is not every single way of providing a data link with speeds greater than an old voice band modem. ADSL *is* Broadband because it has the Voice service as well as the Data service on the same pair of wires - and the operation of either one is not dependant on the other. As soon as only xDSL is on that cable, it is no longer "Broadband" but "Baseband" as the one service uses the media. Using "Broadband" to describe any (and - apparently - every) high-speed Internet service is technically incorrect and really just giving into convenience at the expense of accuracy when propagated by those who should know better. I laugh whenever those with supposedly technical credentials (I forgive the politicians, they only say what they are told to) start spouting about the future of "Broadband" and mention various non-ADSL technologies, if these people can't get the basic language correct what hope have they of actually building highly technical infrastructure that relies on getting everything right? -- Regards, David. David Clayton Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Knowledge is a measure of how many answers you have, intelligence is a measure of how many questions you have. ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Jan 2009 19:55:43 -0800 (PST) From: Joseph Singer <joeofseattle@yahoo.com> To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu Subject: Re: termination fees, Any user reviews of the Magic Jack? Message-ID: <144343.16063.qm@web52703.mail.re2.yahoo.com> 9 Jan 2009 23:07:13 -0000 John Levine <johnl@iecc.com> wrote: <<For the major telcos, it is now very low, a small fraction of a cent per minute. There's still rural LECs who get multi-cent payments, but give or take the occasional "free" international forwarding or conference service, their share of the traffic is tiny. It's pretty common to find flat rate long distance plans from telcos for $20/mo, or the equivalent bundled into an overall plan. You can easily find prepaid calling cards charging 1cpm or less.>> The problem is with those "1cpm" calling cards is that they have lots of "gotchas" if you use 'em. Many have per call connection charges sometimes as much as 50 cents. And many of them hang on various fees such as weekly "maintenance" fees as well as other fees. You'll see these low rate calling cards advertised in convenience stores especially with imigrant population users. Below the "low rate" featured there will be a laundry list of conditions and fees that help to negate any real savings you could possibly have. As mentioned they will also charge exorbitant amounts for public phone access if only because they can (same rationalization that the mobile operators charge 20 cents per message for text messages if you are calling á la carte and don't have a messaging plan. ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:35:21 -0500 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu Subject: Vital Signs - A Note to the Wise on MySpace Helps Message-ID: <p06240804c58f34d21b87@[10.0.1.6]> Vital Signs A Note to the Wise on MySpace Helps By ERIC NAGOURNEY The New York Times January 6, 2009 Teenagers often use social networking sites like MySpace to post intimate personal information they come to regret, as it lets future employers (or online predators) learn about sex activity and substance abuse. Enter "Dr. Meg." When teenagers got a note from "Dr. Meg" warning them about what they had posted, many thought twice about their postings, a new study says. Dr. Meg was Dr. Megan A. Moreno, the lead author of two studies about networking sites in the January issue of Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine. ... http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/06/health/06beha.html Display of Health Risk Behaviors on MySpace by Adolescents (Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine) http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/163/1/27 Reducing At-Risk Adolescents' Display of Risk Behavior on a Social Networking Web Site (Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine) http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/163/1/35 ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 00:38:11 -0500 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu Subject: Teenagers' Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing Message-ID: <p06240805c58f35bf5313@[10.0.1.6]> Teenagers' Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing By TAMAR LEWIN The New York Times November 20, 2008 Good news for worried parents: All those hours their teenagers spend socializing on the Internet are not a bad thing, according to a new study by the MacArthur Foundation. "It may look as though kids are wasting a lot of time hanging out with new media, whether it's on MySpace or sending instant messages," said Mizuko Ito, lead researcher on the study, "Living and Learning With New Media." "But their participation is giving them the technological skills and literacy they need to succeed in the contemporary world. They're learning how to get along with others, how to manage a public identity, how to create a home page." The study, conducted from 2005 to last summer, describes new-media usage but does not measure its effects. ... http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/20/us/20internet.html ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2009 04:42:35 -0800 (PST) From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com> To: redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu Subject: Re: Restoring a 302-type telephone Message-ID: <917188.62506.qm@web112206.mail.gq1.yahoo.com> On Thursday, January 8, 2009 10:44 PM hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote: > On Thursday, Jan 1, 5:50 pm, Wes Leatherock > <wleathus@yahoo.com> wrote: >> Around 1950 I lived in a city (Konawa, Okla.) where telephone >> had either three or four digits. Area codes were just being >> introduced and mostly for operators. Most of the public had never >> heard of "area code" nor knew what the term meant. >> >> That was near the twilight days of 302 telephones. > As the 500 set was only introduced in 1950, it took quite a bit of > time for it to replace existing 302 sets in service. (A family member > had one until they rennovated their house). I suspect the Bell System > continued installing 302 sets well into the 1950s. Some were placed > in a pseudo-500 body and called a 5302. The conversion to the 5302 was intended to extend the life of the then-existing inventory for the many customers who objected to the (by then) "old fashioned" 302 sets. > In 1970 it was not unusual to find a 302 or 354 (wall) set in a home. > > In the 1950s, even into the 1960s, many smaller towns had five digit > numbers. They got a seven digit ANC number to be addressable by DDD, > but for local use continued with five digits (into the 1980s until ESS > came along). Those places obviously never had a named exchange. > > But larger towns and cities did have named exchanges, some seven > digits, a few six digits. Those names appeared on the number card. > In the older days the full name appeared, with the dialable letters in > capitals, often several points bigger than the rest of the name. In > later days for places that didn't go ANC, often only the two letters > appeared with the area code. Dallas, and I believe Houston, had five-digit numbers. Displayed as one letter and four numerals. Where I worked in Dallas in the 1950s, the number was Riverside-4085, dialed as R-4085. Wes Leatherock wleathus@yahoo.com wesrock@aol.com ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecomm- unications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to Usenet, where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. 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