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  The Telecom Digest for February 28, 2011
Volume 30 : Issue 51 : "text" Format

Messages in this Issue:

Re: Verizon/GTE/Bell Atlantic/etc. (was VeriZon Screwed Me) (Lisa or Jeff)
Re: Verizon FIOS(Rich Greenberg)
Re: Abuse Suspects, Your Calls Are Taped. Speak Up.(Adam H. Kerman)

====== 29 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======

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Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2011 19:07:27 -0800 (PST)
From: Lisa or Jeff <hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Verizon/GTE/Bell Atlantic/etc. (was VeriZon Screwed Me)   
Message-ID: <5a4c67ac-7bc8-4f61-80a2-279a6c3f9559@n16g2000prc.googlegroups.com>

On Feb 26, 12:13 pm, "Mark J. Cuccia" <markjcuc...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Bell Atlantic (which now included former NYNEX) and GTE (what still
> remained of it, and which since 1990/91 included what remained of the
> former Contel) announced on Monday 27-July-1998 their intent to merge.

> Prior to the effective date of the BA/GTE merger for the landline
> sides, the WIRELESS sides merged, which also included some other
> wireless licenses in the US as well as Vodafone in the UK and Europe.

History--Bell Atlantic is the "Baby Bell" formed at Divesture of
several phone companies in the mid-Atlantic region.  Nynex was the
"Baby Bell" formed of companies in the New York area.  Prior to
Divesture, Bell of Pennsylvania, New Jersey Bell, and Diamond State
Telephone (Delaware, operated as part of Bell of PA) all had good or
excellent service quality.  New York Telephone wasn't so good.  I
don't know the historical quality of New England area telephone
service.

Service quality in "Independent" telephone companies, such as GTE (the
biggest) and others, varied quite a bit.  Some companies had poorly
maintained step switches and poor service quality.  As mentioned, many
of the smaller Independents merged or were bought out by larger
companies.  A 'swapping' occured where various companies bought/sold
exchanges so as to have a contiguous service area instead of a
checkerboard.

GTE owned the Automatic Electric company which was a large equipment
manufacturer.  Part of their business was private internal school and
industrial telephone systems.

Anyway, prior to the mergers, Bell Atlantic and Nynex merged their
wireless operations.  My first cell phone came from their merged
operation.  Back then I had to pay a separate bill.  Today it is
combined on my landline bill and I get a slight discount for doing so.

As far as I know, the wireless operation was always a subsidiary unit
and remains so to this day.  To me, it always operated under a
different and inferior philosophy than the pre-divesture traditional
telephone company.  IMHO, their customer service and marketing
integrity could use a lot of improvement, but then they say the other
wireless carriers are worse.

Curiously, the fine print on bill inserts and the stamp on the back of
payment checks still said the "Bell Telephone Company of Pennsylvania"
until just a few years ago.  Now they do not bother to return a
payment check but merely electronically acknowledge it, as other large
organizations are doing.

Sorry to nitpick, but the company name is spelled "Verizon".

An observation about Verizon's FIOS:  unlike traditional land lines,
FIOS requires external power to work.  It has a backup battery, but it
only lasts for a few hours.  Some storm-caused power failures last
longer than the battery supply.  To me that is a major reliability
downside.  I suffered a recent power failure and I realized I would've
been without telephone service, when I needed it, had I had FIOS
service instead of a traditional landline.




Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2011 18:46:38 +0000 (UTC)
From: richgr@panix.com (Rich Greenberg)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Verizon FIOS   
Message-ID: <ike66d$mfc$1@reader1.panix.com>

In article <5a4c67ac-7bc8-4f61-80a2-279a6c3f9559@n16g2000prc.googlegroups.com>,
Lisa or Jeff  <hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com> wrote:

>An observation about Verizon's FIOS:  unlike traditional land lines,
>FIOS requires external power to work.  It has a backup battery, but it
>only lasts for a few hours.  Some storm-caused power failures last
>longer than the battery supply.  To me that is a major reliability
>downside.  I suffered a recent power failure and I realized I would've
>been without telephone service, when I needed it, had I had FIOS
>service instead of a traditional landline.

I had FIOS installed when I moved into my current house last May, And I
specificaly asked the installer about that.  He responded that many
users who woried about such things had installed large capacity UPS's to
backup the small built in one.  I may do so, but haven't as yet.  Both
my wife & I have cellphones (and car chargers for them) and one car is
normally in the garage, only a few feet from the verizon node, and I can
run an (already prepared) jumper from the car battery to the Verizon
box.

-- 
Rich Greenberg  Sarasota, FL, USA richgr atsign panix.com  + 1 941 378 2097
Eastern time.  N6LRT  I speak for myself & my dogs only.    VM'er since CP-67
Canines: Val, Red, Shasta, Zero & Casey (At the bridge)        Owner:Chinook-L
Canines: Red & Cinnar (Siberians)  Retired at the beach  Asst Owner:Sibernet-L

***** Moderator's Note *****

The key is to have the jumper cable ready in advance: a car battery
will power a FiOS terminal for many times as long as the built-in
backup. 

Of course, when the outage is over, you'll want to start the car ...

Bill Horne
Moderator




Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2011 20:55:41 +0000 (UTC)
From: "Adam H. Kerman" <ahk@chinet.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Abuse Suspects, Your Calls Are Taped. Speak Up. 
Message-ID: <ikedod$fh$3@news.albasani.net>

Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote:

>Abuse Suspects, Your Calls Are Taped. Speak Up.

>By WILLIAM GLABERSON
>February 25, 2011

Uh, Monty, instead of just using the headline on Subject, you might have
clarified that there are no privacy implications. A prisoner in custody
or jail has zero privacy. Telephone conversations have always been
overheard.

***** Moderator's Note *****

I think the difference is digital recording technology. In the analog
age, taping a prisoner's phone calls was expensive and time-consuming,
and thus hard on prison budgets. Ergo, many cons knew that the chances
of being recorded were actually fairly low.

Now, an entire PRI can be dumped to disk in near-real-time, and made
available through the cloud to prosecuters tens or hundreds of miles
away. It's not that prisoners are careless on the phone - by
definition, they are careless people - it's that the recordings are
finally being used.

Bill Horne
Moderator





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