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The Telecom Digest for April 30, 2010 Volume 29 : Issue 119 : "text" Format Messages in this Issue: Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies (Bob Goudreau) April 2010 NANPA Exhaust Projections; KY 270/364 Split (Mark J. Cuccia) Photos ot Table Top Phone Co. (Sam Spade) Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies (Carl Navarro) Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies (Neal McLain) Your Phone Is Locked. Just Drive. (Monty Solomon) FCC cellphone safety notice (Thad Floryan) ====== 28 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: Wed, 28 Apr 2010 23:01:43 -0400 From: "Bob Goudreau" <BobGoudreau@nc.rr.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies Message-ID: <461654C7BFCD47918D0683102283EFD4@meng.lab.emc.com> T <kd1s.nospam@cox.nospam.net> wrote: >> A year ago, I wrote about how Cablevision, my cable company, had >> quietly begun installing Wi-Fi hot spots all over its market area: >> New York, New Jersey and Connecticut. These hot spots began popping >> up in all the public areas: shopping centers, main streets, train >> stations, parks, marinas and sports complexes. The best part: these >> hot spots are free to anyone who subscribes to Internet service from >> Cablevision at home. > > Thus far I've seen no evidence of Cox doing anythng like this in my > area. They may just get beat to the punch by Clear Wireless though I > don't like the fact that Clear makes you use THEIR device and not > WiFI. That last comment is a bit unreasonable. Do you also object to the fact that your cell company makes you use THEIR device instead of supporting the cordless phone you may have at home? The situations are very similar: both WiFi and cordless phones use technologies that are very short-range (hundreds of feet) and hence require zillions of little transceiver devices in order to blanket a large geographic area with coverage. To provide neighborhood or metropolitan levels of coverage, Clear has to deploy an entirely different kind of technology (WiMax instead of WiFi), just as the cellcos have to use CDMA or GSM instead of the more limited technology found in cordless phones. The cablecos already have zillions of little access points in the territories they cover (cable pedestals typically serve only a few houses apiece), so they have an obvious place to install WiFi access points. Bob Goudreau Cary, NC Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2010 21:00:34 -0700 (PDT) From: "Mark J. Cuccia" <markjcuccia@yahoo.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: April 2010 NANPA Exhaust Projections; KY 270/364 Split Message-ID: <779253.64204.qm@web31103.mail.mud.yahoo.com> On Wednesday evening, 28-April-2010, NeuStar-NANPA uploaded the latest issue of their semi-annual NANP and NPA Exhaust Projections, known as the NRUF, Number Resource Utilization Forms. There are two PDF reports, each can be downloaded from: http://www.nationalnanpa.com/reports/reports_nruf.html There is the April 2010 NPA Exhaust Analysis file: http://www.nationalnanpa.com/pdf/NRUF/April_2010_NPA_Exhaust_Projections.pdf And the April 2010 NANP Exhaust Analysis file: http://www.nationalnanpa.com/pdf/NRUF/April_2010_NANP_Exhaust_Analysis.pdf These reports used to be annually issued, and were once known as the COCUS, Central Office Code Utilization Survey (dating back to the old Bell System days -- AT&T-Headquarters and Long-Lines put together annual COCUS reports from the BOCs/LECs as far back as the 1970s if not even earlier! NeuStar-NANPA and the rest of the industry began calling these reports the NRUF around 2000 or so, and then they became twice-a-year around 2004, in April/May, and in October/November. The NANP exhaust report for April 2010 shows that the NANP is anticipated to "exhaust" its 10-digit format, i.e., its supply of assignable 3-digit area codes, "beyond 2040". The October 2009 report indicated "beyond 2039" as its projection for "complete" NANP exhaust. The NPA exhaust report shows individual NPAs for all US jurisdictions, and also for Canada (all Canadian provinces and NPAs are simply referred to as "Canada", almost "as if" Canada were a "single state"), but the NON US NANP-Caribbean is not included in the NPA exhaust report. Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands in the Caribbean, as well as Guam, the Northern Marianas/Saipan, and American Samoa, in the Pacific, are included, since these are all "US" jurisdictions. Nothing much is "earth shattering" when comparing the previous NPA exhaust report from October 2009, with the current one of April 2010. Most "imminent" exhaust projections are about the same, or else are pushed out one or two quarters. Some of the Canadian NPA anticipated to exhaust, however, have been pushed "earlier", by several quarters, i.e., a few years, when compared to what they had been projected in last Fall's report, but the CRTC and CNA have recently issued reports as to specific scheduled dates for OVERLAYS on these Canadian NPAs, see some of my posts in the past few weeks. The forthcoming Kentucky 270/364 split has been pushed FURTHER OUT by just over a year from what it had previously had been projected to exhaust! This is not surprising, since the KY 270/364 split has been re-scheduled several times now, always pushed further into the future, ever since the KY-PSC approved the split back in late May 2007. At that time, the KY-PSC ordered a 270/364 split in western KY, with the "far west" changing to 364, and points to the east yet still in the western half of Kentucky to retain 270, permissive for April 2008, mandatory for October 2008. However, within weeks (mid-June-2007), the KY-PSC revised its order, this time for permissive being moved out to July 2008 and mandatory "TBD". And there have been several postponements ever since, all of them having mandatory "TBD". Presently, permissive dialing in a 270/364 western Kentucky area code split is for 29-October-2011, and mandatory "TBD". It is quite likely that this date will be pushed out even further, yet again! The KY 270/364 pending relief does seem to parallel what happened in the Salt Lake City UT Metro 801/385 area code relief. In the latter part of 2000, the UT-PSC ordered a DIS-contiguous split of 801, the northern and southern end suburbs/exurbs of SLC Metro would have split to 385, with SLC itself retaining 801, permissive on 31-December-2000, mandatory on 30-June-2001. But within weeks of this announced start of permissive dialing, the UT-PSC began postponing the permissive/mandatory dates. They postponed the implementation dates several times, and by Spring or Summer 2004, they announced that the 801/385 split was postponed "indefinitely, until further notice". The last "announced" permissive date would have been March 2005, the last "announced" mandatory date would have been September 2005. The telco industry had originally requested an 801/385 NPA overlay for the SLC UT metro area though. By Spring 2007, the telco industry appealed to the UT-PSC for the originally requested 801/385 area code OVERLAY, which was granted by the UT-PSC in Summer 2007, for implementation by February/March 2009, which is what has taken place. And there ARE several "POTS" 385-NXX c.o.codes which have since been assigned and activated, with actual customers' line-numbers on those 385-NXX codes! I am hopeful that the same will ultimately happen with western KY's 270/364, that the KY-PSC will eventually revise its previous decision, and instead order a 270/364 area code OVERLAY in western Kentucky, for whatever date it will actually need to become effective. NOTE that 270 split from 502 back in April 1999 (permissive). THAT was ORIGINALLY approved by the KY-PSC back in 1998 as an OVERLAY. But the KY-PSC subsequently "chickened-out", and reversed the overlay, instead ordering the 1999 502/270 area code split. Back in 2008/08, however, several previously approved area code splits were changed to overlays and implemented as such -- the 801/385 Utah relief mentioned above, and also West Virginia 304/681, California's 818/747 (originally announced as a split back in 1999, implementation dates always had been "TBD", revived in 2006/07 and approved for 2009 as an overlay), and California's 760/442 in the eastern edge of California along the borders with Nevada and Arizona, extending into some exurbs and suburbs of the extended Los Angeles Metro area, as well as suburbs of the San Diego Metro area. In the 760/442 relief, it was originally approved as a SPLIT to be implemented back in 2000/01, with the San Diego suburbs changing to 442 with everything else 760 retaining 760. This was put on hold before it could have been implemented. During 2006/07, it was revived, the telco industry desiring an overlay, but the CA-PUC voting for the original split, to take effect during 2008/09. But after an active grass-roots campaign of residents, businesses, local governments, etc. including the US Navy in the San Diego area, the CA-PUC instead canceled the split and instead ordered an overlay for 2009/10. So, hopefully, the KY-PSC can be persuaded to change 270/364 from a (pending) split, into an overlay, as well! Mark J. Cuccia markjcuccia at yahoo dot com Lafayette LA, formerly of New Orleans LA pre-Katrina Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 03:53:36 -0700 From: Sam Spade <sam@coldmail.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Photos ot Table Top Phone Co. Message-ID: <IuednbVpYb6t-ETWnZ2dnUVZ_uudnZ2d@giganews.com> Resubmission because prior submission didn't have a subject line and thus, could be easily overlooked. Photos of the world headquarters facilities of Table Top Telephone Company in Ajo, Arizone. For those of you who didn't follow the earlier thread this is a "micro" independent scattered a several widely separated locations in Arizona, each of which has a No 5 ESS: http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop5-1.jpg http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop4.jpg http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop3.jpg http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop3.jpg http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop2.jpg http://i935.photobucket.com/albums/ad198/telepole/tabletop1.jpg Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 07:18:42 -0400 From: Carl Navarro <cnavarro@wcnet.org> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies Message-ID: <shqit55gg99ito9ieh88cbbkbn62mms4so@4ax.com> On Wed, 28 Apr 2010 05:40:00 -0700 (PDT), "harold@hallikainen.com" <harold@hallikainen.com> wrote: >I really think anyone offering "last mile" Internet connectivity >should be doing something like this. It'd be really easy to do. Just >give all your customers a wireless router like that used by >http://www.fon.com . It sets up a private wireless network and a >public one. Your cable, DSL, or whatever, would provide the Internet >connectivity. If you are away from home, all you have to do is be near >another subscriber and use the public wireless on their router. Data >could be prioritized to give the most bandwidth to the private side of >the network (the one who is actually paying for the connection). This >sort of roaming would be very beneficial to users and would help sell >the ISP service. Now why would I want to do this? My broadband service and speed is based on what I personally use, and I found that even in my cul-de-sac there are neighbors who used to use my broadband while I was on vacation :-) Here's a thought http://www.open-mesh.com/store/ everybody get one, and the "don't haves" can have free Wi-fi. Mus' be a political thing...... Carl Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 05:18:11 -0700 (PDT) From: Neal McLain <nmclain@annsgarden.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: A Convenient, Mysterious Service From Cable Companies Message-ID: <8b93e2c5-61fc-4220-bbd3-0e28d46accc7@y36g2000yqm.googlegroups.com> On Apr 29, 6:18 am, Carl Navarro <cnava...@wcnet.org> wrote: > On Wed, 28 Apr 2010 05:40:00 -0700 (PDT), "har...@hallikainen.com" > > <har...@hallikainen.com> wrote: > >I really think anyone offering "last mile" Internet connectivity > >should be doing something like this. It'd be really easy to do. Just > >give all your customers a wireless router like that used by > >http://www.fon.com. It sets up a private wireless network and a > >public one. Your cable, DSL, or whatever, would provide the Internet > >connectivity. If you are away from home, all you have to do is be near > >another subscriber and use the public wireless on their router. Data > >could be prioritized to give the most bandwidth to the private side of > >the network (the one who is actually paying for the connection). This > >sort of roaming would be very beneficial to users and would help sell > >the ISP service. > > Now why would I want to do this? My broadband service and speed is > based on what I personally use, and I found that even in my cul-de-sac > there are neighbors who used to use my broadband while I was on > vacation :-) Here's a thought http://www.open-mesh.com/store/ > everybody get one, and the "don't haves" can have free Wi-fi. > > Mus' be a political thing...... > > Carl In areas with overhead plant, CATV operators can provide wifi with strand-mounted access points such as: www.nortel.com/solutions/optical/collateral/nn108640.pdf Neal McLain Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 09:22:02 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Your Phone Is Locked. Just Drive. Message-ID: <p0624082ec7ff384d4a4d@[10.0.1.4]> Your Phone Is Locked. Just Drive. By DAVID POGUE April 28, 2010 The statistics on distracted driving are pretty scary. Just making cellphone calls increases your chances of crashing by four times; sending text messages increases the risk 23 times. We know this, we get this, but we keep doing it. About half of all teenagers admit to texting while driving, for example, no matter how many statistics and horror stories we pass along to them. If you're a concerned parent or employer, therefore, you may want to consider fighting technology with technology. There's a new category of cellphone apps made just for this purpose: text blockers like iZup, tXtBlocker, CellSafety and ZoomSafer. When your car is in motion, they lock up your phone so you can't text, call, e-mail or surf the Web. How do they know when you're driving? They rely on your phone's GPS to calculate your speed. If it's more than five or 10 miles an hour, it's pretty clear that you're no longer walking. (You could be riding your bicycle, of course. But come to think of it, that's probably not a great time to be texting, either.) You'll know when the software is in effect: your screen is covered by a "MESSAGES BLOCKED" screen. Incoming calls go directly to voice mail; incoming text messages don't appear until you stop driving. They all let you dial 911, and they all let you set up certain phone numbers in advance (like your parents') that work even when everything else is blocked. But otherwise, you quickly realize that you're wasting your time trying to bypass the blockade, and you focus on getting where you're going so you can get back to your phone. Which, of course, is the whole idea. The four apps are very similar - they all drain your battery faster, they all take a couple of minutes to "notice" that you're moving. But there are some differences, in features, philosophy and the Passenger Problem. (Which is, How can I bypass the block if I'm not the one driving?) ... http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/29/technology/personaltech/29pogue.html Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2010 15:57:33 -0700 From: Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: FCC cellphone safety notice Message-ID: <4BDA0EDD.7010506@thadlabs.com> I found the following while searching for additional info concerning cellphone interference issues: http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/mobilephone.html Even though no scientific evidence currently establishes a definite link between wireless device use and cancer or other illnesses, some parties recommend taking the precautions listed below. When considering these precautions, remember that your wireless device only emits RF energy when you are using it and that the closer the device is to you, the more energy you will absorb. Also, some parties assert that any potential health risks are probably greater for children than for adults. Finally, some experts think that low frequency magnetic fields rather than RF energy measured by the SAR possibly are responsible for any potential risk associated with wireless devices. The precautions are: * Use an earpiece or headset. While wired earpieces may conduct some energy to the head and wireless earpieces also emit a small amount of RF energy, both wired and wireless earpieces remove the greatest source of RF energy from proximity to the head and thus can greatly reduce total exposure to the head. Avoid continually wearing a wireless earpiece when not in use. * If possible, keep wireless devices away from your body when they are on, mainly by not attaching them to belts or carrying them in pockets. * Use the cell phone speaker to reduce exposure to the head. * Consider texting rather than talking, but don’t text while you are driving. * Buy a wireless device with lower SAR. The FCC does not require manufacturers to disclose the RF exposure from their devices. Many manufacturers, however, voluntarily provide SAR values. You can find links to manufacturer Web sites providing these SAR values on the FCC’s Web site at www.fcc.gov/cgb/sar. Note that the variation in SAR from one mobile device to the next is relatively small compared to the reduction that can be achieved by using an earpiece or headset. Other Risks Some studies have shown that wireless devices might interfere with implanted cardiac pacemakers if used within eight inches of the pacemaker. Pacemaker users may want to avoid placing or using a wireless device this close to their pacemaker. [Note: defribrillators and combined pacemaker/defribrillator are considered the same as a pacemaker aka pacer] TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecom- munications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition 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 Bill Horne. 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. The Telecom Digest is moderated by Bill Horne. Contact information: Bill Horne Telecom Digest 43 Deerfield Road Sharon MA 02067-2301 781-784-7287 bill at horne dot net Subscribe: telecom-request@telecom-digest.org?body=subscribe telecom Unsubscribe: telecom-request@telecom-digest.org?body=unsubscribe telecom This Digest is the oldest continuing e-journal about telecomm- unications on the Internet, having been founded in August, 1981 and published continuously since then. Our archives are available for your review/research. We believe we are the oldest e-zine/mailing list on the internet in any category! URL information: http://telecom-digest.org Copyright (C) 2009 TELECOM Digest. All rights reserved. Our attorney is Bill Levant, of Blue Bell, PA. --------------------------------------------------------------- Finally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of fifty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. Please make at least a single donation to cover the cost of processing your name to the mailing list. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. End of The Telecom Digest (7 messages)