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The Telecom Digest for June 22, 2012
Volume 31 : Issue 152 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
NPR Intern Gets an Earful After Blogging About 11,000 Songs, Almost None Paid For (Monty Solomon)
Solved: Why email scammers say they're from Nigeria (Fred Atkinson)
Re: phone service in Canada (Joseph Singer)
Re: Cell Phone in Canada (Joseph Singer)
Re: Meet GSM Nation, an MVNO selling any smartphone you desire (Joseph Singer)

====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======

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Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 18:34:51 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: NPR Intern Gets an Earful After Blogging About 11,000 Songs,  Almost None Paid For
Message-ID: <p06240860cc0951e09dba@[10.0.1.6]>

NPR Intern Gets an Earful After Blogging About 11,000 Songs, Almost 
None Paid For

By BEN SISARIO
JUNE 19, 2012

When it comes to digital music, can the audience be shamed into doing 
the right thing? That is, even if we all agreed that it was the 
"right thing" for musicians to be paid each time someone listened to 
their music, would it make any difference?

A candid blog post over the weekend at NPR's All Songs Considered 
blog has touched off a small firestorm in the music industry over the 
behavior of young, "digital native" music fans and the right of 
musicians and record companies to be paid for their work. Fourteen 
years since the arrival of the game-changing Napster file-sharing 
service, these topics still touch a nerve. But the responses to the 
post show how wide a gulf remains between what the music industry 
expects the public to do and what the public is actually doing.

In the NPR post, a 20-year-old intern named Emily White wrote that 
despite being "an avid music listener, concertgoer and college radio 
D.J.," with an iTunes library of 11,000 songs, she has bought only 15 
CDs in her life. "As monumental a role as musicians and albums have 
played in my life," she wrote, "I've never invested money in them 
aside from concert tickets and T-shirts."

Ms. White went on to describe some typical Gen-Y behaviors about 
acquiring digital music: ripping CDs; copying friends' song files; 
being given 15 gigabytes of music by a prom date. Curiously, she 
noted that aside from "a few" tracks that she obtained through the 
now-defunct file-sharing service Kazaa, most were not "illegally" 
downloaded.

...

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/19/npr-intern-gets-an-earful-after-blogging-about-11000-songs-almost-none-paid-for/




Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 10:16:07 -0600
From: fatkinson.remove-this@and-this-too.mishmash.com
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Solved: Why email scammers say they're from Nigeria
Message-ID: <ae9e784d278566d6785e5d4a808c452c.squirrel@webmail.mishmash.com>

     This article appeared today on the Fox News Web site:

Solved: Why email scammers say they're from Nigeria

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/06/21/solved-why-email-scammers-say-theyre-from-nigeria/?intcmp=features

-or-

http://goo.gl/jFuBE

     Regards,

                                          Fred




Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 16:55:21 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joseph Singer <joeofseattle@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: phone service in Canada 
Message-ID: <1340322921.157.YahooMailClassic@web161503.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>

Recently on CDT/Telecom Digest it was written:

> My daughter has decided to go to graduate school in Canada. Since
> she'll be there a lot more than here (Oregon), we need to figure out
> what to do about her cell phone.
>
> She's currently a 2nd line on my Verizon account. We both have HTC
> Incredible phones.

Well, if she's going to be in Canada she really needs to get service
in Canada with a Canadian mobile provider.  I say this rather than
providing a "Canadian" addition to a Verizon plan for at least a
couple of reasons.  She will likely have people in Canada wanting to
call her.  Even though it's possible to get good US-Canadian rates it
will be much better for local callers to be able to call her without
paying either international long distance (which can be but not
always is rather inexpensive).  You didn't say where in Canada she's
going to be but it's likely if she's in a major urban area of Canada
she'll have access to Rogers, Fido (part of Rogers now), Bell Canada
Mobility, Telus Mobility or Wind (3G only.)  Also, prepaid services
now offer smartphones with monthly data plans if that's something that
she needs.

She can go into one of these providers' retail presence and get
service from them or she can also likely go into a major mobile
provider store such as London Drug and go to their wireless department
and get service.  If she's a US national she'll likely be relegated to
getting prepaid service unless she has a credit file in Canada.

If she must have a smartphone she could sell it through eBay or some
other avenue at the completion of her time in Canada.

> It would be nice if there was some way she could use her existing
> phone, especially if it was possible to use it in both locations
> since she'll be home for things like summer and christmas breaks.

Unfortunately, most CDMA providers of which Verizon and Sprint are in
the US and Telus and Bell in Canada, do not allow phones that they did
not or do not sell and have the phone within their database of MEID
(serial number) range.  If she presently has US mobile service of
course she can use that when she's in the states.  If she doesn't want
to leave her US service "fallow" while she's in Canada she could also
convert her number to prepaid and just make sure that she's got enough
paid into the service to keep it alive.

> Suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Hope that helps.




Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 17:03:38 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joseph Singer <joeofseattle@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Cell Phone in Canada 
Message-ID: <1340323418.95280.YahooMailClassic@web161504.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>

17 Jun 2012 16:11:28 -0000 John Levine wrote:

> Since your phones are CDMA, the only carrier in Canada that supports
> it is Bell.  I suppose another possibility would be for her to
> bring the phone into a Bell store there and see if they'll set up a
> plan on it, although Canadian plans for roaming in the US tend to be
> pretty pricey.

It's likely that Bell (or Telus) would not allow it.  CDMA providers
such as Bell or Telus do not allow any other devices on their network
unless they were or are sold by them and the MEID is within the range
of numbers they have in their database.  The hardware possibly could
do it.  The problem is with the operators (Bell and Telus.)

A GSM provider (Rogers and it's subsidiary Fido) because it is GSM
could do that.  GSM is compatible as long as the device is not SIM
locked and uses the right frequencies.




Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2012 17:15:38 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joseph Singer <joeofseattle@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Meet GSM Nation, an MVNO selling any smartphone you desire 
Message-ID: <1340324138.86326.YahooMailClassic@web161502.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>

Mon, 18 Jun 2012 12:09:28 -0400 Monty Solomon brought t his article to our attention:

> GSM Nation has spent the past two years selling unlocked smartphones
> through its online retail portal, and in the process it has steered
> tens of thousands of customers toward contract-free voice and data
> plans offered by the newly emerging class of mobile virtual network
> operators (MVNOs). GSM Nation CEO and co-founder Ahmed Khattak,
> however, is getting tired of handing off the potentially lucrative
> service business. So this fall GSM Nation plans to launch its own
> MVNO.

And the mobile landscape is littered with lots of MVNO's who also had
good ideas.  Disney, ESPN, Amp'd, and many others including recently
Tuyo Mobile geared towards Hispanics.

A huge chunk of what facilitates an MVNO the network connectivity with
a major network operator such as AT&T, Sprint or in the case of Tuyo
T-Mobile.  Many MVNO's have given up when the money that they thought
that they were going to rake in did not materialize.  About the only
prepaid companies that have lasted are Virgin Mobile and TracFone.






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