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The Telecom Digest for August 30, 2011
Volume 30 : Issue 216 : "text" Format
====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ====== |
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Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 10:41:50 -0700 (PDT)
From: Hancock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Cable phone service disrupted from power outage
Message-ID: <20c42b05-99ce-407a-86ef-9930476c953a@p19g2000yqa.googlegroups.com>
Our area lost power from Hurricane Irene. Those of us with
traditional landline Verizon phones (and plain wired phones, not
cordless) never lost service. However, our neighbors with cable phone
service (Comcast) lost phone service as soon as the power went out. I
don't know why.
My cheapo electronic answering machine has battery backup (2 AA
cells), and that worked fine for 18 hours. My clock radios have a 9V
battery backup but they needed to be reset. (They work okay for brief
power outages).
Being without power is not fun, especially at night. I had
flashlights, but I need a lantern type light that shows a broad light
as opposed to the narrow spotlight of a flashlight.
Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 18:05:12 +0000 (UTC)
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Cable phone service disrupted from power outage
Message-ID: <j3gkco$22$1@reader1.panix.com>
In <20c42b05-99ce-407a-86ef-9930476c953a@p19g2000yqa.googlegroups.com> Hancock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org> writes:
>Our area lost power from Hurricane Irene. Those of us with
>traditional landline Verizon phones (and plain wired phones, not
>cordless) never lost service. However, our neighbors with cable phone
>service (Comcast) lost phone service as soon as the power went out. I
>don't know why.
The relevant question, of course, is whether the cable system
itself lost power, or just the (in the home) converter boxes.
In our own case a few years ago, we had a local power failure.
The cable system itself was still live, so thanks to our UPS'es
on the (so called) cable modem and router, we still had phone
service and internet.
- the power came back before our UPS'es died.
Incidentally, two of the three local cellular companies
had their towers (and backbone) functioning thoughout.
One of them died after about 30 minutes.
Direct-to-the-CO copper lines were fine for the ILEC
and also... for the CLEC. We're in one of the very few
areas that has a real CLEC overbuild.
--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 15:19:18 -0400
From: "ABLE1" <royboynospam@somewhere.net>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Cable phone service disrupted from power outage
Message-ID: <uCR6q.131082$wz.40083@en-nntp-08.dc1.easynews.com>
"danny burstein" <dannyb@panix.com> wrote in message
news:j3gkco$22$1@reader1.panix.com...
> In <20c42b05-99ce-407a-86ef-9930476c953a@p19g2000yqa.googlegroups.com>
> Hancock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org> writes:
>
>>Our area lost power from Hurricane Irene. Those of us with
>>traditional landline Verizon phones (and plain wired phones, not
>>cordless) never lost service. However, our neighbors with cable phone
>>service (Comcast) lost phone service as soon as the power went out. I
>>don't know why.
>
> The relevant question, of course, is whether the cable system
> itself lost power, or just the (in the home) converter boxes.
>
Similar issue here, don't have Comcast Digital Voice but do have High Speed
and TV. Power was out at 3:30am didn't care that point. At about 8:30am
powered up the generator and got house up and running. What I did notice
was that even though the cable modem was powered it had no high speed
connection, nor was there any TV.
About 45 minutes later the power was restored to the neighbors so I switched
off the generator to the local grid. At that point High Speed and TV was
back up. It would seem to me that where ever (locally) Comcast gets power
for their booster, whatever's, they either don't have any backup power or it
is very minimal. My Verizon landlines worked all the time since they are
powered from the CO standby power source or main.
Comcast likely does not care much about emergency power for their services.
I always thought it was a PUC requirement to provide service during a power
outage if at all possible. Guess that theory went out the window with the
digital age.
What will the future hold???
Les
Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 16:43:07 -0700 (PDT)
From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Cable phone service disrupted from power outage
Message-ID: <1314661387.39609.YahooMailClassic@web111725.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
--- On Mon, 8/29/11, ABLE1 <royboynospam@somewhere.net> wrote:
> powered from the CO standby power source or main.
[ ... ]
> Comcast likely does not care much about emergency power for their services.
> I always thought it was a PUC requirement to provide service during a power
> outage if at all possible.~ Guess that theory went out the window with the
> digital age.
Cox Cable is vigorously promoting their digital telephone service in Oklahoma
City, and probably in many places they serve. There is a note in their ads
and mailings that your service may be interrupted during power outages.
Is there any particular advantage to "digital" telephone service? Most
interoffice and toll trunks are "digital" now, and it would seem that for the
subscriber loop to be "digital" just adds one additional thing that could go
wrong.
--
Wes Leatherock
wleathus@yahoo.com
wesrock@aol.com
Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 13:31:22 -0700 (PDT)
From: "Mark J. Cuccia" <markjcuccia@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Touch Tone Trademark Status
Message-ID: <1314649882.1863.YahooMailClassic@web31104.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Lisa Hancock asked in a reply:
> When did Touch Tone lose its trademark status?
According to the US Patent and Trademark Office website search, it was
officially cancelled due to "total surrender" by the (legacy) holder
of the trademark (AT&T), on 13-March-1984. Note that this is shortly
after the official start of divestiture (01-January-1984), some 27+
years ago.
See the following entry at the USPTO's webiste:
http://tarr.uspto.gov/tarr?regser=serial&entry=72109459&action=Request+Status
also, the wikipedia entry for DTMF (Dual-Tone Multi-Frequency)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dtmf mentions that AT&T's trademark
registration for "Touch Tone" ended on 13-March-1983, as well as the
website Trademarkia at the following page:
https://www.trademarkia.com/touchtone-72109459.html
> Did any other old Bell System trademarks lose their status, too?
I don't know offhand, but I wouldn't at all be surprised if several
long-time Bell System/AT&T trademarks or service marks were cancelled
or abandoned or surrendered or otherwise not renewed, during the
early years of post-divestiture, shortly after 01-Jan-1984.
Mark J. Cuccia
markjcuccia at yahoo dot com
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