The Telecom Digest for December 14, 2010
Volume 29 : Issue 337 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
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Date: Mon, 13 Dec 2010 05:49:01 -0800
From: Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: USA broadband isn't broadband per FCC report December 2010
Message-ID: <4D06244D.8090201@thadlabs.com>
I found the following blurb in today's (13-DEC-2010) Slashdot:
The FCC has published a new 87-page report titled 'Internet
Access Services: Status as of December 31, 2009.'
http://www.fcc.gov/Daily_Releases/Daily_Business/2010/db1208/DOC-303405A1.pdf
{ the 87 page, 2.5MB report is dated December 2010 }
The report explains that 68 percent of connections in the US
advertised as 'broadband' can't really be considered as such
http://www.techspot.com/news/41535-fcc-68-of-us-broadband-connections-arent-broadband.html
because they fall below the agency's most recent minimum requirement:
4Mbps downstream and 1Mbps upstream. In other words, more than
two-thirds of broadband Internet connections in the US aren't really
broadband; over 90 million people in the US are using a substandard
broadband service. To make matters worse, 58 percent of connections
don't even reach downstream speeds above 3Mbps. The definition of
broadband is constantly changing, and it's becoming clear that the
US is having a hard time keeping up.
Date: Tue, 14 Dec 2010 07:44:53 +1100
From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: USA broadband isn't broadband per FCC report December 2010
Message-ID: <pan.2010.12.13.20.44.49.88664@myrealbox.com>
On Mon, 13 Dec 2010 05:49:01 -0800, Thad Floryan wrote:
.........
> The definition of broadband is constantly changing, and it's becoming
> clear that the US is having a hard time keeping up.
Just goes to show what happens when a specific technical term is hijacked
by the ignorant for a totally different purpose - in the end the meaning
becomes so devalued that it ends up being utilised by whoever decides it
can be used to push their particular barrow.
How about we dump "Broadband" and use a nice little TLA like "HSI" (High
Speed Internet)?
Then technical committees could attach numerical suffixes to it so
various grades of service could be readily identified so we all know
what we are talking about.
--
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.
***** Moderator's Note *****
My father used to say "Figures don't lie, but liars sure can figure!"
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Mon, 13 Dec 2010 16:03:58 -0500
From: tlvp <tPlOvUpBErLeLsEs@hotmail.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: USA broadband isn't broadband per FCC report December 2010
Message-ID: <op.vnn7gwcpitl47o@acer250.gateway.2wire.net>
On Mon, 13 Dec 2010 15:44:53 -0500, David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com> wrote:
> ...
> How about we dump "Broadband" and use a nice little TLA like "HSI" (High
> Speed Internet)? ...
You may have to fight at&t for rights to that "nice little TLA" --
they're using "HSI" to name their at&t/Yahoo! DSL service (which,
incidentally, starts at as low as 768 kb/s for DL speed, barely 15x
56k modem DL speeds).
Cheers, -- tlvp (currently using just such at&t Yahoo! HSI :-) )
--
Avant de repondre, jeter la poubelle, SVP
Date: 13 Dec 2010 14:43:39 -0500
From: kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Question about an old scrambler phone
Message-ID: <ie5t1b$8hj$1@panix2.panix.com>
Ernest Donlin <ernest.donlin.remove-this@and-this-too.gmail.com> wrote:
>
>Now, I'm curious: is that kind of scrambling still possible? It seems
>like it would be a neat way to keep the kids from picking up the phone
>when I want to gab with the wife. I'm not going to build one, but I
>wonder if there's anything I can buy online?
It's possible, but it would be more effective just for you and the wife
to learn French or even pig latin.
The Germans very quickly learned to decrypt voice inversion systems during
the war, by ear. They called it "Krenkelcan" encryption because the English
word "Telephone" sounds like "Krenkelcan" when inverted.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
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End of The Telecom Digest (4 messages)
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