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The Telecom Digest for November 30, 2010
Volume 29 : Issue 323 : "text" Format

Messages in this Issue:

Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years(Thad Floryan)
Re" How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years(Neal McLain)
Good news: wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California (Thad Floryan)
Re: Good news: wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California (danny burstein)
Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones(David Clayton)
Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years(David Clayton)
Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years(David Kaye)
Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years(David Kaye)
Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones(Richard)
Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones(John David Galt)
Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones ](Tom Horne)


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Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2010 18:59:39 -0800 From: Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years Message-ID: <icv4up$rdq$1@news.eternal-september.org> On 11/27/2010 7:28 PM, Lisa or Jeff wrote: > [...] > I believe it was cost reductions in electronics into the early 1980s > finally made it worthwhile to dump old electro-mechanical gear en > masse. This applied to both telephone switching and information > technology. (For example, in IT, converting data entry from > keypunching cards to key data to tape/disk or on-line systems. Early > on-line systems were not cheap--they needed extensive CPU and disk > space, plus terminals and line controllers, all of which were > expensive.) > > Wasn't a widespread ESS in that era the No 5? When did that come out? I ran the AT&T Silicon Valley UNIX Users' Group for the entirety of its existence. Our meetings were held in the huge AT&T (then) building on Duane Avenue off Lawrence Expressway in Sunnyvale CA [coordinates for Google Earth = 37° 23' 11.38"N, 121° 59' 57.77"W]. Circa 1985 the fine folks of AT&T gave us a tour of the (test) 5ESS located in that building. Amazing. Though I didn't know when 5ESS was "deployed in the wild", it clearly existed then. This page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5ESS_switch claims the 5ESS first appeared in Seneca, Illinois (815 Area Code) in 1982.
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 00:34:22 -0600 From: Neal McLain <nmclain@annsgarden.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re" How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years Message-ID: <4CF3496E.1040507@annsgarden.com> Thad Floryan cited the following article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reel-to-reel_audio_tape_recording [1] In which we find the following: | The earliest machines produced distortion during the recording | process which German engineers significantly reduced during the | Nazi era by introducing a high-frequency bias current also used | during playback. Distortion was the result of magnetic hysteresis. [2] The Germans overcame this problem by adding a high-frequency (above the highest audio signal frequency) bias signal. [3] | American audio engineer Jack Mullin was a | member of the U.S. Army Signal Corps during World War II. His | unit was assigned to investigate German radio and electronics | activities, and in the course of his duties, he acquired two | Magnetophon recorders and 50 reels of I.G. Farben recording tape | from a German radio station at Bad Nauheim (near Frankfurt). | He had these shipped home. Over the next two years, he worked to | develop the machines for commercial use, hoping to interest the | Hollywood film studios in using magnetic tape for movie | soundtrack recording. | | Mullin gave a demonstration of his recorders at MGM Studios in | Hollywood in 1947, which led to a meeting with Bing Crosby, who | immediately saw the potential of Mullin's recorders to pre- | record his radio shows. Crosby invested $50,000 in a local | electronics company, Ampex, to enable Mullin to develop a | commercial production model of the tape recorder. Using | Mullin's tape recorders and with Mullin as his chief engineer, | Crosby became the first American performer to master | commercial recordings on tape and the first to regularly pre- | record his radio programs on the medium. Ampex and Mullin | subsequently developed commercial stereo and multitrack audio | recorders, based on the system invented by Ross Snyder of | Ampex Corp... Surprisingly, that article doesn't mention Alexander M. Poniatoff, the founder of Ampex Corporation. His is an amazing story. In the 1960s, I was a television broadcast engineer. In 1964, I took a course about the "Ampex Videotape Recorder" taught by Matthew McGillicuddy, the Ampex Training Manager. To this day, I still have the "Certificate of Achievement" awarded at the end of the course. The certificate bears the signatures of McGillicuddy (as Manager, Training) and Poniatoff (as Chairman of the Board, Ampex Corporation). During the course, someone (possibly McGillicuddy) told us the story of how Poniatoff came to found Ampex. I have tried to reconstruct the story, based on my memory of a narrative I heard 46 years ago with considerable assistance from Wikipedia. Poniatoff was born in 1892 in what was then the Russian Empire. [4] By 1917, he had been trained as an Electrical Engineer, and was an officer in the Russian army. In February of that year, "White Russian" revolutionary forces overthrew the Czarist government (February Revolution [5]) and established a provisional government. Poniatoff supported the revolution. Before the end of the year, a second revolution (October Revolution [6]), led by Bolshevik Red Guards, overthrew the provisional government and established the Communist government. Poniatoff, along with many other white Russians, fled the country (White emigre [7]). Poniatoff escaped to China, and worked for Shanghai Power Company until 1927, when he emigrated to the United States. During World War II, he worked for General Electric, PG&E, and Dalmo-Victor, specializing in the design and manufacture of motors and generators. [8] In 1944, Poniatoff moved to California and founded Ampex corporation as a motor manufacturer. [9] After the end of World War II, he met the aforementioned Jack Mullin, who provided Poniatoff with access to the technology he had acquired from Germany. Mullin also introduced Poniatoff to Bing Crosby, who invested in Ampex in order to support Poniatoff's efforts to build a magnetic audio tape recorder. Ampex introduced the first commercial audio tape recorder in 1948. [10] At this point, my narrative ends. Return to [1]. [1] Reel-to-reel audio tape recording. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reel-to-reel_audio_tape_recording [2] Magnetic Hysteresis. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hysteresis#Magnetic_hysteresis [3] Magnetic tape: Audio Recording. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnetic_tape#Audio_recording [4] Alexander M. Poniatoff. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_M._Poniatoff [5] February Revolution. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_Revolution [6] October Revolution. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Revolution [7] White emigre. Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_%C3%A9migr%C3%A9 [8] Alexander M. Poniatoff. Consumer Electronics Association. http://www.ce.org/Events/Awards/468.htm [9,10] Ampex History. Ampex Corporation. http://www.ampex.com/l-history.html?start=30 Neal McLain
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 02:13:15 -0800 From: Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Good news: wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California Message-ID: <4CF37CBB.7070506@thadlabs.com> <http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-911-calls-20101129,0,1947409.story> Wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California By Rich Connell, Los Angeles Times November 28, 2010 After years of call centers not being able to keep up with emergency calls from wireless phones, the number of such calls not getting through fell to just 5% so far this year. Millions of California cellphone users are no longer getting busy messages, experiencing unconnected calls or being put on hold for extended periods when they dial 911. The number of wireless emergency calls reaching busy operators or failing to go through for various reasons dropped from 4.9 million or 42% of calls in 2007 to just 470,000 or 5% so far this year, according to the state's Public Safety Communications Division. The improvement came even as cellphone 911 call volumes continued growing steadily. In addition, the California Highway Patrol, by far the largest recipient of emergency cellphone calls, has significantly reduced the time that callers wait for someone to answer. The new data represent a turnaround for a system that struggled for years to adapt as wireless devices rapidly proliferated, becoming the public's primary link to police and fire rescuers. When mobile phones were relatively rare, bulky contraptions installed chiefly in cars, all 911 wireless calls were sent to the CHP. By the late 1990s, as smaller, cheaper cellphones became ubiquitous, CHP call centers were being overwhelmed. Callers often had to wait several minutes to reach an operator, only to then be quizzed and transferred to the nearest public safety dispatch center. The delays added crucial minutes to emergency response times. The state reacted several years ago with a push to reroute many wireless calls, which now eclipse land-line emergency calls 2 to 1, directly to local police and fire agencies. State grants helped equip local dispatchers to handle their jurisdiction's mobile calls. Local dispatch centers now take 60% of wireless calls directly. "We've really had some success in moving wireless calls" to public safety agencies best prepared to handle them, said Karen Wong, who heads the state division overseeing 911 programs. Last year, about 17 million wireless 911 calls were made in the state, a 28% increase from 2007. Land-line emergency calls decreased 20% to 8.2 million over the same period. Emergency call hold times at the CHP also have improved. In 2007, The Times reported that about half of the CHP's call centers failed to meet state standards of 90% of 911 calls being answered in 10 seconds or less. Many were averaging delays of four times that or more, with some waits of 20 minutes or longer. Over the last three months, all 25 of the centers exceeded the quick-answer standard, records show. Statewide this year, the agency has answered 94% or more of its emergency calls within 10 seconds. A combination of increased staffing, more efficient operator scheduling and more refined call-routing procedures contributed to the improvement, said CHP Chief Reginald Chappelle, who oversees the 911 program. "With these types of numbers, [callers] are going to hit some level of assurance that, no matter who they call, it will be answered in three rings or less," he said. The added burden of cell calls initially strained some local 911 call centers, including the city of Los Angeles. But generally, officials say they have adjusted and are serving the public better. In 2008, Long Beach became one of the last large cities in the state to accept emergency cellphone calls directly. Officials were concerned about residents and visitors being routed through the CHP, but they feared that an influx of cell calls could swamp city dispatchers and delay emergency response times. "The initial switch was a bit of a task," said Lt. Ken Rosenthal, who supervises the city's emergency call center. "But that's long since gone. We're doing fine." Getting calls directly is a significant benefit, he said. On a "medical rescue or a crime in progress," he said, "obviously, seconds" can make a difference.
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 16:38:11 +0000 (UTC) From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: Good news: wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California Message-ID: <id0ktj$l74$1@reader1.panix.com> In <4CF37CBB.7070506@thadlabs.com> Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> writes: ><http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-911-calls-20101129,0,1947409.story> >Wait times drop for cellphone 911 calls in California ..... >The state reacted several years ago with a push to reroute many >wireless calls, which now eclipse land-line emergency calls 2 to 1, >directly to local police and fire agencies. State grants helped equip >local dispatchers to handle their jurisdiction's mobile calls. ummm, it ain't "state grants", except in a very broad sense. Telephone users (landline and cellular) pay hefty "911" and "e-911" surcharges (taxes) which are supposed to be directly designated for these PSAPs (911 centers) and their associated infrastructure. Oh, and while I can't give a specific cite for Caifornia, it's pretty common for the periodic State Comptroller audits to find that only a small fraction of these dedicated funds go where they're supposed to. Quite a bit gets siphoned off to the general budget... (PSAP = Public Safety Answering Position) -- _____________________________________________________ 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 Nov 2010 16:11:06 +1100 From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones Message-ID: <pan.2010.11.29.05.11.03.649539@myrealbox.com> On Sat, 27 Nov 2010 14:51:48 -0500, Fred Goldstein wrote: > Disabling mobile phones in moving cars must be a good idea because the > country is suffering from a scourge of motor vehicle fatalities that has > skyrocketed since mobile phones became common. Let's look at the > statistics to prove this thesis. > Creating an exaggerated proposition like that is called a "straw man" argument, isn't it? Pretty easy to blow over but essentially useless to any sort of rational argument on an issue. > In 1994, mobile phones were still pretty uncommon. There were 36,254 > motor vehicle fatal crashes in the US. The number peaked at 39,252 in > 2005, a time when cell phones were everywhere. Of course in 2005, > vehicles were more dangerous (the SUV craze was peaking), the population > was a little bigger, and the increase in fatalities was just 10%, but the > narrative requires us to say that it was skyrocketing. > > Texting was not as popular in the US, at first, as it was in Europe. But > texting really spread in the late 2000s. In 2009, when > anti-texting-and-driving laws were just starting to spread, the fatality > rate had exploded to a whopping 30,797/year, an increase of, uh, negative > 8455. Yep, gotta act on that threat! > > Fatalities per 100 million miles traveled has fallen from 1.73 in 1994 to > 1.13 in 2009. It has been a fairly steady decline. > So disregarding all the other factors that decide if a crash results in a fatality - like having more a higher percentage of modern vehicles on the road reduces them because of their inherently greater overall protection - means than idiots clearly behaving dangerously by using handset while driving aren't a factor? It may be that the death rate would be even lower without more crashes caused by distracted drivers, the absolute figures prove little unless the trend lines show no correlation with increased use of phones and other distracting devices. -- 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.
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 16:20:47 +1100 From: David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years Message-ID: <pan.2010.11.29.05.20.44.830171@myrealbox.com> On Sat, 27 Nov 2010 20:58:42 -0800, Thad Floryan wrote: > On 11/27/2010 2:55 PM, David Clayton wrote: ......... >> I clearly recall the limitations of open-reel, cassette and other Audio >> magnetic media even in the 1970's and even the most expensive equipment >> was a constant battle with precision alignments and cleaning to get the >> best out of them. > > I still have one reel-reel stereo audio tape machine from ages ago and I > never had to "play" with its heads and cleaning took just seconds since > all the parts that could accumulate tape oxide were open and readily > available. With the "good" tapes I'd use it was never a problem. > > I also (still) have two Teac "Esoteric Series" model 860, arguably the > finest cassette deck ever made http://thadlabs.com/PIX/Teac_860.jpg > (picture taken just a few minutes ago), and they never needed any head > alignment. The only adjustments required for normal use is bias and EQ > for a specific tape. I do have the service manual and it, too, states > no adjustments required unless the head assembly is replaced, after > which the adjustments are locked-down "with a drop of locking paint." .......... I was trained in the 1970's to service magnetic tape equipment using things like tension gauges, alignment tapes etc to get the absolute best out of these things. I worked on some reasonably high-end equipment at that time that still needed a lot of care and attention to meet the requirements for audio, so that's why I believe that for data use the medium just was too finicky. I still have a Teac open reel machine holding up some other junk somewhere, as well as some 8" floppy disks which may well shed their oxide now if I still had a drive to put them in! -- 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.
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 07:35:08 GMT From: sfdavidkaye2@yahoo.com (David Kaye) To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years Message-ID: <icvl3b$u9u$2@news.eternal-september.org> David Clayton <dcstar@myrealbox.com> wrote: >For the purposes of DATA use, I would readily believe that in the 1950's >that "magnetic recording technology wasn't ready". It certainly wasn't ready at Safeway's data center on East 14th Street in Oakland in the early 1970s. I had a temp job there pushing a shopping basket filled with punch cards to pick up and deliver to programmers. My first tech job!
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 07:33:30 GMT From: sfdavidkaye2@yahoo.com (David Kaye) To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: How Ma Bell Shelved the Future for 60 Years Message-ID: <icvl09$u9u$1@news.eternal-september.org> Thad Floryan <thad@thadlabs.com> wrote: >Bing Crosby also invested in the founding of Ampex which was using >magnetic tapes for sound recording, and the first 8-track audio tape >player/recorder was developed by Ampex in 1954. One could trace the beginnings of tape recording back even further to Bing Crosby's postwar schedule. Due to his popularity as an actor and stage performer, he insisted that he be able to record his NBC radio program. This was back in 1945. He'd heard about (and possibly saw a demo of) magnetic recorders the Germans had developed during WWII. NBC's refusal to allow recordings caused Crosby to walk off his show for half a year, upsetting his sponsor (shows had permanent sponsors in those days) until NBC capitulated. But it goes back even further than that! Both the ABC (a poor spinoff of NBC) and Mutual (an always poor network) had used recordings in one form or another since at least the late 30s, though these were mostly on disc until mag came into its own.
Date: Sun, 28 Nov 2010 22:16:03 -0800 From: Richard <rng@richbonnie.com> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones Message-ID: <5tf6f6hgnn0sn78tsg1vtmhneeielmgpmg@4ax.com> On 29 Nov 2010 00:55:39 -0000, John Levine <johnl@iecc.com> wrote: >We don't use seatbelt interlocks, because there are too many ways they >don't work. I don't see any reason to expect that cell phone >interlocks would work any better, but I do expect that combinations of >fines and public education can get most people to stop using their >phones while driving, just as they've gotten most people to buckle >their seatbelts. I agree. Education and fines is the proper way to fix the problem. It is not possible to make you 100% safe by passing laws. Whenever government tries to fix one problem by passing a law, they usually end up creating a worse problem due to unforseen consequences. For example, in 1920 the USA banned alcoholic beverages to combat alcoholism. Organized crime stepped in to fill the demand for alcohol, and as a consequence organized crime got a lot bigger and richer. In 1933, Prohibition was repealed because it was obvious that the cure was worse than the disease. In the 1970's, the USA decreed that autos could not start until the seat belt was fastened. Many people defeated that simply by pulling out the belt and tying it in a knot so that it would not retract. My mother hated belts, so she did that on her car; as a consequence, whenever I drove her car, I could not use the belts. And I wanted to use a seatbelt. Dick
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 11:19:51 -0800 From: John David Galt <jdg@diogenes.sacramento.ca.us> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones Message-ID: <id0ucq$mre$1@blue.rahul.net> > John Levine <johnl@iecc.com> wrote: >> We don't use seatbelt interlocks, because there are too many ways they >> don't work. I don't see any reason to expect that cell phone >> interlocks would work any better, but I do expect that combinations of >> fines and public education can get most people to stop using their >> phones while driving, just as they've gotten most people to buckle >> their seatbelts. Richard wrote: > I agree. Education and fines is the proper way to fix the problem. I agree that education is the way to fix the problem, but "the problem" is nanny-statism, not phoning and driving. Anyone who drives badly while phoning probably drives just as badly when not phoning. > It is not possible to make you 100% safe by passing laws. Whenever > government tries to fix one problem by passing a law, they usually end > up creating a worse problem due to unforseen consequences. Precisely. The time for police to intervene in how someone drives is after they crash. Until then, anything the driver does is a victimless crime. > In the 1970's, the USA decreed that autos could not start until the > seat belt was fastened. Many people defeated that simply by pulling > out the belt and tying it in a knot so that it would not retract. My > mother hated belts, so she did that on her car; as a consequence, > whenever I drove her car, I could not use the belts. And I wanted > to use a seatbelt. And as a result, we're stuck to this day with belts that don't do their job (which is to stay tight, so you're fixed to one spot on the seat and have better control of the vehicle).
Date: Mon, 29 Nov 2010 13:52:55 -0500 From: Tom Horne <hornetd@verizon.net> To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: US may disable all in-car mobile phones ] Message-ID: <4CF3F687.3020608@verizon.net> > On Nov 28, 7:55 pm, John Levine <jo...@iecc.com> wrote: > Tom Horne wrote: >> I wouldn't care one bit if traffic deaths were plummeting. If cell >> phone use is causing even one death of a person who had no control >> over the cell phone users actions then I want that use banned. > > If using a cell phone to call 911 to report erratic drivers and > other highway dangers is causing even one death to be averted, then > I want that use made mandatory. > > There are clearly some kinds of phone use that are dangerous, e.g., > the woman at the light in front of me with two kids in the back seat > who didn't move when the light turned green because she was too busy > texting. (I know this because I saw her do the same thing when I > was next to her at the next light.) But there are other uses that > are benign, e.g., passengers texting. > > We don't use seatbelt interlocks, because there are too many ways > they don't work. I don't see any reason to expect that cell phone > interlocks would work any better, but I do expect that combinations > of fines and public education can get most people to stop using > their phones while driving, just as they've gotten most people to > buckle their seatbelts. There may indeed be an insurmountable barrier to preventing the use of cell phones use while driving, but the need to make any legitimate emergency calls is not it. It is a trivial matter to exempt calls to 911 or the state police via *77 (or whatever code is used in each state) from any ban on making calls while in motion. Such calls would be so few and far between that they would not be worth worrying about. For those that believe that the government has no legitimate role in limiting the personal conduct of it's citizens, even if that conduct is jeapordizing other citizens, then you needn't worry. Most legislators are just as self centered as many of the people they allegedly serve, [so] effective bans on cell phone use in moving vehicles will never be enacted unless the legislators can find some easy way to exempt themselves. The proof of that is in the quick rush to ban the texting that most of them don't do and the passage of "feel good" hands-free requirements that do not address the distraction of the call itself. How about this for a compromise. Throw out all regulation of cell phone use while driving, but make any death caused by a driver who was using a cell phone at the time of the collision "Statutory Murder by reason of Depraved Indifference to the safety of others". No ducking and dodging available here because the people who believe that they are not part of the problem could not in all decency object to the state punishing those who are. If the way you drive when you are using a cell phone is not part of the problem you would be unaffected because they would never be involved in an accident while operating a cell phone and driving. For good measure, we add in a statutory presumption, under the "Last Clear Chance" doctrine of tort law, that anyone involved in a collision while using a cell phone is presumptavly at fault and the cell phone use constitutes gross negligence, thus piercing the no fault laws in states that have them, and the remedy is then focused solely on the persons who are causing the colisions. Do not cry foul, though, when insurance carriers walk away from the cell phone user's loss claim, because it is a legal absurdity to expect them to pay for wanton or grossly negligent actions. I will continue to hope that the carnage that cell phone use is causing, that I have personally seen as just one rescue worker, will be stopped. Perhaps [the solution] will have to come in the form of staggering "Dangerous Product" judgments against cell phone service providers that will make their liability insurers run for cover. Once the cell phone service providers are directly exposed to the possibility of huge judgments they will find a way to stop the use of their service while in high speed motion without any legislative action being required. -- Tom Horne, speaking only for himself ***** Moderator's Note ***** My brother is a first-responder who has dedicated his life to helping those in need. As such, I accord him a certain lattitude in the tone of his posts on this subject. Bill Horne Moderator
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.
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