33 Years of the Digest ... founded August 21, 1981
Copyright © 2015 E. William Horne. All Rights Reserved.

The Telecom Digest for Jan 27, 2015
Volume 34 : Issue 14 : "text" Format
Messages in this Issue:
people upset that the E-911 folk want to use... (danny burstein)
Re: people upset that the E-911 folk want to use... (Fred Goldstein)
2014: The year of living cable TV-free (Monty Solomon)
Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free (Julian Thomas)
Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free (Garrett Wollman)
Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free (Pete Cresswell)
Would you sign up for a Google wireless plan over Verizon or AT&T? (Bill Horne)
Government Report: No High Speed Broadband Competition (Bill Horne)

There is not a liberal America and a conservative America - there is the United States of America. There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America - there's the United States of America.  - Barack Obama

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Date: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 19:02:01 -0500 From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: people upset that the E-911 folk want to use... Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1501221900270.19572@panix5.panix.com> ... that they're proposing the US use the Russian "Glonass" GPS system for location finding. Err..... "GLONASS was chosen because similar US systems don't cover the required territory, Trey Forgety, National Emergency Number Association's director of government affairs, said. "Besides that, GLONASS is a lot better than GPS in locating mobile phones when the call is made from inside the building." http://rt.com/usa/225183-us-russia-glonass-911/ _____________________________________________________ Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key dannyb@panix.com [to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded] ***** Moderator's Note ***** Hit-'em-up-for-another-billion department: this looks like a very red herring. I wonder who is planning their next yacht purchase? Bill Horne Moderator
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 14:04:04 -0500 From: Fred Goldstein <fg_es@ionaryQRM.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: people upset that the E-911 folk want to use... Message-ID: <ma631s$het$1@dont-email.me> On 1/22/2015 7:02 PM, danny burstein wrote: > ... that they're proposing the US use the Russian > "Glonass" GPS system for location finding. Err..... > > "GLONASS was chosen because similar US systems don't cover the > required territory, Trey Forgety, National Emergency Number > Association's director of government affairs, said. > > "Besides that, GLONASS is a lot better than GPS in locating > mobile phones when the call is made from inside the building." > > > http://rt.com/usa/225183-us-russia-glonass-911/ > > > ***** Moderator's Note ***** > > Hit-'em-up-for-another-billion department: this looks like a very > red herring. I wonder who is planning their next yacht purchase? RT is not a very reliable source, to put it mildly. Some GPS systems also use Glonass. I'm currently testing a new microwave radio that uses GPS and/or Glonass to provide synchronization, allowing better frequency reuse. The dish is just inside, under a window, and it's picking up 8 GPS and one Glonass satellite. Doesn't look a lot better to me...
Date: Fri, 23 Jan 2015 21:54:29 -0500 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free Message-ID: <AD2F043C-9EA4-4F88-B51E-5525A4A25A14@roscom.com> In April 2013, I quit being a cable customer after more than three decades of paying monthly for TV. It's been more than 20 months since then, and 2014 marked my first full year as a cord cutter. And I'm not alone. While the number of people who have dropped cable and rely solely on Internet streaming to watch TV shows and on-demand movies remains a very small percentage of all TV watchers, it's steadily growing. A May 2014 report by Experian Marketing Services put the number of cord cutters at 6.5 percent of TV households, up from 4.5 percent in 2010. http://blog.chron.com/techblog/2015/01/2014-the-year-of-living-cable-tv-free/ ***** Moderator's Note ***** In 2004, I told the Comcast sales department to stuff it, and after a decade of not paying for TV, I can attest to the benefits of doing without it. Take it from me: it's all the same. I don't mean that the plots are all the same, or that the outcomes are all the same: I mean it's all the same. All the actors are tall and conservative, and all the actresses wear tight sweaters, and all the problems are solved in 60 minutes with time out for commercials. I'm actually looking forward to power outages in the comming blizzard: you'd be amazed at how interesting your neighbors are when you all sit down around a fire and talk to each other. Bill Horne Moderator
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 12:51:44 -0500 From: Julian Thomas <jt@jt-mj.net> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free Message-ID: <DAD8ECA4-3A49-49AA-BE64-F8D33A3B2870@jt-mj.net> > On Jan 23, 2015, at 21:54, Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote: > > And I'm not alone. While the number of people who have dropped > cable and rely solely on Internet streaming to watch TV shows and > on-demand movies remains a very small percentage of all TV watchers, > it's steadily growing. Cable cutting isn't a very interesting option where DSL is slow and undependable [no FioS] and the only other internet option is the cable company. — jt - jt@jt-mj.net He who laughs last is at 300 baud.
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 21:15:03 +0000 (UTC) From: wollman@bimajority.org (Garrett Wollman) To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free Message-ID: <ma6aon$29mb$1@grapevine.csail.mit.edu> In article <AD2F043C-9EA4-4F88-B51E-5525A4A25A14@roscom.com>, Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote: >Take it from me: it's all the same. I don't mean that the plots are >all the same, or that the outcomes are all the same: I mean it's all >the same. All the actors are tall and conservative, and all the >actresses wear tight sweaters, and all the problems are solved in 60 >minutes with time out for commercials. Funny, I don't think I'm paying for anything that matches that description. In fact, I don't think I've ever watched anything of that sort in my life. Different strokes for different folks, you know. That's just about the only thing the modern "cable TV bundle" has going for it. -GAWollman -- Garrett A. Wollman | What intellectual phenomenon can be older, or more oft wollman@bimajority.org| repeated, than the story of a large research program Opinions not shared by| that impaled itself upon a false central assumption my employers. | accepted by all practitioners? - S.J. Gould, 1993
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 19:57:55 -0500 From: Pete Cresswell <PeteCress@invalid.telecom-digest.org> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Re: 2014: The year of living cable TV-free Message-ID: <ododca56n93u99k86ud7jsvakqb2p2mbqd@4ax.com> Telecom Digest Moderator wrote: >> Take it from me: it's all the same. I don't mean that the plots are >> all the same, or that the outcomes are all the same: I mean it's >> all the same. All the actors are tall and conservative, and >> all the actresses wear tight sweaters, and all the problems are >> solved in 60 minutes with time out for commercials. Per Garrett Wollman: > Funny, I don't think I'm paying for anything that matches that > description. In fact, I don't think I've ever watched anything of > that sort in my life. While I wouldn't take it as far as what I perceive as [the Moderator's] poetic license, I would say that when I go down to the #2 daughter's house where they have cable my overwhelming impression is that the stupidity compared to OTA is just multiplied by however more channels they get. I'll grant them CSPAN and History Channel and maybe a couple others, but mostly I think it's just The Vast Wasteland writ larger. OTOH, I think much of network "News" is flat-out moronic... so I may be at the edge of the bell curve on that stuff. - - Pete Cresswell ***** Moderator's Note ***** Pete, please contact me off-line. Bill Horne Moderator
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 11:52:00 -0500 From: Bill Horne <bill@horneQRM.net> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Would you sign up for a Google wireless plan over Verizon or AT&T? Message-ID: <ma5rag$beg$1@dont-email.me> Through an agreement with T-Mobile and Sprint, Google is on its way to becoming the newest wireless carrier in the US, according to reports. What does this say about Google's overall ambitions? by Karis Hustad Google is making unprecedented steps into the telecom game, indicating the tech company wants to be far more than just your search engine or e-mail provider. Mountain View, Calif.-based Google has inked deals with Sprint and T-Mobile to become a wireless carrier, according to technology website The Information citing unnamed sources. There are no details yet on what this service will look like or when it will begin. But it does mean that Google will use existing cell towers to sell wireless plans to consumers - a move that could uproot the already competitive wireless provider field. This means Google not only wants to provide customers with now nearly-ubiquitous Internet services, but control how these services reach customers. http://www.csmonitor.com/Innovation/Horizons/2015/0124/Would-you-sign-up-for-a-Google-wireless-plan-over-Verizon-or-AT-T -or- http://goo.gl/HYVZ7W -- Bill Horne (Remove QRM from my address to write to me directly)
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2015 12:01:22 -0500 From: Bill Horne <bill@horneQRM.net> To: telecomdigestsubmissions.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org. Subject: Government Report: No High Speed Broadband Competition Message-ID: <ma5rs2$e2e$1@dont-email.me> Government Report: No High Speed Broadband Competition: Blame AT&T, Verizon & CenturyLink's Two Decades of Broken Promises. by Bruce Kushnick We estimate that by 2014, America paid about $400 billion extra in higher phone costs and tax perks to the companies, and based on more recent uncoverings of the phone companies' financials, this number is low. I'll get back to this in a moment. New Government Study: The Faster the Speed, the Less Competition or Availability. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-kushnick/government-report-no-high_b_6385798.html -or- http://goo.gl/8vak6y -- Bill Horne (Remove QRM from my address to write to me directly)
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