TELECOM Digest Thu, 17 Mar 94 23:46:00 CST Volume 14 : Issue 137
Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson
Re: TIME Reports 80% Oppose Clipper Chip (Paul Barnett)
Re: TIME Reports 80% Oppose Clipper Chip (Tom Watson)
Re: Clipper and Privacy (Don Berryman)
Re: Los Angeles Phone Fire Update (H. A. Kippenhan, Jr.)
Re: "Out of Area" on CID Boxes (Dave Niebuhr)
Re: Setting up a 900 Number (Lee Lasson)
Re: An Obscene Caller Gets Caught, 1965 (Carl Moore)
Terminal Emulator For Unix (Mark Earle)
Information About GTI (Barry Lustig)
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Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 12:18:43 -0600
From:
[email protected] (Paul Barnett)
Subject: Re: TIME Reports 80% Oppose Clipper Chip
[email protected] (Charles Randall Yates) writes:
> Why shouldn't the government have the right to listen in? Any
> law-abiding citizen should have nothing to hide. I'm for it.
and TELECOM Digest Editor noted:
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, umm, err, uh, I dunno about that.
> I come down a bit more conservative than many people around here and I
> don't think I would like your idea. Were you, like our suicide-hotline-
> on-a-900-number fellow yesterday just getting an early start on April
> Fool's Day this year or do you really believe Big Brother should get to
> listen and see everything? Never mind, don't answer, my mailbox would
> get flooded worse than ever. PAT]
Pat, I didn't want to start a flame war either, but I share your
concerns. There is a on-going thread on alt.privacy entitled "What's
so bad about a surveillance state?"
It doesn't matter if you are liberal or conservative: anyone with
even a basic familiarity with American and world history should be
able to recognize the danger. I've come to the conclusion that these
people are either (a) clueless, or (b) just plain stupid.
I can never remember who said: "He who exchanges liberty for safety
deserves neither".
I think you made the right decision to drop the discussion. Pursuing
it further would be like talking to a wall. I truly wish it WAS an
April Fool's joke.
Paul Barnett Convex Computer Corp.
MPP OS Development Richardson, TX
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, I've said it before and will say it
again: living in a big, dirty, crime-ridden jungle of a city as I have
done for most of my life; seeing the things I've seen and being victimized
as I have been victimized, I'm willing to make *some* exchanges and *some*
compromises. I think the way I put it once was given my druthers I'd rather
be bopped on the head by a police officer than by a drug addict. Why?
Because I know how the government operates and I can argue with the govern-
ment about it. You can't reason with a crazy person or one who is very
distraught or high on drugs, etc. There you have no recourse to the act
committed against you. With the government, there is recourse. Sometimes
I win, sometimes I lose, but I know what to say and how to say it. I know
how the government bureaucracy operates and to some extent, how to intimidate
the government. That's the difference. I'd rather not be bopped on the head
at all, or lose any liberty, but given the realities of life in these United
States today, I'd prefer to give up what I must to the government rather
than hoodlums on the street. They'd just as soon kill you as not; at least
I can go sass-back at the government with impunity afterward in court. PAT]
------------------------------
From:
[email protected] (Tom Watson)
Subject: Re: TIME Reports 80% Oppose Clipper Chip
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 1994 10:48:18 -0800
Organization: Apple Computer (more or less)
In article <
[email protected]>,
[email protected] (Charles
Randall Yates) wrote:
> Why shouldn't the government have the right to listen in? Any law-abiding
> citizen should have nothing to hide. I'm for it.
If this is the case, why not (as someone suggested in another [joke?]
posting) let the government look at all the mail you get. You have
nothing to hide? What did you go to the doctor for? What did you
rent at the video store? (really another question), why not let them
come right in your house and look under your bed. Why not be under
your bed while you are in it (what you do is a subject for another
newsgroup as well). The list goes on. What we can assume is that it
is not really encryption at all. It this mess comes to pass, if you
want anything 'secure' (whatever that means) another level of
encryption is necessary.
What a fiasco!! (*SIGH*)
Tom Watson Not much simpler!!
[email protected]
------------------------------
From: Don Berryman <
[email protected]>
Subject: Re: TIME Reports 80% Oppose Clipper Chip
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 16:11:59 CST
>> conduct wiretaps. When informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they
>> opposed it."
> Why shouldn't the government have the right to listen in? Any law-abiding
> citizen should have nothing to hide. I'm for it.
I can't ignore this statement.
Innocent people do have something to hide: their private life. The
"right to be left alone" is, in the words of the late Supreme Court
Justice Louis Brandeis "the most comprehensive of rights and the right
most valued by civilized men."
The Fourth Amendment says that the government cannot search everyone
to find the few who might be guilty of an offense.
U.S. Constitution 4th, Amendment:
"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses,
papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,
shall not be violated; and no warrants shall issue, but upon
probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and
particularly describing the place to be searched and the persons
or things to be seized."
Don Berryman
[email protected] +1-612-936-8100
ADC Telecommunications, Inc. Minneapolis, MN 55435
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: So tell me, Mr. Berryman, do you get
as equally indignant when 'the right of the people to be secure in
their persons, their houses, et al' is violated by home-invaders,
rapists, and burglars (you *do* have some of those in Minneapolis
don't you?) or is it just when the government does it that you get
uptight? Personally, I think the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution
is a *marvelous* idea -- I like it. President Clinton and her husband
hate the Second Amendment, and I've never much cared for the First
Amendment, but the Fourth is a good one. Trouble is, try telling the
uninvited and masked man who is ransacking your house in the middle of
the night (or climbing in bed with your wife against her will) that
he is violating your constitutional rights. <snicker> ... you see, you
can tell that to the cops. Don't misunderstand, I never would argue
with the police on their own turf -- the streets -- but I'd never hes-
itate to argue with them in court. Who would you rather have in your
home uninvited? Neither, you say? That is not a realistic answer in
the USA today; the country with the highest rate of violent crime in
the world. PAT]
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 1994 19:46:24 CST
From: H.A. Kippenhan Jr. <
[email protected]>
Subject: Re: Los Angeles Phone Fire Update
Hi P.T.:
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Telcos seem to be far more conscious
> of costs than they ever used to be. Of course, many years ago they
> had so much money that offering a high degree of customer service and
> satisfaction (including redundant things to avoid any major problems
> that might disrupt the network) cost them little or nothing by comparison.
> Now things are different. We cannot make direct connections between the
> breakup of the Bell System in 1983 and the gradually deteriorating state
> of telephone service in the USA today, but I can't help but think that
> there is a cause and effect relationship between the two. For how many
> ever decades we lived with the 'natural monopoly' argument and lived with
> things we did not like about the old Bell System in exchange for having
> a great deal we DID like about it. Most of the people involved in forcing
> the breakup were not so much interested in improving telephone service in
> the USA as they were greedy and interested in getting a peice of the
> action. That's fine, but from the very early days of competition in the
> 1970's when we witnessed MCI's blantant 'skimming the cream' activities
> it should have been obvious that subscriber satisfaction and top-quality
> service was not where it was at. I'm not trying to single out MCI here,
> it's just that they were the first of several to come along. Nor am I
> saying that the (old, now defunct) Bell System was without blame at all,
> and surely the AT&T of two decades ago badly needed reform, perhaps even
> under the direction of the government. But, to use an old expression, they
> threw the baby out with the bath water when divestiture occurred. It was
> a massive overkill in my opinion. To the credit of the old system, it has
> taken a decade for the decay to start to become apparent. As the telcos
> approach the next century and the economics of competition, all sorts of
> corners are being cut and shortcuts being taken -- things that the old
> AT&T for all of its own shortcomings -- would never have permitted.
> Now there is major attention given to the bottom line, and while AT&T never
> failed to pay a juicy dividend to its stockholders in the old days, they
> did factor in more realistic costs of doing business (such as adequate
> training of personnel; staffing to the point of redundancy at times, etc)
> in the process. I think things like the outages in recent years are just
> a sample of what is to come. Much of the spirit and enthusiasm of the past
> is gone, and would you feel otherwise if you had to wonder if your job
> was still going to be there a year from now? Did you know there was a
> time when AT&T would never consider putting a new operator to work answering
> actual calls until after *ten weeks* of training in a school they went
> to? Customer service personnel had an initial training period and then
> followup training at intervals. They learned *everything* about the system.
> What telco can afford those luxuries now? For that matter, who cares
> any longer? If you wanted to work in repair, even as a clerk answering
> '611' calls you read {Lee's ABC} books and passed tests showing you were
> qualified before you were allowed to respond to customer trouble tickets.
> Twenty or thirty years ago -- like now -- people complained about the
> gradually eroding quality of the products and service in American business,
> but we never thought it would happen to 'the phone company'. Then came
> along Judge Greene and he said he'd prove us wrong ... PAT]
I think this is very much on target. I would point out another
instance that leads to the same conclusion. Back in the late
seventies (if memory serves) there was a very serious fire in a telco
building in New York City. The building housed several CO's and at
least one toll switch. After the fire was out, AT&T marshalled a huge
task force (many people from states other than New York) to do
whatever was necessary to restore service. Having spent a bit of time
in various wire centers, the quick response was impressive. The
response to the Hinsdale fire (my opinion) wasn't as effective. And
that's not a knock on the Illinois Bell people who worked their tails
off to restore service. We'll have to reserve judgment for a bit to
see how things progress in Los Angeles.
Regards,
H.A. Kippenhan Jr. Internet:
[email protected]
National HEPnet Management HEPnet/NSI DECnet: FNDCD::KIPPENHAN
Fermi National Accelerator Lab. BITnet:
[email protected]
P.O. Box 500 MS: FCC-3E/368 Telephone: (708) 840-8068
Batavia, Illinois 60510 FAX: (708) 840-8463
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Oh, indeed the people from IBT and
other BOC's who responded in the Hinsdale disaster performed heroically
under extremely difficult conditions. They cannot be faulted at all.
The fault for Hinsdale lays with IBT management for not having the
office staffed properly and relying on alarm systems instead. The fault
for Hinsdale also lays with the apparently untrained person in Springfield,
Illinois who chose to ignore the alarms coming from Chicago; taking it
upon himself to decide that the alarms were false. He sat there and
*ignored* the major alarms for an hour. Finally he called a supervisor
in the Chicago area at home who was having her Sunday dinner and suggested
when she finished dinner 'and got a chance' she might want to go over to
Hinsdale -- itself a fifteen minute drive from her home -- and turn off
the alarms which 'must be malfunctioning'. The exact time the fire started
is not known; we do know it was burning for over an hour -- maybe closer to
two hours -- by the time an IBT employee first got to the building and saw
it. And when she saw it, and tried to call the fire department only to
find the phones everywhere were already dead all over town, does she get
in her car and drive to the fire department? Oh no ... she sticks her
head out the door and asks a passer-by to please go call the firemen from
a payphone down the street ... a dead payphone like all the other phones
in Hinsdale at that point! A few more minutes pass and then she decides
to go get the firemen herself.
How *are* things coming along in Los Angeles? I know they have the vital
stuff restored; is the rest of it back in service? Unlike Hinsdale, where
IBT just plain screwed things up by ignoring the problem, El Lay was
strictly an accident and Bell's response was swift and immediate; that
probably kept the damage to a minimum, even as severe as it is. PAT]
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 13:56:20 EST
From:
[email protected] (Dave Niebuhr)
Subject: "Out of Area" on CID boxes
In TELECOM Digest V14 #135
[email protected] writes:
>> When CID was deployed in my area (516 area code), I tried calling home
>> from a pay phone and the number was displayed. However, when I call
>> home while I'm having my car serviced at a local service station, the
>> number doesn't show.
>> The difference is that the pay phone on the corner is NYNEX owned,
>> and the other one is a COCOT.
> This sounds to me like your area might be served by a CO with two
> vintages of switches (i.e., one is SS7 compatible, and the other
> isn't) The Nynex telephone is probably connected to the SS7 compatible
> switch in that CO and the COCOT telephone is probably connected to the
> non-SS7 switch. As you can see, this also results in some prefixes in
> your exchange being able to get and display CID and the rest not being
> able to.
Nope; both are on the same prefix (516-281) and have been for over twenty
years. I could understand it if the prefix was different at the COCOT,
but its not.
Dave Niebuhr Internet:
[email protected] (preferred)
[email protected] / Bitnet: niebuhr@bnl
Senior Technical Specialist, Scientific Computing Facility
Brookhaven National Laboratory Upton, NY 11973 (516)-282-3093
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Are you sure the number on the COCOT is
correct, and is it possible the company which runs it is not taking the
call for whatever reason and bouncing it through some other office? PAT]
------------------------------
From:
[email protected] (Lee Lasson)
Subject: Re: Setting up a 900 Number
Organization: On-Line Consulting
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 1994 19:54:19 GMT
Tauren N Mills <
[email protected]> writes:
> I am investigating setting up a 900 number for my business, but cannot
> justify the $2500 installation fee that AT&T wants, plus the $1000 per
> month. Does anyone know of any outfits that will rent 900 numbers?
> I don't want to rent one that is already set up and all you have to do
> is advertise. I need my own information to be available.
Tauren,
Sounds like you need a service bureau. The term 'renting' as it
applies to 900 numbers can get you into some pyramid re-sale schemes
and I don't think that is what you want for your business. When you
deal directly with a 900# service bureau, they provide the equipment
and programming and you provide the Information and the marketing.
Drop me an email with what you are thinking of doing and I'll get more
information to you.
Thanks,
Lee Lasson 800/900 systems
On-Line Consulting Audiotex & Faxback
303-586-4760 / 303-586-3471 fax Service Bureau
Internet:
[email protected] Consulting Services
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 15:15:05 EST
From: Carl Moore <
[email protected]>
Subject: Re: An Obscene Caller Gets Caught, 1965
What are "frames"?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The distribution frames were the tall
metal racks where the wires terminated on stepping switches. To trace
a call in those days, a person had to first go to the wire pair of
the line receiving the call in question and study the matrix of
wires through the stepping switch to see where the call was from. They'd
take what they found there, and trace *those* wires back to the next
stepping switch in the 'switch train'. From there, they would go back
still another level to where the wires from that switch led ... and
so forth until they got to the beginning. They'd look and look and look
and look, and then maybe find that the call was inbound to them from
some other central office in which case they'd call the foreman in the
other central office and he'd tell someone to go in the frames there
and pick up on the outbound trunk to the other office. That person
would repeat the process, looking and looking and looking everywhere
until he found the stepping switch with its matrix of wires, and he'd
work his way backward to the origin.
The only trouble was, maybe they'd be almost there -- almost back to
the point where they could identify the caller and they'd hear that
sickening sound of the connection collapsing ... the caller had hung
up and the step switches had all returned to their normal not in use
state. They'd look at each other and say, well, maybe next time we'll
catch him. Experienced crank/obscene callers in those days just laughed
when their victim said 'the operator is tracing this call'. They knew
they could stay on the line another 30 minutes or so before it mattered
any, especially if there were two different CO's involved.
This is not so today of course. Gone are the frames and the spaghetti-
like mountains of wires everywhere. Now-a-days a technician need merely
type a few keys on the keyboard of his terminal and he'll know perfectly
well who is talking to whom; when they started the connection and when
they finished, and more. PAT]
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 19:19:29 CST
From:
[email protected] (Mark Earle)
Subject: Terminal Emulator For Unix
Pat et all, excuse me for not citing the original, but I'm on a
palmtop at 1200. Lucky to get AT&T at all, the hotel uses 6 for LD
access ... oh well.
We have PCOMM on our unix system. It's very similiar to Procomm. We
ftp'd the source from world.std.com. IT's very nice, and you can
"drive" it from a vt100 or ansi terminal, an HPUX terminal window,
etc. Even has Zmodem built in! Works very well. It's a real "work
horse" for our operations.
[email protected]
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Actually, thank you for *not* quoting.
There really is too much quoting in a lot of the messages I get and
they have to be trimmed back considerably. Keep quotes to a minimum
here please. PAT]
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 1994 20:58:21 EST
From: Barry Lustig <
[email protected]>
Subject: Information About GTI
I sent for a copy of their brochure. All of the text below is
copied from it. Please excuse any typos.
HOW THE CALL AMERICA TRAVEL PLAN WORKS.
LONG CALLS: With a pin code, you may make calls up to one hour each,
at any time, to anywhere in the 50 states. Each month you will be
billed $12.99 in advance by GTI Telecommunications, Inc (GTI) for five
calls. Charges for overage minutes, extra calls, and calls less than
one minute from the previous month will also be included on your
statement.
* Long calls over the basic five are billed at $2.99 each.
* Calls over 60 minutes are additionally charged at 17.5 cents per
minute, in six-second billing increments.
* Calls 60 seconds or less are billed at only 30 cents and do not count
as package calls. (Time charges do not commence until your calls are
answered.)
No surcharges or access fees are incurred! (Most carriers have a
surcharge of 75 cents to 80 cents just to make the connection, and
then charge in full minutes - depending on the time of day, distance
to the number called, and length of the call.)
SHORT CALLS: On your Call America Travel Plan, you may also make short
calls with a second pin code and realize additional fantastic savings.
Because you are billed in 6-second increments (instead of full-minute
billing) and because you do not pay surcharges or access charges when
calling, you will SAVE 63% over usage of an AT&T calling card and 62%
over MCI or Sprint on a 3.5 minute call.
Pin Code 1: Long calls (up to 60 minutes each)
First 5 calls $12.99
Extra calls (each) $ 2.99
Overage per minute $ 0.175
Calls less than 1 minute $ 0.30
Pin Code 2: Short calls (per minute rates)
Cost per minute $ 0.175
6-second increment billing
GTI TELECOMMUNICATIONS, INC. is a long-distance telephone company
based in Bellevue, Washington, that offers discounted rates to both
business and residential customers. With its combination of long
calls and short calls, you may enjoy great long-distance savings ANY
TIME and ANY PLACE - while traveling, or just in your normal
day-to-day lifestyle. Instead of spending millions of dollars on
advertising, savings are passed on to you. The only way to hear about
GTI is when people tell you how much they are saving on their
long-distance bills or through a brochure like this one.
BUT I NEVER SPEND AN HOUR ON THE PHONE!
This Plan will save you money, even if you NEVER talk for a WHOLE HOUR
on the phone. A 25-minute evening call with your current carrier is
about $3.25. If made with a typical calling card, $7.05. That same
call with your Call America Travel Plan is just $2.60, for a savings
of $4.45! And you may even talk an additional 25 minutes (60 minutes
total), without increasing the total cost, ANY TIME.
CAN I MAKE SHORT CALLS WITH THIS PLAN?
Of course! Use your second pin code number for all your short calls.
Leave a message, set an appointment, or just call to say "hello" At
17.5 cents a minute with six-second billing, and no surcharge or
access fee, a 3.5 minute call from Seattle to Miami is only 61 cents!
HOW DO I SIGN UP?
This service is now available in all states except Oregon. Just fill
out the attached service application, mail it to the Associate listed
below, and include your $37.99 check ($12.99 for your first month's
service plus a one-time activation fee of $25.00) payable to GenCom,
GTI's tariffed carrier. (Washington state customers will be billed
for their Travel Plans).
------------------
The rest of the brochure has the "associate's" name and address, as
well as a form to fill out.
Barry Lustig Nicholas-Applegate Capital Mgmt
[email protected]
------------------------------
End of TELECOM Digest V14 #137
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