For your convenience in reading: Subject lines are printed in RED and
Moderator replies when issued appear in BROWN.
Previous Issue (just one)
TD Extra News
For your convenience in reading: Subject lines are printed in RED and
Moderator replies when issued appear in BROWN.
Previous Issue (just one)
TD Extra News
TELECOM Digest Mon, 7 Mar 2005 19:55:00 EST Volume 24 : Issue 100
Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson
Bells Ringing in Net Phone 911 (Jack Decker)
Firms Taking Action Against Worker Blogs (Monty Solomon)
Is Router Needed For One Computer With VOIP? (elaine4funs@nospam.com)
Voicepulse - is Router Needed For One Computer? (wilbur@post.com)
Nortel Hires Former Cisco Executive (Telecom dailyLead from USTA)
Latest on Worldcom (Spider)
Re: Vonage Outage Last Thursday, was: Vonage (DevilsPGD)
Re: Vonage Outage Last Thursday, was: Vonage (Thor Lancelot Simon)
Re: Strange Call ID (Spyros Bartsocas)
Re: Strange Call ID (Tim@Backhome.org)
Re: Strange Call ID (Dean)
Re: Strange Call ID (DevilsPGD)
Re: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP Blocking Is 'Censorship' (Dana)
Re: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP Blocking Is 'Censorship' (Isaiah Beard)
Re: Paris Hilton's Sidekick Hacked (news01@jmatt.net)
Re: Last Laugh! was Re: Reporter Name (Carl Moore)
Re: Nokia 6010 Reporting in to Mama -- Radio Interference? (Joseph)
Re: New Monopoly in Dept Stores; Federated and May to Merge (Henry)
Re: New Monopoly in Dept Stores; Federated and May to Merge (L. Hancock)
Re: Pricing Comparison, was: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP (Garrett Wollman)
Re: Pricing Comparison, was: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP (Mike Sullivann)
Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Patrick Townson and
the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other
journals or newsgroups, provided the writer's name and the Digest are
included in the fair use quote. By using -any name or email address-
included herein for -any- reason other than responding to an article
herein, you agree to pay a hundred dollars to the recipients of the
email.
===========================
Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be
sold or given away without explicit written consent. Chain letters,
viruses, porn, spam, and miscellaneous junk are definitely unwelcome.
We must fight spam for the same reason we fight crime: not because we
are naive enough to believe that we will ever stamp it out, but because
we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands
against crime. Geoffrey Welsh
===========================
See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details
and the name of our lawyer; other stuff of interest.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Jack Decker <jack-yahoogroups@withheld on request>
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 01:20:21 -0500
Subject: Bells Ringing in Net Phone 911
Reply-To: VoIPnews@yahoogroups.com
http://news.com.com/Bells+ringing+in+Net+phone+911/2100-7352_3-5600445.html
By Ben Charny
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
A 17-year-old girl's call to 911 earlier this month after both her
parents were shot by intruders never got through to police.
Rather, the Houston teen got a recording from the Net phone company
her family recently began using telling her that 911 service wasn't
available. She managed to escape to summon authorities and an
ambulance from elsewhere -- with a phone that did provide 911
connection.
This nightmarish scenario is fresh evidence of continuing 911 problems
for Net phone providers, say executives gathering for this week's
Voice on the Net Spring 2005 trade show in San Jose, Calif. Net phone
providers sell voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP, telephone
services that use the unregulated Internet rather than the more
expensive, heavily taxed and less efficient traditional phone
network. That network is dominated by the four local phone giants,
also called the Baby Bells, which provide 911 services. The majority
of U.S. Net phone providers still cannot successfully route a 911 call
to the right emergency calling center and also provide emergency
operators with the caller's phone number and location.
There has been recent progress, however. The Bells are closer than
ever to allowing Net phone operators direct access to their emergency
call infrastructure, which would ease a major hurdle in offering
better 911 VoIP service.
Full story at:
http://news.com.com/Bells+ringing+in+Net+phone+911/2100-7352_3-5600445.html
How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home:
http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html
If you live in Michigan, subscribe to the MI-Telecom group:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MI-Telecom/
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 02:03:40 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Firms Taking Action Against Worker Blogs
By ANICK JESDANUN AP Internet Writer
NEW YORK (AP) -- Flight attendant Ellen Simonetti and former Google
employee Mark Jen have more in common than their love of blogging:
They both got fired over it. Though many companies have Internet
guidelines that prohibit visiting porn sites or forwarding racist
jokes, few of the policies directly cover blogs, or Web journals,
particularly those written outside of work hours.
Simonetti had posted suggestive photographs of herself in uniform,
while Jen speculated online about his employer's finances. In neither
case were their bosses happy when they found out.
- http://finance.lycos.com/home/news/story.asp?story=47450847
------------------------------
Subject: Is Router Needed For One Computer With VOIP?
From: elaine4funs@nospam.com
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 11:18:44 -0600
If I have a cable broadband connection, do I need to purchase the
router to use Vonage and access the internet at the same time?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: In addition to the telephone adapter
device needed to operate the VOIP phone, you need some sort of
router/splitter device to use the internet at the same time. Otherwise
you are stuck with plugging in the phone when you wish to use it, or
plugging in the computer when you wish to surf the net. but not both
at the same time. The router allows you do to both at one time; but
depending on the type of VOIP service you get, many of the telephone
adapters in fact are routers as well. Vonage is like that; the TA used
includes a simple router in the same unit. Bring the cable in one
side, send output to the telephone and the computer at the same time.
PAT]
------------------------------
Subject: Voicepulse - is Router Needed For One Computer?
From: wilbur@post.com
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 11:45:51 -0600
They recommend the Sipura modem. Do you also need the Netgear router
if you're going to access the net and use the phone service at the
same time?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: See the answer given to Elaine
elsewhere in this issue. It will make the whole simpler and much
less complex to have some sort of router (Netgear is fine, but so
is Linksys) if you want to use the computer and VOIP at the same
time. But you may want to consider a VOIP service like Vonage, for
instance, which uses a telephone adapter which has a router built
in, so you get by with one nice, neat little connection. For any
interested parties, I still have Vonage e-coupons which you redeem
for one month of free Vonage service. You use the link in the email
I send you; this walks you through the sign up process to start
using Vonage. You use _your credit card_ to pay for the installation
costs, and the number assignment, and the first month of service.
Then, the e-coupon kicks in and you get the *second month* of whatever
service plan you purchased for free. Write ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu
to request your e-coupon. PAT]
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 13:34:53 EST
From: Telecom dailyLead from USTA <usta@dailylead.com>
Subject: Nortel Hires Former Cisco Executive
Telecom dailyLead from USTA
March 7, 2005
http://www.dailylead.com/latestIssue.jsp?i=19874&l=2017006
TODAY'S HEADLINES
NEWS OF THE DAY
* Nortel hires former Cisco executive
BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH
* Insight Communications to go private in deal led by Carlyle Group
* Vonage hits VoIP milestone
* Some doubts about mobile TV
* Cox announces VoIP plans
* Cablevision tells Sears that Voom service will continue
USTA SPOTLIGHT
* Order USTA's Best-Selling VoIP Implementation and Planning Guide Today
EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES
* Yahoo! games going mobile
REGULATORY & LEGISLATIVE
* Bells open testing with VoIP providers for 911 calls
Follow the link below to read quick summaries of these stories and others.
http://www.dailylead.com/latestIssue.jsp?i=19874&l=2017006
------------------------------
From: spider <spider@none.com>
Subject: Latest on Worldcom
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 18:11:49 GMT
I recently received the following Re: Worldcom.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
United States District Court
Southern District of New York
Securities and Exchange Commission,:
Plaintiff, :Civ No. 02-CV-4963 (JSR)
v. :
Worldcom, Inc., :
Defendant. :
Eligibility Criteria
1. You are not entitled to any recovery from the Trust for any
Eligible Securities you sold prior to June 25, 2002.
2. You are not entitled to a recovery from the Trust with respect to
any Eligible Securities you acquired prior to April 29, 1999.
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
In other words, in order to recover any money from the SEC for the
Worldcom fraud, you had to have bought your shares after the fraud
started and not sold your shares until the fraud was made public.
I sold my shares 7 days too early. I won't get a dime of restitution.
It took me a while to figure out what was happening here. There is
only one group of people who are eligible for restitution:
Former employees of Worldcom!
The employees were forced to buy Worldcom stock for their 401Ks.
Worldcom then forbid their employees from selling their Worldcom stock
until the fraud was discovered. They will get restitution.
People like me are going to get nothing, According to the SEC and the
United States District Court we didn't get cheated.
This stinks to high heaven. Only a small, carefully selected group of
people will get restitution. The individual investor without political
or financial clout can go pound sand.
I have lost all respect for the SEC and the Courts. I will never put a
dime in the stock market ever again. If this is the government's idea
of restoring investor credibility, then they have completely lost it.
The stock market is just a place to lie, steal and cheat with the full
connivance of the government and the court system.
------------------------------
From: DevilsPGD <ihatespam@crazyhat.net>
Subject: Re: Vonage Outage Last Thursday, was: Vonage
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 00:46:30 -0700
Organization: Disorganized
In message <telecom24.99.4@telecom-digest.org> Danny Burstein
<dannyb@panix.com> wrote:
> "Vonage ... suffered an outage that left about half of its 500,000
> subscribers without phone service for about 45 minutes.
> "The outage was caused by a glitch with a software upgrade Thursday
> night, said Brooke Schulz, a spokeswoman for Vonage Holdings Corp.
> "The problem struck at about 2:45 p.m. EST, and Vonage stabilized the
> network with a software patch within an hour...
> "Vonage said about 50% of all inbound and outbound traffic was
> affected by Friday's disruption.
> To which I'd only add, "big deal. yawn." Unlike all the whiners who,
> for some reason, love to point out each and every hiccup the
> alternates run into.
Since that outage all three of my ATAs are dropping inbound calls
15-30 seconds after I answer.
Whether it's related or not, I don't know, but they're connected via
two different ISPs, at two physical locations, all the ATAs have been
rebooted.
At this point, I'm pretty sure it's Vonage's fault, not mine.
------------------------------
From: tls@panix.com (Thor Lancelot Simon)
Subject: Re: Vonage Outage Last Thursday, was: Vonage
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 14:42:10 UTC
Organization: Public Access Networks Corp.
Reply-To: tls@rek.tjls.com
In article <telecom24.99.4@telecom-digest.org>, Danny Burstein
<dannyb@panix.com> wrote:
> FYI, quoting from an AP dispatch:
> "Vonage ... suffered an outage that left about half of its 500,000
> subscribers without phone service for about 45 minutes.
> "The outage was caused by a glitch with a software upgrade Thursday
> night, said Brooke Schulz, a spokeswoman for Vonage Holdings Corp.
> "The problem struck at about 2:45 p.m. EST, and Vonage stabilized the
> network with a software patch within an hour...
Unfortunately, the actualy duration of the problem was several hours;
Vonage is, quite simply, lying. And the problem recurred on two
successive days.
If Vonage were a regulated entity -- which it's gone to great lengths
to not be -- there would be significant penalties not just for this
sort of service failure (note that Vonage hasn't exactly contacted its
customers and offered to refund any of their money for the time that
their phones were out of service) -- but also for lying about it.
If Vonage isn't going to be a regulated entity, fine. But in that
case it is just totally inappropriate for them to turn around and use
a complaisant FCC board as a stick to beat _other_ unregulated
entities with when they happen to do things that Vonage finds
inconvenient.
We can argue about whether or not telecom regulation is a good thing.
But "just however much regulation Vonage likes, whenever Vonage
happens to like it", I think, is unquestionably a bad thing.
Thor Lancelot Simon tls@rek.tjls.com
"The inconsistency is startling, though admittedly, if consistency is
to be abandoned or transcended, there is no problem." - Noam Chomsky
------------------------------
From: Spyros Bartsocas <spyros@telecom-digest.zzn.com>
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 12:46:42 +0200
Subject: Re: Strange Call ID
> So clearly it is possible. It seems thought that most US landline caller
> ID boxes assume that all numbers are in xxx-xxx-xxxx format.
A GE caller id phone I used to have, displayed 10 digit caller ID as
xxx-xxx-xxxx, but longer (international) caller id's would appear as
XXXXXXXXXXXX (no dashes).
------------------------------
From: Tim@Backhome.org
Subject: Re: Strange Call ID
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 08:22:44 -0800
Organization: Cox Communications
Mark Crispin wrote:
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Has anyone received a phone call from
> someone calling via Vonage recently? My caller ID (on those calls)
> shows the number, but identifies the caller as 'Vonage User'. PAT]
If I call my wireline phone from my Vonage phone it shows my name.
------------------------------
From: Dean <cjmebox-telecomdigest@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Strange Call ID
Date: 7 Mar 2005 11:53:04 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Spyros Bartsocas wrote:
> I live in Greece. I received a call from my cousin in NY. On my caller
> Id his number appeared as 0044212xxxxxxx (where the x's show his
> actual 212 area code POTS number.
> How is this possible?
Spyro,
Iit's not that easy to know exactly what happened. Who knows what the
carrier(s) of that particular international call did to it prior to
delivery? Generally speaking though, the calling number carried can be
manipulated by a variety of parties carrying the call, is almost never
necessary in order to route the call properly (but maybe for charging)
and is obviously not necessarily the actual/real number belonging to
the party who's calling you (assuming they even have a "real" e.164
number and are not just calling from skype or something like it).
In this case, my buest guess is the call was routed via the UK and the
calling number was modified thus for reasons internal to some/all of
the carriers involved (i.e. not necessarily a bug; they could be using
it this way to settle charges between them or something like that).
Another possibility is that your cousin was using a calling card
platform located in the UK, etc etc.
Regards,
Dean
------------------------------
From: DevilsPGD <ihatespam@crazyhat.net>
Subject: Re: Strange Call ID
Date: Sun, 06 Mar 2005 22:40:00 -0700
Organization: Disorganized
In message <telecom24.97.8@telecom-digest.org> Spyros Bartsocas
<spyros@telecom-digest.zzn.com> wrote:
> I live in Greece. I received a call from my cousin in NY. On my caller
> Id his number appeared as 0044212xxxxxxx (where the x's show his
> actual 212 area code POTS number.
> How is this possible?
The caller probably used a calling card that terminated calls in a
nonstandard way.
------------------------------
From: Dana <raff242@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP Blocking Is 'Censorship'
Date: Sun, 06 Mar 2005 22:32:31 -0900
Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com
DevilsPGD wrote:
> In message <telecom24.97.14@telecom-digest.org> joel@exc.com (Dr. Joel
> M. Hoffman) wrote:
>>> Yes Pat, but it didn't do it on the basis of the 1st Amendment. As I
>>> understand it, the fine was to preserve "Net Freedom" (Powell's term)
>>> and although I like it, I still don't understand the legal basis for
>>> this action. It seems to me the Telco's ought to be concerned about
>>> this because if there is now a "must carry" rule for VoIP traffic, what
>>> happens when they start to offer TV/video? Will they be forced to allow
>> In the end, the only reason VoIP is so cheap is that it passes the
>> costs off to other sectors.
> Not exactly.
> The difference isn't that VoIP is "passing the cost", but rather, that
> with VoIP, the customer is providing the connection from their
> premises to the telco.
> Back in my ISP days, the ISP I worked for provided DSL over dry copper
> pairs. We were selling 2.5Mb/1Mb and later 7Mb/1.5Mb before either
> the telco or cableco were offering any soft of connectivity.
> We gave customers a choice: Either provide your own copper pair from
> your location to the nearest CO, or pay us more and we'll cover the
> loop costs (As well as handle the installation and whatnot)
> VoIP is similar. You can either pay a telco to bring the service to
> your door, or you can pay a cheaper rate if you provide the last mile
> yourself.
> VoIP is virtually always more expensive then traditional telco
> services if you include the cost of the internet connection. However,
> since I already have an internet connection, I don't include the cost
> of my internet connection in the cost of VoIP service.
> In message <telecom24.97.15@telecom-digest.org> Dana <raff242@yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>>> I would think of it more this way: let's say that
>>> your phone company provider, be it Verizon or other LEC, decided
>>> that profanity should no longer be used on its phone lines, and
>>> installs special filters to capture and "bleep out" such speech.
>>> Would that be acceptable?
>> This is a strawman argument, as this is in no way compariable to the
>> situation with Vonage.
> How about if Verizon (or other LEC) decided to censor conversations
> about other telcos?
Same thing we are not talking about the content of the message, but
how the message gets from one point to another. What the carriers and
ISP's are saying about VOIP from providers like Vonage, is that their
broadband subscribers (carriers and isp's) are using Vonage for long
distance, and the carriers and ISP's cannot compete at the prices that
Vonage is offering because of the fact that Vonage does not have to
pay the same fees as the carriers and ISP's are paying.
This same argument raised it's ugly head when phone calling over the
internet first started when it sounded very bad. My father got one of
those types, and used to love calling from Florida to New York via AOL
bypassing phone company long distance charges. If companies like
Vonage are ot going to be held to the same fees that long distance
carriers have to pay, watch for many legal fights in the future. It
will not be long when consumers without broadband access start to
complain about their long distance costs, when consumers with a
broadband access and a Vonage account are pretty much getting long
distance for free. But then I look at my deal with GCI cable for
internet access allows me so many free minutes of plain old telephone
long distance service pretty cheap. I just see a lot of legal fights
coming up over the internet and it's applications such as phone and
video capabilities.
------------------------------
From: Isaiah Beard <sacredpoet@sacredpoet.com>
Subject: Re: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP Blocking Is 'Censorship'
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 14:41:50 -0500
Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com
Dana wrote:
> Isaiah Beard wrote:
>>> My local convenience store and drugstore carry certain newspapers, but
>>> not all for my area. Does that mean they are _censoring_ the ones
>>> they don't sell? According to Vonage they are.
>> You comparison is overbroad and overreaching, and compares apples to
>> oranges.
> No, his comparison is right on.
It would be right on if grocery stores and newsstands had exclusivity
arrangements. They do not. However, cable ISPs have exclusive
franchise agreements in many areas where they provide service, and by
default and through fancy FCC footwork, ILECs are often the only other
game in town. A duopoly doesn't make for much choice.
>> I would think of it more this way: let's say that
>> your phone company provider, be it Verizon or other LEC, decided
>> that profanity should no longer be used on its phone lines, and
>> installs special filters to capture and "bleep out" such speech.
>> Would that be acceptable?
> This is a strawman argument,
If it was a straw man argument, then you would have a quick and easy
rebuttal other than this.
> as this is in no way compariable to the situation with Vonage.
On the contrary: your retail store argument is the only straw man here.
E-mail fudged to thwart spammers.
Transpose the c's and a's in my e-mail address to reply.
------------------------------
From: news01@jmatt.net
Subject: Re: Paris Hilton's Sidekick Hacked
Date: 7 Mar 2005 10:31:52 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Dr. Joel M. Hoffman wrote:
>> Paris Hilton's address book, famously kept on a T-Mobile Sidekick, has
>> been popping up all over the internet after someone managed to figure
>> out her password.
> Do we know for sure that this was just a guessed password?
Articles I read said that it was a well-known hole in T-Mobile's
website which allowed somebody who knew a customer's phone number to
reset her password.
See
http://www.computerworld.com/developmenttopics/websitemgmt/story/0,10801,100104,00.html
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 14:04:07 EST
From: Carl Moore <cmoore@ARL.ARMY.MIL>
Subject: Last Laugh! was Re: Reporter Name
A 2-year-old item, but wasn't Truman's daughter called Margaret?
----- Forwarded message # 1:
From: John David Galt <jdg@diogenes.sacramento.ca.us>
Subject: Last Laugh! was Re: Reporter Name
Date: Thu, 13 Feb 2003 11:05:42 -0800
Organization: Diogenes the Cynic Hot-Tubbing Society
>>> By JENNIFER 8. LEE
>> Her middle initial is "8"? Or is that some kind of typo?
>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/09/technology/09PORN.html
>> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: It is obviously some kind of typo, but
>> that is how it arrive here from Monty Solomon. I didn't insert it
>> here. It I had caught it I would have deleted the '8'. PAT]
> Nope. That is, in fact, her name.
What is "8." short for?
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: 'Eight' is short for 'eighteen', her
real name, although no one calls her that. Actually, the 'typo' in the
original message was in putting a 'period' behind the 8, which is her
'full name'. The newspapers make that mistake now and then when writing
about former president 'Harry S Truman'. His middle name, in fact, was
merely the initial /S/ and there shouldn't be a period after a complete
name. There were many conjectures over the years about what the 'S' stood
for in his name. His wife Bess and his daughter Margaruite both confirmed
it meant nothing at all. Just 'S'. PAT]
------------------------------
From: Joseph <JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: Nokia 6010 Reporting in to Mama -- Radio Interference?
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 12:00:33 -0800
Reply-To: JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com
On Sat, 5 Mar 2005 19:13:32 -0500, Tony P.
<kd1s@nospamplease.cox.reallynospam.net> wrote:
> So GSM that we have today is a patch on top a patch. Nice to think about
> that.
Be glad that it wasn't cooked up by the bunch in Redmond.
------------------------------
From: henry999@eircom.net (Henry)
Subject: Re: New Monopoly in Dept Stores; Federated and May to Merge
Date: Mon, 7 Mar 2005 17:23:25 +0200
Organization: Elisa Internet customer
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I have seen mentions of Sears, Roebuck
> occasionally in this thread. Back in the 1920's, Sears Roebuck was a
> very large chain of stores. The radio station they started
> acknowledged this fact by its call sign: 'W'(orlds)'L'(argest)'S'(tore),
> based in Chicago. WLS is on AM radio 890 kc...
Interesting. I knew a different version of the 'World's Largest Store'
story. The way I heard it, the radio station was owned by the same
outfit that owned the Merchandise Mart (also in Chicago).
Cheers,
Henry
------------------------------
From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Re: New Monopoly in Dept Stores; Federated and May to Merge
Date: 7 Mar 2005 13:15:01 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
Bob Goudreau wrote:
> More to the point, the Bell system monopoly was actually sanctioned by
> the government. No analogous situation has ever existed in US
> retail, thankfully.
I don't know of anything major, but Pennsylvania's liquor stores (wine
and hard stuff) were and remain the sole source of that for within
Pennsylvania.
At the end of WW II the govt had a monopoly on reactor by-products
used for medical and physics research.
> The defined market that Sears itself paid attention to was "retail",
> and Sears was for decades the market leader in the US.
Yes and no. While Sears had a big array of products, it didn't sell
everything and there were other retail stores that did. (Did Sears
have book departments? Grocery stores?) Further, Sears was a "full
service" store, but there were other high-end and low-end stores (esp
low-end discounters). Sears may have been the _biggest_, but it
certainly had plenty of competition in retail.
>> As a shopper, if Wanamaker's didn't have what I wanted, I'd go up
>> the street to Strawbridges, and then over to Gimbel's. Three
>> different stores, run by three different companies. As mentioned, I
>> also_ had the choice of numerous smaller specialty stores and
>> discount stores.
>> And we still do, including a vast plethora of new specialty and
>> discount stores out there in cyberspace. The way people choose to
>> shop is heavily influenced by the available technology. ...
Again, yes and no. I don't like buying clothing via the Internet
because size labels have terribly high variances (I have "large" items
that are too tight on me and "medium" items that swim on me. You have
to try something on every time regardless of the stated "size".)
I don't like the discount/specialty stores since they don't offer the
service/support/guarantee/integrity that the traditional stores do.
For instance, at "Best Buy" I bought software that came with a rebate.
It turned out I could've bought the same product at another store.
The other store had a cheaper price (no rebate). They never sent me
the rebate check (for $20) so I grossly overpaid. The big dept stores
will cheerfully take stuff back, the discounters don't like it even if
it's obviously defective merchandise. Further, the discounters are
fast and free on product spec labels, I remember them pushing TVs
supposedly having stereo but were actually mono.
Lastly, on sale items, the dept store prices are competitive.
Some specialty/discount stores have a relatively short life.
> I think this actually reinforces (not refutes) my point. (And the
> "railroad business vs. transportation business" observation isn't
> actually even my own; it's the one made famous by Theodore Levitt in
> his 1960 Harvard Business Review article entitled "Marketing Myopia".)
> The behavior of the railroad companies shows that they clearly saw
> their other business lines as mere adjuncts to support their crown
> jewels, which were the railroad lines. So much so that when they were
> forced to choose between the old, proven business and the new,
> higher-growth lines, the railroad execs chose to stick with what they
> knew and to sell off the other stuff. They could have chosen instead
> to sell off their rail assets and concentrate on the higher-growth
> markets.
As I said, the railroads were FORBIDDEN by the govt to do what you
suggest, and ORDERED to divest what things they had done. For
example, the railroads set up bus lines to more efficiently serve
light-volume areas, but the govt ordered them out. Railroads were
regulated, just like the phone company, and the phone company was
tightly limited into what communication product markets it could
enter. (Western Electric had sound systems they had to discontinue.)
Now Hollywood was late in shifting its resources to television,
initially it hated TV thinking of it as an enemy.
Further, IBM was exactly as you describe, seeing punch cards as its
business, not electronic computers, and had to rush to catch up when
they finally realized they missed the first boat. Fortunately, they
were doing some experiments and research, Watson Sr was not as
anti-electronics as claimed and he initiated basic research during the
war.
> That's exactly right. The department stores have been trimming
> departments as business trickles away to other retailers, especially
> "category killers". How many people would buy a TV or a pair of skis
> at Macy's these days, when they know they could get a better selection
> and better prices at Best Buy or a sporting goods superstore?
The thing is, I'm far from convinced those other stores are truly
superior. They actually seem to have a smaller selection and not the
most desirable models. I recall shopping for a VCR and a TV (a few
years ago) at both types I ended up getting the best price and
selection from a traditional dept store, not the discounters or
specialty. I checked the mfr's web site and only the dept stores had
the most desirable model I wanted.
> People just don't particularly need department stores any more in
> order to purchase their clothes and furnishings. They can buy their
> clothes and furnishings elsewhere, and they increasingly are doing so,
> which is why the department store chains are having so much trouble in
> the first place.
I would be curious: take men's dress suits. What is the breakdown for
men buying suits? I dobut Walmart/Kmart are that big. One
discounter, Today's Man, went out of business.
> The radio station they started
> acknowledged this fact by its call sign: 'W'(orlds)'L'(argest)'S'(tore),
> based in Chicago. WLS is on AM radio 890 kc, which was and still is a
> clear channel frequency.
I used to listen to it at night in Phila.
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: WLS comes booming in at night here in
Independence, also. PAT]
------------------------------
From: wollman@lcs.mit.edu (Garrett Wollman)
Subject: Re: Pricing Comparison, was: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP...
Date: Sun, 6 Mar 2005 23:05:03 UTC
Organization: MIT Laboratory for Computer Science
In article <telecom24.98.1@telecom-digest.org>, TELECOM Digest
Editor noted in response to Danny Burstein <dannyb@panix.com>:
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Yeah, and can you imagine there are
> folks who want to place the blame on VOIP because it is so
> inexpensive; they seem to feel all those taxes and fees the landline
> telcos pay are justified. Why they want to blame VOIP instead of
> placing the blame of the government, squarely where it belongs, is
> anyone's guess. PAT]
Regulated telcos don't pay taxes. Only their customers pay taxes.
Some of those taxes are itemized on the bill, and some are just buried
in the rates, but one way or another, every dime of tax paid by the
telco comes ultimately from the ratepayers.
This is not a problem insofar as the taxes in question are general
taxes that apply to all businesses (or, more specifically, all
businesses which offer a service which is substitutable for the
service the telcos offer, in proportion to the service's relative
value). At present, we have a regulatory system where some services
are taxed specifically, and other, eminently substitutable services
are not so taxed or indeed regulated at all, depending entirely on
where in the protocol stack these services are implemented.
There is no question that substitutability is valuable in a
competitive marketplace; indeed, it is a necessary condition of having
a competitive marketplace. The problem, however, is that differential
taxation and regulation of otherwise substitutable services causes
consumers to make choices between services for reasons external to the
market, to wit, on the basis of that differential taxation.
Telcos see this problem most clearly, because they are the ones being
discriminated against in the current scenario. Unfortunately, the
approach they have taken in their campaign, demanding that everyone be
regulated and taxed in the same way as they are, is both
counterproductive for the economy as a whole and ultimately futile as
more and more non-telco voice services are designed to be
unregulatable and untaxable.
The telephone regulatory regime needs to begin the process now of
phasing itself out of existence. A good start would be eliminating
direct taxation and cross-subsidy of telephone services (e.g., USF,
franchise fees, state sales and excise taxes), while simultaneously
prohibiting the itemization of non-tax costs of doing business, so
that consumers are able to make a reasoned choice among different (but
substitutable) communications offerings.
-GAWollman
--
Garrett A. Wollman | As the Constitution endures, persons in every
wollman@csail.mit.edu | generation can invoke its principles in their own
Opinions not those | search for greater freedom.
of MIT or CSAIL. | - A. Kennedy, Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. ___ (2003)
------------------------------
From: Michael D. Sullivan <userid@camsul.example.invalid>
Subject: Re: Pricing Comparison, was: Vonage's Citron Says VoIP...
Date: Mon, 07 Mar 2005 05:27:50 GMT
In article <d0g581$2hhc$1@grapevine.lcs.mit.edu>, wollman@lcs.mit.edu
says:
> Regulated telcos don't pay taxes. Only their customers pay taxes.
> Some of those taxes are itemized on the bill, and some are just buried
> in the rates, but one way or another, every dime of tax paid by the
> telco comes ultimately from the ratepayers.
Regulated telcos are in fact liable for, and do pay taxes of many
different kinds, some or all of which are ultimately recovered from
ratepayers. There are also taxes that are imposed directly on the end
user of telecommunications, which are merely collected by the telco. An
example of the latter is the federal telecommunications excise tax,
which is levied on the end user directly by federal law, but is
collected and remitted to the government by the telco. This is very
different from the taxes and tax-like fees and charges that are imposed
directly on the telco, but which are ultimately recovered from the end
user.
For example, the Federal USF charge is assessed on the carrier based
on its end-user interstate telecom revenues; it must be paid by the
carrier, whether or not the carrier can recover it from its customer,
either as a line item or as a hidden component of its rates.
Likewise, there are state taxes and fees, such as gross receipts
taxes, state USF fees, 911 charges, sales taxes, intrastate
telecommunications excise taxes, etc. These are typically levied
directly on the telco, but the telco passes them through to the
customer one way or another. And then there are income taxes, state
and federal, levied on the telco and paid by it, but taken into
account as a cost of doing business when setting rates.
While it's true that, ultimately, all of the taxes on telcos ultimately
come out of the pockets of their customers, either directly or
indirectly, that is also true of every other business. What is unique
about the telecom industry is that the state and federal governments
have latched onto telecom as a cash cow, imposing thousands of separate
taxes across the country above and beyond the normal income, property,
and sales taxes that are imposed on other businesses. There is
absolutely no justification for imposing all of these costs on telecom
providers, and their customers, alone, other than the fact that they are
sitting ducks.
One reason why telecom companies tend to pass these taxes and fees
through as line items, rather than absorb them as a cost of doing
business, is because they are imposed arbitrarily and are subject to
frequent change, so they can't in many instances be internalized into
the cost of doing business like income and property taxes. Stores
pass through the sales tax as a line item on your register receipt for
the same reason. Doing this makes consumers aware that the
government, and not the carrier, is responsible for much of the total
cost (up to 1/3, or even more) of telecommunications services. Did
you know that your telephone bill is inflated by 10% or so in order to
subsidize rural telephone companies, many of which are highly
profitable?
That's what the federal USF charge does, in part. Thank Ted Stevens
for this subsidy, not your carrier. People in rural areas pay less
than urban customers for telephone service because the urban
subscribers pay a huge subsidy to the rural telcos, all in the name of
supporting universal service in high cost areas. Likewise, states
impose a 911 surcharge on telecom providers, which is passed through
to the customer. In some cases, states have used the funds collected,
which were supposed to subsidize the cost of upgrading 911 dispatching
facilities, to redecorate police stations while leaving 911 service
unimproved. Why should telcos and their subscribers pay for
redecorating police stations, or even for upgrading other areas' 911
centers, when these are general government public welfare
expenditures? The answer is that it's easier to levy taxes on telecom
than to raise income taxes.
Michael D. Sullivan
Bethesda, MD, USA
Replace "example.invalid" with ".com".
------------------------------
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