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TELECOM Digest Sat, 26 Nov 2005 13:40:00 EST Volume 24 : Issue 535 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Internet Saves Woman in Diabetic Coma (Associated Press/Information Week) Firm Wants to Rid Net of Suffixes (Lucas van Grinsven) Web Site Offers Saddam Uniform For Sale (Reuters News Wire) Online Retailers Await Cyber Monday (Lisa Baertline) Sweden Plans to Bring Expo to Internet (Tommy Grandell) Obsessive Coupon Disorder / Web's Extreme Bargain Hunters (Monty Solomon) New Online Auction Site (Sam) Re: Los Angeles Numbering, 1940s (Steven Lichter) Re: Auto Call Forward (Wesrock@aol.com) Re: Personal Computers Enlisted in AIDS Research (David Wolff) Re: Skype - H.323 or SIP (jhblee@gmail.com) Our New Classified Advertisements Area (TELECOM Digest Editor) 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: Information Week <infoweek@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Internet Saves Woman in Diabetic Coma Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 11:18:15 -0600 Internet Allows Sons To Rescue Mother By The Associated Press InformationWeekFri Nov 25, 4:04 PM ET OSLO, Norway (AP)--A Web camera in a Norwegian artist's living room in California allowed her sons in Norway and the Philippines to see that she had collapsed and call for help, one of the sons said last week. Karin Jordal, 69, collapsed Thursday in her living room in Pinon Hills, California, and was motionless on a couch when her son Tore in the Philippines checked in through the Internet. "He tried to call her, and got no answer," Tore's brother, Ole Jordal, said by telephone from the western Norway city of Bergen. "He had also tried to call the police and ambulances (in California) but couldn't get through." Ole Jordal said his brother then called him in Norway, as he and his wife, Tammy, originally from Long Island, New York, were having breakfast. "My wife is American and she knew exactly whom to call for help," he said. "It took five or 10 minutes for the ambulance personnel to arrive." He said the family was on the verge of tears when they watched on the Web camera as ambulance personnel assisted their diabetic mother, who is recovering in the Desert Valley Hospital in California. "I thank that camera and my sons for my life," Karin Jordal told the Norwegian newspaper Bergens Tidende by telephone from her hospital bed. She has lived in the U.S. and Spain on and off for the past 15 years. Ole Jordal said low blood sugar caused his mother's collapse, and that she would be allowed to go home after a few days in the hospital. He said the family set up Web cameras in their homes because of the high cost of staying in touch by telephone when they live so far apart. "But now I see the Internet as a way to save lives. It's also a wonderful tool for people who live alone in some remote area, and might need help," he said. The mother had been unconscious for about two hours before her sons checked in, so there was also an element of luck, since they only use the camera a few times a week. Copyright 2005 CMP Media LLC. ------------------------------ From: Lucas van Grinsven <reuters@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Firm Wants to Rid Net of Suffixes Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 11:16:18 -0600 By Lucas van Grinsven, European Technology Correspondent A Dutch technology company has breathed life into a project to rid the Internet of suffixes such as .com, and instead offer single names which can be countries, company names or fantasy words. Such a system, which enables countries, individuals and firms to have a Web address which consists of a single name, offers flexibility and is language and character independent. "The plan is to offer names in any character set," said Erik Seeboldt, managing director of Amsterdam-based UnifiedRoot. UnifiedRoot offers practically unlimited numbers of suffixes, unlike the short list of suffixes currently in use. Its offer is different from other "alternative root" providers such as New.net which offers to register names in front of a small range of new suffixes, such as .club and .law. "We've already had thousands of registrations in a single day," said Seeboldt after the official opening of his 100-strong company which has installed 13 Internet domain name system (DNS) root servers on four continents. Dutch airport Schiphol is one of the early customers. Registering a name costs $1,000 plus an annual fee of $240. Companies can then invent additional Web site addresses in front of their top-level domain (TLD) name, such as flights.schiphol or parking.schiphol. Critics argue alternative root companies such as UnifiedRoot introduce ambiguity because they bring a new set of traffic rules to the Web which are, certainly in the beginning, only recognized by a limited number of computers around the world. "Those who claim to be able to add new 'suffixes' or 'TLDs' are generally pirates or con-men with something to sell," said Paul Vixie, who sits in several committees of the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) with day-to-day control of the Web, on his CircleID blog. WELCOME Others, however are more appreciative and welcoming. "The existence of alternate roots, and the possibility of new ones, provides a useful competitive check on ICANN," said Jon Weinberg, a member of ICANNwatch which keeps a critical eye on ICANN. ICANN is overseen by the U.S. Department of Commerce and operates the root servers of the Internet which guide all Web traffic. The organization also determines which top-level domains are recognized by those root servers. At the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society earlier this month, many countries said they wanted to take part in the governance of ICANN. But the United States would not give up control. UnifiedRoot plans to take advantage of unhappiness about ICANN by offering geographic locations for free to countries, regions and cities. If alternative root companies want their TLDs recognized by computers around the world, they need to circumvent ICANN by pointing every single Internet computer around the world to their own root servers -- which contain a copy of ICANN's root server plus the addition of own-made TLDs. A quicker way to change the settings in individual computers is by closing deals with Internet Service Providers (ISPs) which can change the settings for all their subscribers. UnifiedRoot has already clinched deals with most ISPs in Turkey. ISP Tiscali is also a UnifiedRoot client. To avoid conflicts between TLDs from UnifiedRoot and ICANN, the Dutch company will not register existing ICANN TLDs. UnifiedRoot took over from a Dutch company called UNIDT which launched the initial plan for TLDs last year, but which relied on a network of root servers controlled by individuals. This made the network vulnerable to manipulation or even criminal attack directing Internet surfers to fake Web sites. "The network has not been abused, but this was a mistake," said Marty van Veluw, the founder and manager of UNIDT who sold his client base and some other assets to UnifiedRoot. "UnifiedRoot has understood that the network needs to be 100 percent reliable, and they put a new one in place," he said. Copyright 2005 Reuters Limited. NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new articles daily. ------------------------------ From: Reuters News Wire <reuters@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Wed Site Offers Saddam Uniform For Sale Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 11:09:30 -0600 A U.S. auction house is trying to sell one of Saddam Hussein's military uniforms online, calling it an "ultimate artefact" of the U.S. war in Iraq. Manion's International Auction House ( http://www.manions.com ) is offering the olive green dress uniform, complete with Saddam's special rank on its shoulder straps, at a starting price of $5,000 (2,915 pounds), but expects it to sell for much more. "We have only seen one other Hussein uniform here at Manion's, and it realized over $20,000 at auction," the auctioneer says on its Web site. The company says the uniform was obtained by a soldier in the U.S. army's Third Infantry Division after American troops seized Baghdad airport in April 2003. According to the military orders governing U.S. forces in Iraq, soldiers are forbidden from taking any artefacts or souvenirs from the country except in very rare circumstances, a U.S. military spokeswoman said on Saturday. Manion's said it would give a proportion of the proceeds from the sale to charity. Bidding closes on December 1. There have been no bids so far. Copyright 2005 Reuters Limited. ------------------------------ From: Lisa Baertlein <reuters@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Online Retailers Await 'Cyber Monday' Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 11:11:06 -0600 By Lisa Baertlein U.S. online holiday sales are expected to hit nearly $20 billion this year and should take off on Monday, when consumers return to work and their fast Internet connections after the long Thanksgiving weekend. "Cyber Monday," the term coined for the Monday after Thanksgiving, comes on the heels of the busy "Black Friday" shopping day when many brick-and-mortar retailers begin turning a profit. The good news for online shoppers this year, is that "Cyber Monday" is becoming the Web shopping equivalent to "Black Friday" when retailers launch major sales and discounts to drive traffic, analysts said. Consumers are seen spending $19.6 billion on non-travel goods on U.S. Internet sites during November and December, up 24 percent from $15.8 billion during the same period last year, according to comScore Networks. That accounts for less than 5 percent of total holiday sales in the United States but excludes large corporate purchases and sales on auction sites like eBay Inc., the most popular shopping site on the Web. "Most people who shop online do it at work, not at home," despite rising rates of high-speed home Internet connections, said Jay McIntosh, Americas director of retail and consumer products at Ernst & Young. Work connections tend to be faster than those at home, he said. While companies like Amazon.com were first to make a splash selling online, traditional retailers have helped to drive sales with investments in their own Web sites and by offering consumers the chance to return Web purchases at physical stores, McIntosh said. Concerns about returns and the inability to touch and feel items are major issues now for consumers who in recent years had listed security as a top Web-shopping worry, he said. Massive site outages, which dampened online holiday shopping in its early years, are now uncommon. Still, some shoppers were reporting on Friday that online ordering was temporarily unavailable on Best Buy Co. Inc.'s Web site. A spokeswoman said the company had been limiting the number of connections to its site due to heavy traffic following the debut this week of Microsoft Corp's Xbox 360 video game console, for which Best Buy is the retail launch partner. FREE SHIPPING RULES While today's Web shoppers are wooed by conveniences such as avoiding store lines and driving costs, as well as price-comparison tools offered by Shopping.com, Shopzilla, Yahoo Shopping and Google's Froogle, a survey from online retailer association Shop.org said the biggest draw was free shipping offers. Jupiter Research analyst Patti Freeman Evans said consumers will be more concerned about prices this year due to higher home heating costs and added that many shoppers believe they can find better deals online because there is more choice. "Pricing online is competitive. Sometimes you can get better deals online, sometimes you can get them in stores with sales and coupons and rebates," she said. (Additional reporting by Jim Finkle in Boston) Copyright 2005 Reuters Limited. NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new articles daily. ------------------------------ From: Tommy Grandell <ap@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Sweden Plans to Bring Expo to Internet Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 11:12:26 -0600 By TOMMY GRANDELL, Associated Press Writer There won't be any cotton candy, but most other treats of a world fair would be available in an Internet version of the global exposition being prepared in Sweden. The Swedish government and the organization responsible for running the World Expo want to attract younger people and others without the means to travel across the globe to visit a fair, officials said Friday. They hope to have it up and running in three years. "With an Internet World Expo, it might be possible to reach target groups that are not interested in world expositions designed the way they are today," said project leader Staffan Bjorck at the Swedish Foreign Ministry. The Paris-based Bureau International des Expositions, or BIE, the governing body of international expos, has pledged euro200,000 to get the project started, and the Swedish government is expected to do the same, Bjorck said. Organizers envision virtual pavilions from more than 100 countries, but it is not yet known if USA will participate. "The site will be an encyclopedia of different countries, their cultures, traditions and music," said Bjorck, who is also vice president of BIE. "Imagination is the only limit to the country presentations." Each member's contribution would be vetted by the BIE, in the same manner that physical pavilions are approved by the body. Major World Expos are typically arranged every fifth year and run for half a year. Some 22 million people visited the Expo 2005 in Aichi, Japan, which ended its six-month run in September. The next World Expo will be held in Shanghai, China, in 2010, with an estimated 70 million visitors. The Internet World Expo would complement the physical fair, but would run continuously and be updated with new themes. National pavilions would be based on their physical counterparts, but the virtual exhibition would also feature music, games, e-learning, an exposhop and opportunities for dialogue and chat. "It will open the doors of an exhibition to everybody worldwide, even if it is not possible to say now how many people would 'visit' this Expo," the BIE's Information and Communication Committee said in a Nov. 15 document approving the project. Organizers hope that more than 40 million people worldwide will visit the site daily, with the target group being people ages 15-24. "However, the exhibition will of course be open to everyone, and will no doubt attract a considerably broader group," Bjorck said. Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new articles daily. For more headlines news and stories from Associated Press, please go to: http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/AP.html (and) http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/newstoday.html ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 02:58:32 -0500 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: Obsessive Coupon Disorder / How the Web's Extreme Bargain Hunters VIRTUAL REALITY By STEVE STECKLOW Obsessive Coupon Disorder How the Web's extreme bargain hunters get deep discounts -- or even make a profit -- when they buy While millions of American shoppers seem willing to risk stampedes next Friday to get something on sale, Heather Wilde says she plans to sleep in. She belongs to a virtual community of extreme bargain hunters who know the best deals are online every day -- and go to elaborate lengths to find them. They've learned how cryptic codes like H2MAB5 can knock 15% off purchases at a major children's clothing retailer. They do their online shopping via special money-saving Web sites that offer rebates at hundreds of retailers, including Lands' End, Saks Fifth Avenue and Apple Computer. They share information on how to "stack" mail-in rebate forms, allowing them at times not only to get stuff like Sony Ericsson cellphones free, but actually make hundreds of dollars doing so. Which somehow seems appropriate given all the work serious online bargain hunting can entail. http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113234748894101688-GwNwJWgHDWPvvBbqKlELZocf3fo_20061126.html ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 03:19:25 +0100 From: Sam <hv2005_remove@gmail.com> Subject: New Online Auction Site I've just found http://www.billgoods.com It's a brand new online auction site, you can put your auction in 1760 categories, every seller and bidder must check! Free listing and many other things ... bid this online auction now ! snipe it. ------------------------------ From: Steven Lichter <shlichter@diespammers.com> Reply-To: Die@spammers.com Organization: I Kill Spammers, Inc. (c) 2005 A Rot in Hell Co. Subject: Re: Los Angeles Numbering, 1940s Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 01:06:28 GMT Chris Williams wrote: > Hi Tim, > What a surprise to be reading along in comp.dcom.telecom and see > someone mention California Drip and Tinkle. I grew up in Monrovia also > (MSH '65). I can remember back in very early 1950s we had an AE-40 and > to call my aunt and uncle in Highland Park we had to get the long > distance operator by dialing 110. When were you in Monrovia? > Regards, > Chris Williams Since you did not quote the message and it has been a couple of weeks, I don't know if you mean me or not. I started in San Fernando/Granada Hills with CW&T in 1967 just as it was being merged into General Telephone of Calif. I worked in Monrovia/Hasting Ranch in 1968/1969. The only good spammer is a dead one!! Have you hunted one down today? (c) 2005 I Kill Spammers, Inc. A Rot in Hell Co. ------------------------------ From: Wesrock@aol.com Date: Fri, 25 Nov 2005 20:31:33 EST Subject: Re: Auto Call Forward In a message dated Thu, 24 Nov 2005 19:38:32 -0500, asdf <asdf@asdf.com writes: > I know of a feature that when you want incoming calls forwarded > to let's say your cellular you can reconfigure the office phone. > However you have to be onsite to do so. But what if you can't get to > the phone. Is there a way of doing this remotely or is there some kind of > auto call forward feature so that if line goes down the system > automatically forwards incoming calls to the cellular. I believe the service you are looking for is called "Remote Access to Call Forwarding" (RACF). I first heard of it from a woman active in a largely volunteer organization where different volunteers took turns answering the calls when there was no one in the non-profit's office. She was looking for a way to change what number the call was forwarded to when the designated volunteer changed so that no one would have to go to the office to change the destination number. The service was not offered when she first made the request, but it became an offering a year or two later and the organization promptly subscribed to it. There was a monthly charge, but as I recall at that time it was pretty modest. Wes Leatherock wesrock@aol.com wleathus@yahoo.com ------------------------------ From: dwolffxx@panix.com (David Wolff) Subject: Re: Personal Computers Enlisted in AIDS Research Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 02:44:12 UTC Organization: Public Access Networks Corp. In article <telecom24.532.1@telecom-digest.org>, Reuters News Wire <reuters@telecom-digest.org> wrote: > A new project in the fight against AIDS will tap into the unused power > of individual and business computers to help research and identify > drugs used to combat the HIV virus. > An Internet-based initiative, called FightAIDSatHome, aims to enlist > about 100,000 computer users to donate the use of their machines when > they would otherwise be idle. I just checked the web site http://www.fightaidsathome.org . They support various Windows OSes, and Real Soon Now Linux, but not any Mac OS. So non-Windows users, don't waste your time at this time. Thanks -- David (Remove "xx" to reply.) [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: It is too bad that other OSes are not available now, but there are still plenty of Windows users, and I hope everyone who can do so will get involved in this effort to fight AIDS. PAT] ------------------------------ From: jhblee@gmail.com Subject: Re: Skype - H.323 or SIP Date: 26 Nov 2005 04:21:00 -0800 Organization: http://groups.google.com To my understading Skype is *a* form of SIP. I am not sure if it is 100% SIP but definitely the protocol resembles more of SIP than H323. One SIP provider can actually run IVR for calls from Skype clients, so I guess this is more likely so. Lasse wrote: > Hi all you gurus, > Does anyone know if Skype is based on the H.323 protocol family -- or > the more modern SIP protocol?. > Lars Kalsen > PS: You might also review: > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype > Vi leverer viden! Lars Kalsen IT-consultant, Cand. scient. & HD IT-gruppen > Brorsonsvej 19 9490 Pandrup Lars.Kalsen@itgruppen.dk www.itgruppen.dk tel: > fax: mobile: +45 96 73 01 02 +45 96 73 00 31 +45 40 15 66 02 Add me to your > address book ... Want a signature like this? > Greetings from Denmark! ------------------------------ Subject: Our New Classified Advertisements Area Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2005 16:37:09 EST From: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Starting officially on December 1, but open now for you to review and make postings in at no charge are the TELECOM Digest Classifieds, also known as Operator Pat's Bulletin Board. You'll find it at http://telecom-digest.org/classified.html You can post or respond to telecom-related postings by others relating to items for sale, (want to buy) and/or Help Wanted (and Looking for Work). It works like any other newspaper classified ads section and it is free until December 1, then a voluntary donation will be requested of one dollar per line/month, using the PayPal logo. Feel free to buy/sell/seek employment in this new section each day. You control how long the ad stays up, just like with newspapers. If the item is sold or no longer available, please use the provision to erase it. I hope this will be a useful feature. PAT ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecomm- unications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of networks such as Compuserve and America On Line, Yahoo Groups, and other forums. It is also gatewayed 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 Patrick Townson. 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. Contact information: Patrick Townson/TELECOM Digest Post Office Box 50 Independence, KS 67301 Phone: 620-402-0134 Fax 1: 775-255-9970 Fax 2: 530-309-7234 Fax 3: 208-692-5145 Email: editor@telecom-digest.org Subscribe: telecom-subscribe@telecom-digest.org Unsubscribe:telecom-unsubscribe@telecom-digest.org 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! 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Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. End of TELECOM Digest V24 #535 ****************************** | |