32 Years of the Digest ... founded August 21, 1981
Add this Digest to your personal
or 
The Telecom Digest for August 30, 2013
Volume 32 : Issue 184 : "text" Format
====== 32 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
|
Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Bill Horne 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 that person, or email address
owner.
Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be
sold or given away without the explicit written consent of the owner of
that address. 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, and other stuff of interest.
|
Date: Wed, 28 Aug 2013 20:35:21 -0700 (PDT)
From: Joseph Singer <joeofseattle@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: How one man turns annoying cold calls into cash
Message-ID: <1377747321.53918.YahooMailNeo@web121403.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>
A man targeted by marketing companies is making money from cold calls
with his own premium-rate phone number.
In November 2011 Lee Beaumont paid &pount;10 plus VAT to set up his personal
0871 line - so to call him now costs 10p, from which he receives 7p.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23869462
***** Moderator's Note *****
In the U.S., these are "976" numbers. Does anyone still offer them?
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: 29 Aug 2013 16:39:43 -0000
From: "John Levine" <johnl@iecc.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: How one man turns annoying cold calls into cash
Message-ID: <20130829163943.17647.qmail@joyce.lan>
>In the U.S., these are "976" numbers. Does anyone still offer them?
I don't think so. And apparently the last carrier that was willing to
bill for 900 numbers no longer does, so there aren't any more 900 numbers,
either.
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 01:59:23 -0400
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: NYC area emergency "weather station" off the air
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1308290154570.506@panix5.panix.com>
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has operated a
nationwide network of radio transmitters providing full time weather reports
and forecasts for decades now, dating back to their "Weather Bureau" days.
As I wrote in a note way back in Oct 2005 [a], where I discussed the
lack of backup power to many of their facilities:
"These stations are part of the real emergency network and are supposed
to stay up after anything short of a direct nuclear hit."
Ok, I'm exaggerating a touch. But still...
There are numerous radio receivers that can pick up these stations, with
many of them in a "silent/squelch mode" until activated.
In case of a local hazardous/emergency situation such as a hurricane,
tornado, flood, chemical spill, nuclear reactor plant breach, or.. national
events up to and including nuclear attack, the transmitters send out an
alert tone which "unlocks" the receivers and activates the loudspeakers.
Hence just about every "911 PSAP" (public safety answering position),
utility headquarters, transit operations center, many tv/radio stations,
and... thousands and thousands of people living in tornado/hurricane/flood
zones, have these radios. Hence it's critical that the system stay up.
Recently friends of mine in NYC noted that the local station, covering
perhaps 15 million people, was repeatedly off the air for the past two
months.
Finally, after many complaints to NOAA, they posted a note on their
"outages" web page confirming the problem. And then, a few days later, came
up with the startling reason that...
(quoting from the page [b]):
SPECIAL NOTICE
NEW YORK CITY, NY Transmitter (KWO35)
Frequency 162.550
Due to interference issues with the U.S. Coast Guard, the New York City
transmitter has been temporarily taken out of service while a solution is
being formulated.
Yes. Really. And no one is willing to simply "roll back" the
systems to the way they were three months ago.
The Big Problem here (aside from the lack of urgency by all the folk
involved) is that many, make that MANY, people and agencies are counting on
this working. Folk using the radios in "squelch" (silent) mode are relying
on them to "open up" in an emergency, yet have no way to know the system is
dead.
It's kind of like depending on your overhead sprinklers and not knowing
that the main water valve is off. Or not knowing your smoke detector
battery is dead.
[a]
[http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/24.07.html#subj4
[
[b]
[http://www.nws.noaa.gov/nwr/outages.php
[
- since the NOAA outage page is dynamic and, hopefully, real soon now, will
change when the system is finally fixed, I've mirrored that image up at:
http://www.dburstein.com/images/noaa-tx.png
+--------------------------------------------------------------+
Date: Tue, 27 Aug 2013 19:27:54 -0700 (PDT)
From: Neal McLain <nmclain.remove-this@and-this-too.annsgarden.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Rim Fire and Landlines
Message-ID: <da03f8e4-528e-4d26-8ca1-5840733856ef@googlegroups.com>
Cross-posted from the Telecom Collectors International listserv.
Walt Aydelotte <aydelotte01@comcast.net> wrote:
> I received this message from Susan Mundy regarding the massive
> Wild Fire that is ravaging the Sierra Nevada Mountains just
> outside of Yosemite National Park, which is close to Twain Harte
> where she lives. She is a very avid Telephone Collector who is
> very popular with many of the Telephone Collector community. She
> has let me know that all of her better phones have been "removed
> to a safe protected environment", and that she is feeling better
> now that they are safe. At any rate, she uncovered another
> salient reason one might think long and hard about giving up
> your last Land Line. Here is her message:
>
> Hi Walt,
>
> The Rim fire is a few miles from my home and tension is high in
> our community. When we are given an "advisory evacuation", it
> is done with a reverse 911 call to our land lines. Tonight at
> the community meeting with all of the agencies working on this
> catastrophic fire, someone asked if cell phones could be added
> to the list because some people have given up their land lines.
> With the current system we have in place, it will take two or
> three weeks for cell phones to be added. Not much help, so our
> sheriff's department is sending out officers to each house to
> make sure everyone receives the advisory evacuation message.
> Once the status changes to mandatory evacuation, we have to
> leave immediately, so the advisory evacuation notice is
> critical. This is just another reason why I will NEVER give up
> my land line.....I know the subject of whether to keep a land
> line comes up on the list-serve, and who would have thought that
> it would take 2-3 weeks to add a cell phone number to an
> emergency system. That is the current state of affairs in
> Tuolumne County California, and even the top officials were
> shocked it will take that long to add a cell phone number.
>
> If you feel the 911 reverse news is list-serve worthy, please
> share. I would never have known except I am in the middle
> of this mess....
>
> Sue
Posted by Neal McLain
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 13:08:21 -0700 (PDT)
From: Neal McLain <nmclain.remove-this@and-this-too.annsgarden.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Aereokiller in the Ninth Circuit
Message-ID: <3e8c779e-6133-43a6-ac89-3c47be246f76@googlegroups.com>
By Harry Cole, FHH Commonlaw Blog, August 28, 2013
> May it please the court? Maybe, maybe not. YOU be the judge.
>
> Even those practiced in the art of appellate advocacy have
> trouble correctly guessing, on the basis of oral arguments, how
> a court will ultimately rule....
>
> The post-argument guessing game is particularly hard for the
> Great Unwashed because appellate arguments tend to be somewhat
> intimate affairs, not widely publicized beforehand, seldom
> recorded for extensive public consumption. Any press accounts of
> arguments tend to shed only limited light on precisely what was
> said, making it hard for the reader to draw any conclusions.
>
> But things are different in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the
> Ninth Circuit which, as it turns out, posts audio recordings of
> its arguments on its website within 24 hours of each argument.
Continued:
http://tinyurl.com/palrqz9
As T-D readers will recall from my previous posts about Aereo, copyright
owners, including broadcast station licensees, have sued it claiming copyright
infringement. Aereo has successfully defended itself in District Court
(Southern District of New York) and the Court of Appeals (Second Circuit).
Another company providing a service similar to Aereo's, formerly called
Aereokiller but now known as FilmOn X, has been operating in Los Angeles.
Copyright owners have sued that company as well, and in this case, the
District Court (Central District of California) ruled against it. FilmOn has
appealed to the Court of Appeals (Ninth Circuit) which has not yet issued a
ruling.
If the Ninth Circuit rules against FilmOn, two Appeals Court decisions will be
in conflict. It will then be up to the Supreme Court to settle the issue.
As the article cited above notes, oral arguments in Ninth Circuit's proceeding
have been posted on line.
http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/media/2013/08/27/13-55156.wma
Neal McLain
TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecom-
munications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in
addition to Usenet, where it appears as the moderated newsgroup
'comp.dcom.telecom'.
TELECOM Digest is a not-for-profit, mostly non-commercial educational
service offered to the Internet by Bill Horne. All the contents
of the Digest are compilation-copyrighted. You may reprint articles in
some other media on an occasional basis, but please attribute my work
and that of the original author.
The Telecom Digest is moderated by Bill Horne.
This Digest is the oldest continuing e-journal about telecomm-
unications on the Internet, having been founded in August, 1981 and
published continuously since then. Our archives are available for
your review/research. We believe we are the oldest e-zine/mailing list
on the internet in any category!
URL information: http://telecom-digest.org
Copyright (C) 2013 TELECOM Digest. All rights reserved.
Our attorney is Bill Levant, of Blue Bell, PA.
Finally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as
yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help
is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of fifty dollars
per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above.
Please make at least a single donation to cover the cost of processing
your name to the mailing list.
All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the
author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only
and messages should not be considered any official expression by the
organization.
End of The Telecom Digest (5 messages)
Return to Archives ** Older Issues