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TELECOM Digest Tue, 5 Jul 2005 14:10:00 EDT Volume 24 : Issue 308 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Don't Let Data Theft Happen to You (Lisa Minter) Nasty Virus Writers Get Even Nastier (Lisa Minter) Pirated Live 8 DVDs on E-Bay; Music Industry Complains (Lisa Minter) Microsoft Ready to Discuss RSS Security (Lisa Minter) IBM Lawsuit Against Microsoft (Lisa Minter) Time to Explode the Internet (Lisa Minter) Deutsche Telekom Mulls T-Mobile USA Sale (Telecom dailyLead from USTA) Harvard Project to Scan Millions of Medical Files (Monty Solomon) Saluting Thumbs in Perpetual Motion (Monty Solomon) Re: Supplemental Grounding Electrodes (Bob Vaughan) Re: Supplemental Grounding Electrodes (Don Shoemaker) Re: VoIP Phone Home? (Marc Popek) Re: Ombudsman on N. Korea Food story (jmeissen@aracnet.com) Re: DO NOT! DO NOT Use Cingular Go Phone (Lisa Hancock) 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: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: Don't Let Data Theft Happen to You Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:28:36 -0500 By M.P. DUNLEAVEY ABOUT two weeks ago, I was alarmed by a phone message from my bank alerting me to some "unusual activity" on my debit card. Unusual wasn't the word. Someone had gone on a shopping spree -- $556.46 and $650.81 at one store, $264.99 and $300 in charges that were pending at another -- and none of it was mine. My debit card was still in my wallet. I hadn't used it in days. The bank said thieves might have created a counterfeit card. Someone -- a store clerk, waiter, whoever -- could have used a card reader to harvest the information imbedded in the magnetic strip to create a fake one. The bank assured me the debit account was closed and the thieves no longer had access to my cash -- but who could be sure? How much of my personal information did these thieves get? Between bouts of tears and frantic phone calls to my bank, I became obsessed with what I might have done to prevent this. The recent spate of data breaches was worrisome, but I never expected to become a victim. Maybe I should have. Companies like Citigroup, Bank of America, ChoicePoint and LexisNexis have lost, misplaced or otherwise exposed the personal information of tens of millions of Americans. Even the government concedes it lost records containing the Social Security numbers of more than a million employees. UNFORTUNATELY, although there are steps you can take to protect yourself -- and you should -- there are no guarantees. "You cannot protect yourself completely," said Edmund Mierzwinski, consumer program director at the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in Washington. "The best thing you can do is react swiftly if it does happen." That said, Mr. Mierzwinski endorsed the preventive measures offered by Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (www.privacyrights.org), a nonprofit consumer advocacy group, and by the Identity Theft Resource Center (www.idtheftcenter.org), also a nonprofit. Besides the standard advice to shred personal documents, following are some tips I found useful: -- Avoid letting your cards out of your sight. Do not let store clerks take your card away on the pretext that there's a "problem." -- Restrict the access to your personal data by signing up for the National Do Not Call Registry (www.donotcall.gov); remove your name and address from the phone book and reverse directories -- and, most important, from the marketing lists of the credit bureaus to reduce credit card solicitations. The site www.optoutprescreen.com can help. -- Consider freezing your credit report, an option available in a growing number of states. Freezing prevents anyone from opening up a new credit file in your name (a password lets you gain access to it), and it doesn't otherwise affect your credit rating. -- Protect your home computer with a firewall, especially if you have a high-speed connection. -- Rein in your Social Security number. Remove it from your checks, insurance cards and driver's license. Ask your bank not to use it as your identification number. Refuse to give your Social Security number to merchants, and be careful even with medical providers. The only time you are required by law to give your number, Mr. Mierzwinski said, is when a company needs it for government purposes, like tax matters, Social Security and Medicare. -- Curtail electronic access to your bank accounts. Pay bills through snail mail. Avoid linking your checking to savings. Use a credit card for purchases rather than a debit card. Although I was able to get all $1,772.26 reimbursed, I was lucky. While individual liability for fraudulent credit card purchases is only $50, it can be higher for debit cards: up to $500 or even all the money in your account in some cases. These and other preventive steps may help, but people really can't safeguard their money and their data on their own. Robert Douglas, the chief executive of PrivacyToday.com, a privacy advocate, believes that this is not an issue of consumer responsibility but of corporate negligence. "These companies are trying to tell people it's their fault, but the largest breaches have been within the financial services industry itself," Mr. Douglas said. Mr. Douglas and Mr. Mierzwinski say that shredding documents is fine, but calling your state and local representatives is better. "Companies have refused to give consumers control over their financial DNA and they've refused to take responsibility for their actions," Mr. Mierzwinski said. "What will stop identity theft are stronger notification laws and stronger penalties, which we don't have now." M. P. Dunleavey writes about personal finance for MSN Money. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company 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. Read New York Times on line each day with no login nor registration requirements at: http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/nytimes.html ------------------------------ From: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: Nasty Virus Writers Get Even Nastier Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:30:51 -0500 by Jay Wrolstad, cio-today.com Malware practitioners are more prolific than ever these days and have reached a level of sophistication where the viruses they produce can spread across the Internet in minutes, according to a new report by security specialist Sophos. Thus far this year, Sophos has detected nearly 8,000 new viruses, up 59 percent from the first six months of last year. At the same time, the average time from initial release to widespread infection is decreasing rapidly. According to Sophos, there now is a 50 percent chance of being infected by an Internet worm in just 12 minutes of being online with an unprotected Windows PC. Money To Be Made For users, the latest virus report should serve as an incentive to be more diligent with security patches and other software updates, said Gregg Mastoras, senior security analyst at Sophos. Mastoras attributes the potential profits from spyware and other attacks that let hackers obtain information -- such as bank-account data or credit-card numbers -- as a primary reason for the rise in virus activity. In fact, he said, Sophos has seen a threefold increase in the number of keylogging Trojans so far this year. Once planted, these keyloggers run in the background and monitor a user's keystrokes, feeding passwords and other personal information back to the Trojan writer. Zafi, Sober Worms Top the List The long-running Zafi-D worm accounts for more than a quarter of all viruses reported to Sophos thus far this year. Dominating the top of the monthly virus charts for the first four months, this worm circulates under the guise of a Christmas greeting to trick users into opening an infected attachment. "Protection against this worm has been around for a while, but infections are still being reported, which means consumers are not protecting themselves," said Mastoras. The Sober-N worm also is nasty. Primarily, it uses file-sharing networks for distribution, then hides in the background of infected PCs before upgrading itself to a newer version to churn out spam from compromised machines. Sophos noted that traditional PC threats seem to be consolidating, which makes it difficult to identify certain kinds of attacks as being spam, spyware or virus. Some Trojans, for example, infect user machines to engage in several kinds of malicious activities. Moving Beyond Microsoft While the ubiquity of Windows-based PCs makes them the preferred target, Mastoras said virus writers seeking personal information are showing greater interest in Linux, Unix and Mac systems. As a result, businesses and others using alternative operating systems -- on desktops or servers -- should not let down their guard in the belief that they are not vulnerable to attack, he said. "It's important for all users to update their OS with the latest patches and to use antivirus applications," Mastoras said. Copyright 2005 NewsFactor Network, Inc. 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. *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. This Internet discussion group is making it available without profit to group members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of literary, educational, political, and economic issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. I believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner, in this instance, NewsFactor Network. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ------------------------------ From: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: Pirated Live 8 DVDs on eBay, Industry Protests Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:33:39 -0500 Internet auction site eBay said on Tuesday it had begun removing illegal DVD copies of the Live 8 poverty awareness pop concerts from its Web site, after the record industry complained. Some of the pirate recordings on the site early on Tuesday were on sale within 24 hours of Saturday's concerts ending, and have been attracting bids of up to 16.99 pounds ($31) each. One of them boasts footage from huge concerts in London's Hyde Park and Philadelphia. Ten concerts took place in all, from Tokyo in the east to near Toronto in the west, and more than a million people turned up to see the greatest line-up of rock stars ever assembled. While the concerts were free, British media said record company EMI (EMI.L) paid millions of pounds for the rights to release the official DVD of the event, which Bob Geldof organized to put pressure on world leaders to do more to beat poverty. "There are too many people out there who believe music is for stealing, regardless of the wishes of artists and the people who invest in them," said David Martin, director of anti-piracy at the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). "Sadly we are not at all surprised by this incident." EBay said it had begun removing the listings. "The unauthorized copies of Live 8 DVDs we have been told about have been taken down, because the sale of fake items is not permitted on eBay.co.uk," the site said in a statement. EBay has already been labeled an "electronic pimp" by Geldof after free Live 8 tickets appeared on the site ahead of Saturday's concerts. It suspended some of the accounts of users who placed hoax bids for the tickets of up to 10 million pounds in order to sabotage the sales. Geldof also organized the Live Aid charity gigs 20 years ago to raise money for Ethiopian famine victims, and brought out a re-recording of the 1984 "Do They Know It's Christmas?" track to try to prevent bootleggers profiting from the original. The BPI urged eBay to toughen its safeguards against piracy, noting a dramatic rise in illegal sales. In 2001, the BPI arranged for the removal of 2,315 illegal online auctions, but in the first six months of this year that number had risen to 13,280. 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: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: Microsoft Ready to Discuss RSS Security Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:35:31 -0500 Robert McMillan, IDG News Service Microsoft will be taking a closer look at the security of a new Web publishing technology it plans to integrate into the next major version of Windows, code-named Longhorn. Microsoft plans to offer ways for developers to use the RSS (Really Simple Syndication) standard to create Windows applications, but the company first wants to talk about the security implications of such a move. Developers should expect to discuss RSS security at Microsoft's upcoming Professional Developers Conference, to be held in Los Angeles this September, says Robert Scoble, a Microsoft technical evangelist writing in a recent Web log posting. "This is something we all need to do a lot of thinking and work on," he says. RSS is now used primarily as a way of letting Web surfers know when new articles have been posted to Web sites, but they must use special software in order to view and subscribe to RSS feeds. With Longhorn, expected in the second half of 2006, that capability will be built into the operating system. Microsoft will also provide new developer tools so that developers can more easily build Windows applications that use the protocol. Cause for Concern? Microsoft declined to say what, if any security concerns it has about RSS, but observers say that once it is included in Windows, RSS will be a much more appealing target to attackers. Jupiter Research estimates that the protocol is used by about six percent of U.S. consumers, but once it is embedded in Windows that number will jump substantially. As Web browsers and e-mail clients moved into the mainstream, so too did worms and viruses, says Rich Miller, an analyst with Netcraft. Some are concerned that the same pattern may emerge with RSS readers, he says. "Once that becomes a technology that's on everybody's desktop and can be accessed using the Windows operating system, that changes the dynamic quite substantially." Though there haven't yet been any major security risks associated with RSS, which is generally considered more secure than many other Web technologies, security may become more of an issue as RSS begins to be used for a wider variety of tasks. "We have an opportunity to look at ways we could build into RSS some of the security features that we wished had been present in e-mail," says Phillip Hallam-Baker, principal scientist with VeriSign. Phishing, for example, could become a problem as new applications are developed for RSS, he says. "At the moment, I don't see that there is a phishing issue with RSS," he says. "However, if banks start using it to distribute statements, it may become an issue." "The more automation that people have built in [to RSS] the more places that you might have somebody work out some dirty trick," Hallam-Baker says. "Are we going to make sure we've locked down as many rat holes as we could have done, or are we going to find that if we'd put better security in there, we'd be happier with the result?" he asks. Copyright 2005 PC World Communications, Inc. 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. *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. This Internet discussion group is making it available without profit to group members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of literary, educational, political, and economic issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. I believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner, in this instance, PC World Communications, Inc. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ------------------------------ From: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: IBM Lawsuit Against Microsoft Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:37:19 -0500 IBM Wins $850M Settlement vs. Microsoft By BRIAN BERGSTEIN, AP Technology Writer BOSTON - IBM Corp. will get $775 million in cash and $75 million worth of software from Microsoft Corp. to settle claims still lingering from the federal government's antitrust case against Microsoft in the 1990s, the companies announced Friday. The payout is one of the largest that Microsoft has made to settle an antitrust-related case. And it brings the software giant closer to moving on from claims involving technologies long since eclipsed. IBM was pressing for restitution for the "discriminatory treatment" that U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson cited when he ruled in 2000 that Microsoft had broken antitrust law. IBM and Microsoft once had a trailblazing collaborative relationship, dating to Big Blue's historic decision in 1981 to have Microsoft write software for the original IBM PCs. Later, IBM and Microsoft would jointly create the OS/2 operating system. But the partnership soured, and Microsoft eventually focused on Windows and left OS/2 development to IBM. In the mid-1990s, IBM irked Microsoft by selling PCs that were loaded with OS/2 as an alternative to Windows and with its SmartSuite productivity software, a rival for Microsoft Office programs. IBM also backed Java, a programming language that doesn't need Windows to run. Jackson noted that Microsoft retaliated by charging IBM more than other PC makers for copies of Windows. There were other tactics. Months before Windows 95 came out, Microsoft let other PC companies pre-install the operating system on new computers that could go on sale right after the launch. But IBM got its license only 15 minutes before the event. As a result, many customers eager for the latest software opted for machines made by IBM's rivals. Since Windows 95 arrived in August, IBM missed out on back-to-school sales and lost "substantial revenue," Jackson wrote. IBM didn't sue Microsoft over the findings, but kept the right to do so under a 2003 agreement between the companies. Similar talks led to a $150 million settlement with Gateway Inc. in April. Separately, Microsoft has spent more than $3 billion in recent years settling lawsuits by rivals, including a $1.6 billion deal with Sun Microsystems Inc. in 2004 and a $750 million truce with America Online, part of Time Warner Inc., in 2003. Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft still faces legal challenges, including a lawsuit by RealNetworks Inc. and an appeal of a $600 million antitrust ruling by European regulators. Though software maker Novell Inc. reached a $536 million settlement with Microsoft in November, Novell got a judge's approval last month to proceed with a separate antitrust suit over the WordPerfect word-processing program. Even so, Microsoft's general counsel, Brad Smith, said he believes antitrust issues are close to being resolved. IBM had been the biggest rival with a pending claim. "This takes us another very significant step forward," he said. "We're entering what I think is the final stage of this process." The $775 million payment will pad IBM's second-quarter earnings, which are due to be released in two weeks. The Armonk, N.Y.-based company is coming off a first-quarter report that included a $1.4 billion profit but fell short of Wall Street's expectations. Microsoft set aside $550 million for antitrust claims in April, during the company's fiscal third quarter. At least part of the IBM payment could result in a charge in the company's fourth quarter; results are expected July 21. IBM shares rose 47 cents to close at $74.67 on the New York Stock Exchange. Microsoft shares fell 13 cents to $24.71 on the Nasdaq Stock Market. When Jackson ruled against Microsoft in 2000, he ordered the company broken into two as punishment. But a year later, the Clinton-era Justice Department having given way to the Bush administration, the government decided not to seek the breakup. The case was settled in 2002. Even with Friday's deal, IBM reserved the right to press claims that its server business was harmed by Microsoft's behavior. But such claims appear unlikely to surface soon. IBM agreed not to seek damages for actions that occurred before mid-2002, meaning the findings in Jackson's ruling would no longer apply. But while much of that case is anachronistic now -- OS/2 faded by the late 1990s, and IBM doesn't even make PCs anymore, having sold the business to China's Lenovo Group Ltd. -- there's still conflict between Microsoft and IBM. Perhaps Microsoft's toughest competitive challenge today comes from the open-source Linux operating system, which has made steady gains especially in overseas markets. Some of Linux's biggest backing has come from IBM. Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. ------------------------------ From: Lisa Minter <lisa_minter2001@yahoo.com> Subject: Time to Explode the Internet? Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 11:23:28 -0500 An editorial comment from Chicago Tribune, July 4, 2005: In the beginning, the Internet was an experiment among a small group of government scientists and military folks who all seemed to know each other. They were friendly. Then the doors were thrown open to the public, and millions revved their engines and zoomed onto the Internet superhighway. All these technological pioneers marveled at the clever new ways to share information, find out stuff, buy things and connect with others who have common interests. Unowned and virtually unregulated, the Internet functioned for a few years in the mid-1990s under self-governance, a certain live-free-or-die ethic of community responsibility. Most people were still friendly. The Internet's original design rested on the premise that all these new Netizens would be as law-abiding and conscientious in the privacy of their home offices as they would be strolling through a public park. But even savvy computer users aren't monolithic. Some have a dark side. In came the hackers, the viruses, worms, spyware, phishing, and spam; the purveyors of pharmaceuticals and porn sites; and Nairobi bank presidents and generals promising to wire millions of dollars into your bank if you'd kindly give them your account number. According to a Washington Post report last weekend, Carnegie Mellon University CERT Coordination Center logged 3,780 new computer security vulnerabilities in 2004. In 2000 the center logged 1,090. In 1995, it was just 171. Weeks ago, in one of the largest security breaches of the Internet to date, MasterCard International revealed that more than 40 million credit card numbers had been exposed to hackers and potential fraud. "The Internet is stuck in the flower-power days of the 1960s during which people thought the world would be beautiful if you are just nice," computer scientist Karl Auerbach told the Post. Formerly with Cisco Systems Inc., Auerbach now volunteers with engineering groups to try to improve the Internet. Auerbach is part of a handful of groups now looking into whether the entire Internet needs an overhaul, or, in Web-speak, a Version 2.0. What the existence of those groups tacitly acknowledges is that too many people aren't just nice. With more than a billion Internet users across the globe, and nearly everyone who surfs it vulnerable to hazards, a structural overhaul is not an outlandish idea. Copyright 2005, Chicago Tribune 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. ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 12:31:48 EDT From: Telecom dailyLead from USTA <usta@dailylead.com> Subject: Deutsche Telekom Mulls T-Mobile USA Sale Telecom dailyLead from USTA July 5, 2005 http://www.dailylead.com/latestIssue.jsp?i=22830&l=2017006 TODAY'S HEADLINES NEWS OF THE DAY * Deutsche Telekom mulls T-Mobile USA sale BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH * Broadcom sues Qualcomm * Mobile phone companies eye music business * European telecom market heats up USTA SPOTLIGHT * Just Released: The USTelecom IP Video Implementation & Planning Guide EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES * AOL's Live 8 coverage a success REGULATORY & LEGISLATIVE * P2P, music companies seek new business model Follow the link below to read quick summaries of these stories and others. http://www.dailylead.com/latestIssue.jsp?i=22830&l=2017006 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 21:56:08 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: Harvard Project to Scan Millions of Medical Files By Gareth Cook, Globe Staff Harvard scientists are building a powerful computer system that will use artificial intelligence to scan the private medical files of 2.5 million people at local hospitals, as part of a government-funded effort to find the genetic roots of asthma and other diseases. The $20 million project -- which would probe more deeply and more quickly into medical records than human researchers are capable of -- is designed to find links between patients' DNA and illnesses. Although the effort could raise concerns about privacy, researchers say the new program, called 'I2B2' (for 'Informatics for Integrating Biology and the Bedside) would respect the strict guidelines set out in federal and state laws, and could be a powerful tool for many kinds of research. Hospitals gather huge amounts of information from patients each day -- from blood tests to chest X-rays and brain scans. For decades, researchers have pored through these records and gleaned insights that have helped millions of Americans. Now, the Harvard team hopes to put far more information at the fingertips of researchers, and to speed the process with sophisticated automation. Scientists said the Harvard work and similar efforts elsewhere increase the stakes in the nation's move to medical records stored electronically. With mounting examples of personal financial information being compromised, work such as this will have to be done with extreme care. Scientists also said, however, that if the project is successful, it would be widely copied -- and it could mean that studies that now take months or years could be done in weeks or even minutes. "If we could use routine clinical care to generate new findings without having to do multimillion-dollar studies, that would be a true change in the way medical discovery is done," said Dr. Isaac Kohane, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School who is one of the project's directors. "We want to use the healthcare system as a living laboratory." All of the records -- from patients at Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women's Hospital, and several Partners HealthCare hospitals -- are protected by multiple layers of security designed to prevent private medical information from being released, the scientists said. None of the information will be sold, said John Glaser, the project's other director, and the chief information officer for Partners HealthCare. Funding for the five-year I2B2 project began in the fall of 2004; researchers are now getting the first hints of success and are forming plans to contact patients. The first study to be carried out under the project is an effort to understand the genetic roots of asthma, which afflicts about 20 million Americans. For reasons that are not well understood, some asthma patients do not respond well to the usual treatments and suffer repeated, frightening attacks that send them to the emergency room, said Dr. Scott Weiss, a scientist at the Channing Laboratory at Brigham and Women's Hospital who is leading the asthma team. http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2005/07/03/harvard_project_to_scan_millions_of_medical_files/ ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 4 Jul 2005 22:54:27 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: Saluting Thumbs in Perpetual Motion @LARGE By Scott Kirsner ESPN doesn't understand the excitement, and Fox Sports doesn't grasp the inherent danger. The New England Sports Network simply can't appreciate the technique and strategy. That's why none of those channels carried live coverage of the first-ever @Large BlackBerry Invitational Tournament, held last week. Their mistake. This would've been a ratings bonanza. Who cares about baseball or golf when you could be watching a middle manager surreptitiously typing 60 words-per-minute under the conference table during a plodding PowerPoint presentation? Nearly 50 entrants vied for the grand prize: a mention in print, and the right to add a line to one's e-mail signature boasting, 'Winner of the 2005 @Large BlackBerry Invitational.' Proceeds from the competition went to the American Association for the Prevention of Thumb Tendinitis, a painful affliction that sadly ends the careers of many talented BlackBerry users. (Perhaps you'll donate, as there were no proceeds this year.) Two observations led me to launch the tourney.The first was that people with hand-held e-mail devices tend to get obsessed with responsiveness. (I use the term BlackBerry to encompass devices like the PalmOne Treo and the T-Mobile Sidekick, which I'm sure infuriates the legal department at Research In Motion, the Canadian company that makes BlackBerrys.) They volley back answers mere milliseconds after the sender has asked the question.The second observation was that as people have been getting more comfortable with their devices, responses have been getting longer. http://www.boston.com/business/personaltech/articles/2005/07/04/saluting_thumbs_in_perpetual_motion/ ------------------------------ From: techie@tantivy.tantivy.net (Bob Vaughan) Subject: Re: Supplemental Grounding Electrodes Date: Tue, 5 Jul 2005 10:48:09 UTC Organization: Tantivy Associates In article <telecom24.307.9@telecom-digest.org>, Paul Coxwell <paulcoxwell@tiscali.co.uk> wrote: >> Article 250.54 of the NEC says local supplemental grounding >> electrodes (such as the one for phone service) must be bonded to >> the primary electrode. Where does the NEC apply? According to >> what the telco man admitted seven years ago, I assume our county >> code says the same thing. > Which edition of the NEC are you looking at? In the 2002 edition > article 250.54 relates to supplementary electrodes which MAY be > bonded, not MUST. 250.58 does seem to correspond with 250.54 in > earlier editions though, so that could be the section you are looking > at. > Chapter 8 of the NEC also relates specifically to communication systems. > Article 800.40(D) in the 2002 edition states: > QUOTE > Bonding of Electrodes. A bonding jumper not smaller than 6 AWG copper > or equivalent shall be connected between the communications grounding > electrode and power grounding electrode system at the building or > structure served where separate electrodes are used. > /QUOTE >> Is this a recent addition to the NEC? > No. I don't know how far back the requirement goes, but the 1971 NEC > says much the same thing in article 800-31(b)(7): > QUOTE > Bonding of Electrodes. A bond not smaller than No. 6 copper or > equivalent shall be placed between the communication and power grounding > electrodes where the requirements of (5) above result in the use of > separate electrodes. > /QUOTE It looks like 800-31(b)(7) was added after 1965. The 1965 code says, in section 800-31 (b)(5): [QUOTE] Electrode. The grounding conductor shall preferably be connected to a water pipe electrode. Where a water pipe is not readily available and the grounded conductor of the power service is connected to the water pipe at the building, the protector grounding conductor may be grounded to the power service conduit, service equipment enclosures, or grounding conductor of the power service. In the absence of a water pipe, connection may be made to a continuous and extensive underground gas piping system, to an effectively grounded metallic structure, or to a ground rod or pipe driven into permanently damp earth. Steam or hot water pipes, or lightning rod conductors shall not be employed as electrodes for protectors. A driven rod or pipe used for grounding power circuits shall not be used for grounding communication circuits unless the driven rod or pipe is connected to the grounded conductor of a multigrounded neutral power system. The requirements for separate made electrodes for power and lighting system grounds, those for communication systems, and those for a lightning rod installation shall not prohibit the bonding together of all such made electrodes. See Section 250-86. [ It is recommended that all separate electrodes be bonded together to limit potential differences between them ans between their associated wiring systems. ] [/QUOTE] > Disclaimer: Being British I'm just an outside observer to the NEC. I > could post your query in a Stateside electrical forum where we have > some NEC experts though, if you wish.> > - Paul -- Welcome My Son, Welcome To The Machine -- Bob Vaughan | techie @ tantivy.net | | P.O. Box 19792, Stanford, Ca 94309 | -- I am Me, I am only Me, And no one else is Me, What could be simpler? -- ------------------------------ From: Don_Shoemaker@HotMail.com Subject: Re: Supplemental Grounding Electrodes Date: 5 Jul 2005 09:26:46 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com John Hines wrote: > The NEC does get revised periodically, 2002 the most recent. The 2005 version has been out for several months. > Grounding and bonding have been revised in the last few years. In > summary, the service entrance has to have a ground rod installed, and > this is bonded to the electrical system at one and only place at the > main box, this is the grounded conductor aka neutral. A great resource on grounding and anything related to electrical work & the NEC is www.MikeHolt.com. ------------------------------ From: Marc Popek <LVMarc@att.net> Subject: Re: VoIP Phone Home? Date: Mon, 04 Jul 2005 22:32:28 GMT Organization: AT&T Worldnet And some wish to have a VOIP and a PSTN local presence. Why into use a PSTN /VOIP automatic switch so that you can mange both services from a single handset, answering machine etc? Marco http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5786887222&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMESE%3AIT&rd=1 fiatlux <jmc@canon.org> wrote in message news:telecom24.299.2@telecom-digest.org: > Written by: Jason Canon > Peach ePublishing LLC > VoIP Phone Home? > The movie Extra Terrestrial (ET) coined the phrase "phone home" and > each year American's look for more cost effective ways to do just > that. The past 10 years have seen the development and growing > popularity of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technologies to > achieve cost savings over the traditional circuit-switched telephone > networks. The two dominate technologies used for VoIP are: (1) the > Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) and (2) Peer-2-Peer (P2P). For > business and educational institutions SIP VoIP solutions have produced > substantial savings. For home voice users, however, SIP VoIP is still > value challenged. > A typical circuit-switched landline phone costs about $19.95 per month > (plus tax). The good old American landline phone should be graphically > depicted beside the word "reliable" in the dictionary. Not only does > it keep working, even when all electrical power fails, but it can even > provide you with a light to dial with. At $15 dollars per month SIP > VoIP is still value challenged due to the lack of full support for > E9-1-1 emergency services and of course the reliability issues > inherent with using a real time application over a "best effort" > network like today's Internet. Although few VoIP articles still > reference Internet Request For Comments (RFC) 3714 "IAB Concerns > Regarding Congestion Control," the technical challenges associated > with VoIP are widely known. Further, even with the recent dubious > edict by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that VoIP service > providers will provision support for E9-1-1 within 90 days, this still > leaves the reliability issues unresolved. The use of adaptive rate > CODEC's to prevent congestion collapse is a swell idea if it applies > to my neighbor's service but not my own. Using adaptive rate CODEC's > to elicit voluntary user preemption has no appeal in the modern world. > Technology is supposed to be getting better and it is clearly not > better that users receive disconnects or degraded service quality in > order to constrain network bandwidth consumption. > Quality of Service (QoS) has been the four letter word of the Internet > for a very long time. Yet, we know that real time applications such as > video and voice are a mismatch for "best effort" service models. Cost > savings are important, but not if they require users to accept > backward technology leaps. After 9/11 the United States should have > begun standardization efforts to insure that VoIP QoS levels would be > equivalent to circuit-switched networks, especially where emergency > E9-1-1 calls are concerned. The recent FCC order only requires that > E9-1-1 call center traffic be properly routed. It does nothing to > insure QoS of the connection once the call is completed. > As for SIP VoIP in the home, there is too little incentive for savvy > consumers to part with more of their hard earned communications > dollars for an industry offering that simply does not meet the needs > of the user. Until something concrete can be done to move SIP VoIP > forward, service based on P2P such as Skype seems to be the only > sensible choice on the kitchen table. Why should home users pay $15 or > more per month for less reliable communications than they already have > with their land line? Skype gives users the ability to experience > "best effort" voice over the Internet for FREE. Could this be the > reason why more than 125 million copies of Skype's P2P software has > been downloaded? And for the occasions where interconnection with the > existing circuit-switched telephone networks is required, Skype offers > a very competitive 2 cents per minute interconnection rate. With Skype > you can talk for 12 =BD hours interconnected to the phone system for > the same cost as a basic rate SIP VoIP service. > Until genuine changes are made to support SIP VoIP QoS there does not > appear to be a convincing or compelling reason today for users to > choose anything other than P2P VoIP services such as Skype to render > Internet "best effort" home phone services. > You can read the complete article and view associated graphics online > at: http://canon.org/VoIP_Phone_Home.html. > Copyright 2005 Peach ePublishing, LLC > Jason Canon has authored numerous technical research papers including: > photonic switching, gigabit networking, VoIP E9-1-1 and others. He is > an expert author for EzineArticles.com. E-mail: Jason Canon at > jmc@canon.org. > 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: jmeissen@aracnet.com Subject: Re: Ombudsman on N. Korea Food story Date: 5 Jul 2005 04:02:02 GMT Organization: http://extra.newsguy.com In article <telecom24.307.14@telecom-digest.org>, Justa Lurker <JustaLurker@att.net> wrote: > No one is stopping you (or anyone else) from leaving. So if you are > so unhappy and dissatisfied here in the USA as you seem to be based > upon your constant snide comments and whining, then by all means I > suggest you move to some other country more to your liking. Ah, yes. "Love It or Leave IT". If you don't like being shagged by the power elite, well, TS, Eliot! No criticism allowed! I would point out that the right of dissent is at the core of our country. If that's not acceptable to our esteemed anonymous lurker then I invite him to go live in a country more suited to his beliefs. Oh, wait ... that's what the Administration is making this country! ;-) john- (not afraid to sign his real name) John Meissen jmeissen@aracnet.com [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Well, Justa signed his name elsewhere, and he has been around here for awhile, so his screen name is no hassle to me. In fact, John, you may come to regret signing _your_ name to most anything sometime soon. It has been well known for quite a long time now that there are rotten, no-good jackals who read this Telecom Digest each day _just to harvest any real names_ they can find. So I do not fault anyone who feels they need to at least camoflouge their email address these days. If I were not the editor here, and had to stand in the open as a place for guys to write to, I probably would hide my email address also -- in fact, in other instances, I do in other forums, etc. So I seriously doubt that Justa is afraid of any repercussions from _me_ or this forum; more that likely he has been eaten alive so often by spamscam he does not give his real name any more often than necessary. PAT] ------------------------------ From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com Subject: Re: DO NOT! DO NOT Use Cingular Go Phone Date: 5 Jul 2005 08:56:32 -0700 > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Now I would think that a prepaid > customer was the best possible customer; no credit problems for the > company to worry about; they probably have a few million dollars in > effect 'loaned' to them on a revolving basis each day that they do > not yet have to account for. To add insult to injury, the cell > phone people even route their prepaid customers through some idiot > service bureau in an international place. PAT] I have heard problems from people using pre-paid phones, such as "Trac" phone (believe it's offered by Verizon). Yes, the service offices were international and no help at all. I don't understand either why the wireless companies treat these ad-hoc customers so poorly. Maybe because they really want the guaranteed $40/month customers and hope they'll spend money on premium services to generate even more profit. I shudder to think what people are paying for cell phone service these days given how often and long they talk, esp teenagers. I hear my cube neighbors yelling at their kids for overuse of txt messaging or other premium services that drove up the bill. Do cell phone plans still charge per call? I have an old plan that is $19.95 a month. Even on 'free' off peak calls there is a 12c land line fee for each call made or received. Since I don't use the phone that much I don't mind it. Periodically some clueless salesperson calls me to push an upgrade to a fancy new phone (that I must purchase) and pay $40 a month for a "cheaper plan". Considering usage charges are now about $1-3 a month it would be quite foolish for me to switch; but they tell me I'll save money. When I first got cellphone service I went to the wireline carrier. I expected the same sort of treatment regular phone service got. I quickly learned it was a very separate division with very different practices. I thought I'd get best service by being in one of their owned stores, not an agent or mall kiosk. Didn't matter. The salesgirl was bored, pretty much threw the phone at me, didn't bother explaining how it worked until I insisted she do so and still left out a lot. She spent time on the phone making her social plans for the evening. When I pass the kiosks today I don't see anything different. The sales people just push the $40 plans and fancy features. If they realize you want very basic service they lose interest and shoo you away. I guess they work only on commission. I've had a few good people on customer service (one even gave me her direct inward number so I could call her back if not resolved), but most were clueless. It is clear, unlike the old days when someone in the Commercial Dept of Bell was a career worker, today's workers are just passing through. Turnover is very high and nobody thinks that is a problem. Today some kid (ie a 19 y/o) is selling cell phones, tomorrow he or she will be serving pizza down the shore and the day after they'll be working for a bank boiler room. I do get frustrated at this world when the server of pizza at my local joint has more knowledge of food preparation and service then someone at phone store has about phones. The servers at my pizzaria are young but still have been there a few years and if you ask for a special order they will accomodate you. This is great for getting pizza, but why can't the rest of the business world operate this way? What is the pizzaria owner doing for his employees so that they stick around for a few years -- in what is not the most pleasant job in the world -- that big companies can't do for their employees in what should be far more pleasant working surroundings? ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications 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'. 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