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TELECOM Digest Wed, 28 Sep 2005 15:34:00 EDT Volume 24 : Issue 441 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson FCC Backs Down Again on VOIP/911 (Bruce Myerson) Arizona Court Rules Against Unwanted Text Message Spam (Martin Bosworth) SanDisk Unveils Secure Memory Cards (Reuters News Wire) In Baton Rouge Center, Nothing to do But Wait (Thomas Frank) Louisiana Begins Hefty Task of Cleaning Up (USA Today News Wire) When Students Open Up - a Little Too Much;Colleges Cite Risks (Solomon) Cellular-News For Wednesday 28th September 2005 (Cellular-News) Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? (Wesrock@aol.com) Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? (Joseph) Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? (harold@) Re: Why is VOIP Getting Hot Now? (Joseph) Re: Why is VOIP Getting Hot Now? (beavis) Re: Did You Say Dogging or Blogging? Brits Confused (Paul Coxwell) How Come www Has Number i.e. http://www31.website.com? (strutsng@gmail.com) Can PC to Phone Talk? Is VoIP Only Choice For PC/PC Talk (strutsng@gmail) Re: Scientists Find Mature Galaxy Eight Times Larger Than Milky Way (Dink) 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: Bruce Myerson <ap@telecom-digest.org> Subject: FCC Backs Down Again on VOIP/911 Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 18:58:39 -0500 By Bruce Meyerson, AP Business Writer NEW YORK --The Federal Communications Commission backed off again Tuesday on enforcing a deadline for Internet phone service providers to disconnect all customers who haven't acknowledged that they understand it may be hard to reach a live emergency dispatcher when dialing 911. The agency explained that the status reports required from every Internet phone company last week showed that by "repeatedly prompting subscribers through a variety of means, the majority of providers ... have obtained acknowledgments from nearly all, if not all, of their subscribers." The decision came a day before a deadline that would have required Internet phone companies to cut off at least 10,000 of the estimated 2.7 million users of the service in the United States. The FCC said providers who have received confirmations from at least 90 percent of their subscribers will no longer face the disconnection requirement, but still must continue seeking the remaining acknowledgments. All carriers below the 90 percent threshold will have until Oct. 31 to reach that level and avoid the disconnection requirement. Vonage Holdings Corp., the biggest carrier with more than 1 million subscribers, told The Associated Press on Monday that 99 percent of its customer base have responded to the company's notices about 911 risks. But that still meant that about 10,000 accounts stood to be shut off as early as Wednesday. The deadline, originally set for a month ago before a last-minute reprieve by FCC, was intended as an interim safeguard while Internet phone companies rush to comply with another FCC order that they add full 911 capabilities by late November. The FCC issued the order in May after a series of highly publicized incidents in which Internet phone users were unable to connect with a live emergency dispatch operator when calling 911. Critics had been increasingly vocal in questioning the wisdom of abruptly leaving users without any calling capability, particularly a type of phone service that came through in a pinch in the chaos after Hurricane Katrina. Cut off from traditional and cellular phone service by the floods after the storm, a top aid to the mayor of New Orleans managed to re-establish communications with the outside world -- including President Bush -- using a broadband connection and an Internet phone account. "To have a system where you risk cutting customers off in such a short time frame? It's unintended consequences," Sen. John Sununu of New Hampshire said in a speech last week at VON, a conference that revolves around Internet phone technology, which is also known as VoIP or Voice-over-Internet-Protocol. "Cutting someone off from their voice service carries enormous risks," Sununu said. Unlike the traditional telephone network, where phone numbers are associated with a specific location, VoIP users can place a call from virtually anywhere they have access to a high-speed Internet connection. That "roaming" flexibility, while generally viewed as a benefit, can make it more complex to connect VoIP accounts to the computer systems that automatically route 911 calls to the nearest emergency dispatcher and instantly transmit the caller's location and phone number to the operator who answers the call. Most VoIP providers have only been able to offer a watered-down version of 911 service that often directs emergency calls to a general administrative phone number at a local public safety office. In many cases, those lines are not staffed by emergency operators, and some may even play only a recording or go unanswered, particularly during non-peak hours. Cable-based VoIP services have avoided the roaming issue by tying each phone number to a specific location and emergency dispatch center. But VoIP providers who allow their customers to use their numbers in multiple locations face major challenges. They need to adopt a technology that will send their customers into a disparate national patchwork of 911 call-routing systems and databases. That means they must reach an interconnection agreement with each of the more than 1,000 local phone companies who maintain and operate those 911 systems. While most Internet phone companies and industry observers haven't objected to the FCC's goal, many have criticized the agency for allowing only four months for such a young industry with limited financial resources to overcome the assorted hurdles with providing full 911. "I'm not sure what the FCC was thinking when they made up their 120-day timeframe," Sununu said in his speech last week. 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. For headlines and stories from New York Times daily with no registration nor login requirements go to: http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/nytimes.html ------------------------------ From: Martin H. Bosworth <consumeraffairs@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Arizona Court Rules Against Unwanted Text Messaging Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 19:00:21 -0500 By Martin H. Bosworth ConsumerAffairs.Com Cell phone users frustrated by unsolicited ads and text messages may have some relief at last. The Arizona Court of Appeals upheld a ruling that unsolicited text messaging to a cell phone violates federal laws against telemarketing. The three-judge panel ruled that Arizona-based Acacia Mortgage Corporation violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) of 1991 when it sent two unsolicited text messages to local businessman Rodney L. Joffe. The court's ruling stated that text-based short messaging services (SMS) constituted a "call," just as a voice call or "autodialed" message would. Acacia had argued that the TCPA could not have anticipated technological advances such as text messaging or e-mail when it was enacted, and thus did not apply. The judges disagreed, stating in their opinion that, "Congress intended the TCPA to apply to advances in automatic telephone dialing technology and to the use of that technology to disrupt the privacy of residential (and business) telephone subscribers. Protecting the privacy of the home from unwarranted and unrequested intrusions constitutes a significant governmental interest." Joffe filed suit against Acacia in 2001, and was awarded a pretrial judgment which Acacia appealed. Joffe was petitioning the court to grant class action status to his lawsuit at the time of the appeal decision. The case will now return to the trial court. If Acacia appeals the ruling, the case could be taken to the state Supreme Court. Joffe's business ventures have included fighting spam proliferation from direct marketers and establishing ethical guidelines for solicitations. His company, Whitehat Inc., designs marketing structures for companies to advertise without resorting to spam or junk mail. "We make sure companies perform e-mail marketing appropriately and with permission," Joffe told ConsumerAffairs.Com. Companies such as Jamster have come under fire from consumers and anti-spam advocates for sending unsolicited e-mails or text messages to unsuspecting phone subscribers, and in some cases charging the subscriber even if they haven't purchased anything from the service. Joffe commented that since the lawsuit was filed, he has received "1 or 2 spams on his cellphone in the past four years. I think they got the hint I was not the right person to be targeting." Asked if the court ruling might set a precedent against companies sending unsolicited text messages or e-mails, Joffe replied, "I sure as hell hope so!" Copyright 2003-2005 ConsumerAffairs.Com 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. ------------------------------ From: Sinead Carew and Lucas van Grinsven <reuters@telecom-digest.org> Subject: SanDisk Unveils Secure Memory Card Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 18:46:30 -0500 By Sinead Carew and Lucas van Grinsven SanDisk Corp. on Tuesday introduced memory cards that let consumers move digital video and music among devices like cellphones and computers without violating copyright protection. The first cards to go on the market in November will come preloaded with the Rolling Stones' new CD "A Bigger Bang," said SanDisk, which helped pioneer flash memory storage cards used in phones and digital cameras. Internet media company Yahoo Inc. (Nasdaq:YHOO - news) said customers who subscribe to its digital music service could use the card which will be sold under the name gruvi. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd also said it would support gruvi in its phones. SanDisk's new cards come as the entertainment industry moves content to the Internet and onto devices such as mobile phones. The industry is increasingly protecting its content with software that prevents copying to plain flash memory cards or other non-secure storage mediums. SanDisk, based in Sunnyvale, California, hopes to convince other entertainment companies to sell their content preloaded on the cards, or make it available for secure Internet downloads straight onto the cards. "This enables secure content to be truly portable for the first time," SanDisk Chief Executive Eli Harari said at a press event at the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Assocation, or CTIA wireless conference in San Francisco. Harari said that once the cards are widely used by technology and entertainment companies, he expects them to bring in sizable revenue for the company by the end of 2007. "This will take one or two years to become a very substantial business," Harari said on the sidelines of the conference. He said he expects the bulk of sales to come from empty cards that consumers then fill with the content of their choice and that demand will increase as prices come down. He sees preloaded cards such as the 265 Megabyte $40 card that will go on sale in November with a Rolling Stones album on it as an example of how the cards could be used. SanDisk hopes companies would use Sandisk's TrustedFlash technology to implement their own digital rights management systems, Harari said. "It has the potential to change how people view mobile content," said Ted Cohen of record label EMI, adding that the company would see how consumers receive the Rolling Stones product before more similar products for other performers. The TrustedFlash cards will work as normal mass storage cards with capacity of up to several gigabytes of data -- but the movies, music or games on the cards would be protected with digital rights management (DRM) software. The cards can also contain media and game playing software, which make it possible to play content on devices that were not originally designed for those services, though devices must be compatible with the TrustedFlash cards. The new type of storage media is designed to support electronic commerce and enable mobile phones to perform secure financial transactions. SanDisk said it is unique in that it offers the advantage of portability, so consumers will be able to take their legally purchased music, movies and games with them and play them on any compatible device. 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: Thomas Frank <usatoday@telecom-digest.org> Subject: In Baton Rouge Center, Nothing to do But Wait Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 18:49:07 -0500 By Thomas Frank, USA TODAY Sometimes when Veronica Joseph wakes up in the middle of the night, she slips outside this city's main emergency shelter, where she's been living for three weeks. She sits on a plastic chair and enjoys a cigarette and the solitude. After sleeping on a cot, sharing communal bathrooms and being fed cafeteria-style meals with up to 1,700 people, Joseph is aching for the privacy of home. But it's not going to be easy to find one. Her former $5.15-an-hour job picking broken breadsticks off a New Orleans bakery assembly line yielded no savings. Fliers on the shelter walls beckon the homeless here to a house in Montana, a church in Oklahoma, an apartment in Brooklyn. But there's nothing available in Louisiana. "We just want to get back to living as man and woman," says Joseph, 47, who lived with her boyfriend in a $300-a-month New Orleans house that Hurricane Katrina destroyed. "But I don't see a way out yet." Nearly 100,000 evacuees remain in shelters a month after Katrina demolished communities across the Gulf region, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) says, down from a peak of 250,000. The shelter residents taken together would form Louisiana's sixth-largest city and are the most visible symbol of Katrina's diaspora. Evacuees live in more than 1,000 shelters spread across 26 states and, for all the variety of their locales and circumstances, they mostly do one thing: wait. Some are waiting for their New Orleans neighborhoods to reopen so they can return to homes that were damaged but not destroyed. Some are waiting to see their homes for the first time to determine whether they can be repaired or rebuilt. Some are waiting for money -- from the federal government or from a new employer -- so they can afford a new home, possibly in a new state. And some are so overwhelmed they can't fathom what to do. "I am just waiting right now," says Lou Cooper, 78, slouching on a cot as her husband, Hillary, sleeps nearby, next to his wheelchair. The Coopers and two teen grandchildren moved to the shelter after their Jefferson Parish home was destroyed and a daughter went to Shreveport for her nursing job. When do they hope to leave? "I have no idea," she says. Seeking sites for trailers The federal government is trying to move all evacuees from shelters to temporary housing by Oct. 15, a goal set by President Bush. The core of FEMA's effort is a plan to park 125,000 trailers and mobile homes in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to house evacuees until they find permanent residences. But federal inspectors are struggling to find sites with the infrastructure -- water, sewers and electricity -- to accommodate trailers. The FEMA teams fanning out across Louisiana are being greeted warily in some communities. Tangipahoa Parish, north of New Orleans, adopted an emergency ordinance limiting the density of mobile-home parks after FEMA began inspecting local sites. Neighboring Livingston Parish is being cautious in approving trailers because its services "just cannot sustain what FEMA is trying to do," parish president Mike Grimmer says. So far, only 99 trailers are occupied in Louisiana, and about 2,000 more are being prepared in the state. An additional 2,325 trailers are occupied in Mississippi and Alabama. The pace has so alarmed Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco that last week she urged FEMA to move all shelter residents immediately into hotel rooms for 90 days. Ron Sherman, head of FEMA's housing effort for evacuees, said Monday that Oct. 15 is "a challenging goal." FEMA last week offered evacuees $786 a month for three months to pay for any temporary housing, including hotels. Sherman said the payments would "give people other options ... so that trailers don't become the focus of their recovery." State facilities planning director Jerry Jones doubts the Oct. 15 goal will be met. But he says temporary housing is vital to getting evacuees out of shelters and to getting the hundreds of thousands of people who left Louisiana back to the state, which would help restore the Louisiana economy. "We want all those other states to know those are our people and we want them back," Jones says. New housing is necessary because Louisiana faced a severe housing shortage even before Katrina destroyed an estimated 275,000 homes, says state policy and planning director Kim Hunter Reed. Wayne Scardino found that out a week after Katrina washed away his home in heavily damaged St. Bernard Parish, east of New Orleans, and he took a bus to the Baton Rouge shelter, in a modern arena and exhibit hall in the center of downtown. For three days, Scardino sat at one of the free telephones available inside the Baton Rouge shelter, calling apartment complexes in the region. He even visited a few but didn't bother walking past the "no vacancy" signs. 'You've got to go out of state' "No apartments, no hotel rooms nowhere. Everything's filled," says Scardino, 45, who ran a lawn-service business. "You've got to go out of state to get anything." And that's what he hopes to do. Scardino recently called a phone number he found on a flier in the shelter advertising apartments in Tennessee. The bus to pick him up, he says, will come to the shelter any day. While he waits, Scardino is filling out a FEMA application for money through a program that helps replace uninsured homes in disaster areas. He says his house was worth $125,000. He plans to seek a low-interest loan from the Small Business Administration, which lends businesses money to buy capital items. He says he's serious about using the money to rebuild his life - but not in his old community. "There won't be a St. Bernard Parish for 10 years," Scardino says. "I'll go anywhere." Leon Frederick doesn't find such mobility as easy. He's been in the Baton Rouge shelter with his common-law wife and their three young daughters since a week after Katrina, when they could no longer afford a hotel in Jackson, Miss. "I would like to move somewhere temporarily for a job and for school for the kids," says Frederick, 48, who worked as a security guard. His twin 4-year-old daughters had attended all-day Head Start outside New Orleans, but Frederick couldn't find anything similar in Baton Rouge -- except an unaccredited nursery program at the shelter that runs from 9 a.m. to noon. Frederick's talk about moving to Texas ended when his partner, Chalana Bland, declared herself "dead set on going back" to their townhouse east of New Orleans. "She wants to go home -- into her own house, where she has her own things," Frederick says. Instead of looking for new housing, Frederick drives his customized van 85 miles back to Harvey to check their rented duplex. The roof was sheared off, the first floor flooded, the carpet is mildewed, and furniture and appliances are ruined. "We can't do anything till FEMA looks at it," Frederick says, referring to an inspection to verify and calculate housing losses. Frederick expects to be home in a month, but even that won't end his family's problems. "When we come back, there's really nothing to come back to -- no jobs, no business," he says. "We'll just have to sit there and wait." LaToya Dennis and Calvin Jacob are waiting, too -- for help from the government, the Red Cross and anyone who can get them out of the shelter. The couple, whose New Orleans home was destroyed, has neither the desire to return to a city they call violent nor the money to relocate. Jacob's $8.25-an-hour warehouse job was their only income. They don't have a car. And they don't like the housing options that have come their way. "We really don't have anywhere to go," says Dennis, 20, who's at the Baton Rouge shelter with Jacob and their daughter Sanai, born in early August. Church leaders who flew to Baton Rouge from Colorado and California tempted Jacob and Dennis with offers of shelter in those states, but the couple saw no reason to move to a place where they know no one. Cousins and aunts in Dallas offered to put them up, but the couple declined, not wanting to impose. And when they heard about trailers being set up, the notion of living in a portable dwelling with little or no foundation conjured nightmares. 'We could do better' "It's inappropriate because if we have another storm, where are we going to go?" Dennis says. "I'm not being ungrateful, but I feel we could do better." Jacob, 22, says he's tried to get jobs recently but has been turned away from construction sites that told him they had enough workers. He says many jobs involve nighttime hours that he can't work because of the shelter's 10 p.m. curfew. The Red Cross, which runs the Baton Rouge shelter, says residents can get in after curfew if they've been working. "We just want some housing and to get on with our lives," Jacob says. They'll stay at the shelter, he says, "until we get the assistance we need to get housing." Although Jacob and Dennis hate the shelter -- they call it "a prison" patrolled by National Guard troops toting loaded M-16 combat rifles -- some express no hurry to leave. "I worked so many years and so long and so hard, it's kind of like a vacation," says Jessie Merrell, 54, who was a banquet captain at the Omni Royal Orleans hotel. His family's house is in New Orleans' 9th Ward, parts of which have stood underwater for a month. But even that raises more curiosity than alarm. "The news media -- they tell you it's gone, but I don't believe that," Merrell says, leaning back in a chair. Merrell is in the shelter with his wife, their two daughters, in their 20s, and a granddaughter, 2. Merrell plays with her for hours, drives around Baton Rouge, eats lunch and wonders when he'll be able to get into New Orleans to see the house where he's lived for 30 years. If it's gone, the family will decide whether to rebuild or relocate. "I've got people in Houston," Merrell says, suggesting they might move there. But minutes later, the New Orleans native says, "I don't believe I could actually get adjusted to living anywhere else." He doesn't have to make up his mind now. "Right now," Merrell says, "I'm just waiting to see what happened." Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. 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. ------------------------------ From: USA Today Staff <usatoday@telecom-digest.org> Subject: Louisiana Begins Hefty Task of Cleaning Up Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 18:50:44 -0500 By Matt Kelley, Richard Wolf and Oren Dorell, USA TODAY Here in Cajun country, where signs in French and English are standing in water and shrimp boats have been tossed onto land, Hurricane Rita brought the Gulf of Mexico right into almost everyone's home. "Now our concern is trying to save what we want to save and clean up and try to find some way to start over again," Tonya Etier said Monday as she stood in her water-stained kitchen. More than 2 feet of water flooded her house Friday night when seawater pushed by Rita's 120-mph winds burst through a nearby levee and swamped the town. Her house smells of bleach. Furniture, CDs and other items are drying on the kitchen table. Similar scenes of cleaning up, tallying damage and hoping for recovery played out Monday along Louisiana's marshy coast. Lake Charles, among the cities Rita hit hardest, remained closed to residents and without power as emergency workers turned from rescue operations to repairs. Trees blocked streets and sprawled across damaged roofs. Power lines lay toppled and gas pumps uprooted. Tall office buildings had shattered windows, and smaller stores were in shambles. An Allstate Insurance office stood exposed to the elements, its walls turned to rubble. To the south in Cameron Parish, home to about 10,000 people along the Gulf of Mexico, floodwaters had not receded. The area, which includes a national wildlife refuge, was "devastated," said Hal McMillin, president of the Police Jury, the county commission in Calcasieu Parish, which includes Lake Charles. Power company officials described damage as worse than that caused by Hurricane Katrina last month. About 120 transmission lines and 125 substations were knocked out in the region, said Renae Conley, president of Entergy Louisiana. She said much of the power system will have to be rebuilt, not repaired. Likewise, telephone company officials say the damage is actually worse than that caused by Katrina, two weeks earlier. The good news was that apparently no one died in Louisiana, and few suffered serious injuries. Officials attributed that to widespread evacuations. An estimated 95% of the residents of Calcasieu Parish got out. "It is very surprising," Lt. Remy Broussard of Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Enforcement said of the small number of casualties. "It's a direct result of Katrina." His teams searched in boats and helicopters Monday for people trapped in their homes and found none, although some remote areas along rivers remained to be searched. "Without a doubt, there would have been a lot more injuries and deaths had more people remained," Broussard said. Shrimp industry takes hit Rita's storm surge reached about 15 feet in places along Louisiana's coast and blew at least a half-dozen holes in levees amid the lakes, canals and bayous. In Montegut, (pronounced MOHN-te-goo), Rita's floods left shrimp boats marooned on roadways, people perched on roofs and cattle stranded neck-deep in brackish water. A stream of military and civilian helicopters hauled massive sandbags to drop into breaches in levees that normally protect the town from flooding. Residents worry that the flooding will cripple the area's main businesses: shrimp, cattle, sugar cane and oil. "I don't think I'd want to eat what's in that water," said shrimper Darrell Billiot, 58, Etier's father-in-law. The season for white shrimp -- regarded by locals as tastier than brown shrimp, the other dominant species -- should run August through December, but the boats haven't been able to go out much for nearly a month. Authorities warned people to evacuate ahead of the storm, and they warned them again just before and after the levee gave way. Billiot felt he had nowhere to go. "I was raised in this water, and I'll die in it, I guess," he said with a shrug. On a nearby waterway, Bayou Petit Caillou, the town of Chauvin was swamped. Authorities and neighbors evacuated stranded residents by boat Saturday. By Monday, the water had receded, but not enough to leave most homes dry. Robert Taylor, 61, spent most of the day waiting for the water to drop so he could drive to his home and inspect the damage. "That's the Gulf of Mexico right there," he said, pointing at floodwaters flowing over the highway through the town. "This is worse than it's been in 50 years. Places are flooded here that never flooded before." Caught off guard To the west in Lake Charles, Carla Pratt's family had a horrible decision to make when they realized Hurricane Rita was bearing down on their home and they had nowhere to go: To whom should they strap her granddaughter, Sarah, in case a friend's brick home where they sought shelter blew apart? Like many other residents of this low-lying city, they were caught off guard by Rita's turn to the north Friday night and did not have time to flee. They decided to tie the 5-month-old baby to her father, although he was not the biggest and strongest person in the house. "We'd rather her be with one parent in case something bad happened to the other," Pratt said. All the family survived when Rita thrashed ashore early Saturday, but Pratt, 39, and her son lost their newly bought mobile homes. Pratt's was knocked off its cinder block posts, and the roof is leaking. The walls of her son's home came apart from the floor of the trailer, she said. On Monday, the National Guard was distributing a day's supply of food, water and ice to storm victims. Some of those who didn't get out before Rita struck described horrific winds and rains lasting for several hours. "It was kind of scary," said Georgia Kimble, 16, as she waited at Christus St. Patrick Hospital for her mother to be treated for an asthma attack. "Everything just came in at one time, like whoosh." Ray Thisius, 52, helped evacuate the retirement center where he works, then stayed behind with about 15 staff members because of heavy traffic. All night long, windows blew out and trees fell, striking the center's roof and cars parked outside. "It felt like you were in the end of a tunnel, and the wind's rushing at you," Thisius said. "I'm running away the next time, whether I have to ride a bicycle or take a bus. I'm getting out of here." Wolf and Dorell reported from Lake Charles, La. Copyright 2005 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2005 01:07:41 -0400 From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> Subject: When Students Open up - a Little Too Much; Colleges Cite Risks By Sarah Schweitzer, Globe Staff Last school year, Brandeis University junior Emily Aronoff tapped this sentiment into a computer: "I enjoy the festive greens." The reference to marijuana became part of her profile on facebook.com, the online student catalogue that allows Aronoff and tens of thousands of collegians to share photos and idiosyncratic odds and ends of their lives, intended for viewing by other students. But others were reading as well -- including "an individual in the community," she said, who shared the reference with her parents in Marietta, Ga. Eventually, word reached her grandmother. "My bubbe," she said, using the Yiddish word for grandmother, "told me her seniors home was abuzz with the news, and I was like: 'I hate the Facebook.' " As the Facebook has become a phenomenon at schools across the country -- a virtual bible for campus socializing and networking -- the unintended consequences of overly comprehensive, brutally frank, or mischievous entries are surfacing. Colleges and universities are increasingly taking steps to help students avoid pitfalls -- most critically, those that put students at risk for stalking and harassment. At Tufts University this year, freshmen-orientation leaders encouraged students to omit detailed personal information from their profiles, such as dormitory room numbers and class schedules. Boston College plans to do the same next year, and Boston University has instructed residential advisers on offering guidance on Facebook matters. Meanwhile, Brandeis held an hour-long seminar last week on Facebook savvy -- recommending safety tips, but also telling students to consider future employers, professors, or family members who might read Facebook entries. Indeed, some Brandeis administrators said at the meeting -- to open-mouthed reactions of students attending -- that they have begun reading Facebook entries before hiring a student for campus positions. http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2005/09/26/when_students_open_up____a_little_too_much/ ------------------------------ Subject: Cellular-News for Wednesday 28th September 2005 Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2005 09:16:09 -0500 From: Cellular-News <dailydigest@cellular-news.com> Cellular-News - http://www.cellular-news.com Nearly a Quarter of Primary School Children Have Cellphones http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14214.php An Amplitude Research survey of 2,400 American consumers, including 2,000 cell phone users -- conducted over a two-week period ending Sept. 20, 2005 -- revealed strong support of a policy that limits cell phone usage to ... Pull the Udder One ! http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14215.php An Oman newspaper has reported that a cow managed to eat a mobile phone. This was discovered when the phone owner called it to try and locate it by the ringer and found the cow was ringing instead. The phone had been los... Communist Rebels Torch Base Station http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14216.php Communist rebels in the Philippines have destroyed a mobile phone transmission tower as part of their insurgency in the Southern Philippines. Approximately 30 New People's Army rebels disarmed the security guard at a Glo... Consolidation in India's GSM Market http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14217.php Hutchison Telecom says that its Indian joint venture, Hutchison Essar has signed an agreement to buy rival GSM operators,? BPL Mumbai and BPL Mobile Cellular. It also announced that Hutchison Essar has entered into a con... Siemens Wins Swiss GSM Contract http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14218.php in&phone, a new Swiss mobile operator, has commissioned Siemens Communications to set up its central mobile communication systems. Siemens is also responsible for operating and maintaining the systems.... New Billing Platform for Trinidad Operator http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14219.php Intec has signed a contract with Telecommunications Services of Trinidad and Tobago (TSTT) for it's service activation and interconnect billing solutions, Inter-activatE and InterconnecT v7. Also included in the contract... Digital TV on Mobiles in Japan http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14220.php Japan's DoCoMo has announced the development of the 3G P901iTV, DoCoMo's first mobile handset to receive terrestrial digital broadcasting signals, in addition to conventional analog signals. The handset was developed in ... Mobile Music Could Prove More Popular Than Gaming http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14221.php Mobile music services -- either in the form of downloadable music files or broadcast digital radio -- have greater interest among U.S. mobile customers than gaming, an application that is now providing some of the greate... Mobile Subscribers to Continue Utilizing a Potpourri of Air Interfaces http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14222.php Mobile operators and vendors will benefit throughout the decade no matter if they are pursuing low-end or high-end mobile strategies, according to a new Visant Strategies study. The worldwide mobile subscriber base will ... 3 Scraps its SMSC http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14223.php Scandinavian mobile operator Hi3G Access AB, under the brand 3, has replaced its SMSC (Short Message Service Centre) technology with Telsis Intelligent SMS Routing. SMSCs have often been seen to limit throughput during h... Improving Communications in the Maldives Islands http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14224.php The Maldives Islands based GSM operator, Dhiraagu has signed a US$ 10.4 million contract with Alcatel to expand and enhance its mobile service. Under this contract mobile coverage will be extended to new geographical are... Billions of Dollars Lost Through Mobile Data Revenue Leakage http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14225.php The premium mobile content industry is incurring billions of dollars in lost revenue through insecure transaction processing, a problem that could reach more than $18 billion by 2009, according to a study authored by mar... Vodafone Testing HSDPA in Germany http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14226.php Vodafone is the first German network operator to start customer trials using HSDPA for business customers at the CentrO Oberhausen shopping centre. Selected business customers can now trial their notebook and data card f... SK Telecom: Exploring India, SE Asian Mkts For Growth http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14214.php SK Telecom Co Ltd. (017670.SE) is looking at India and Southeast Asian markets for expansion opportunities, Shin Bae Kim, the South Korean company's president and chief executive said Tuesday. ... Bharti: No Need For SingTel To Increase Stake http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14215.php Bharti Televentures Ltd. (532454.BY), India's biggest GSM mobile phone company by customer numbers, said there currently isn't scope for Singapore Telecommunications Ltd. (T48.SG) to raise its 32.8% stake. ... O2 Raises Fiscal Year Outlook On Strong UK User Growth http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14216.php Wireless operator O2 PLC (OOM.LN) Tuesday upgraded its outlook for U.K. revenue growth and German margin performance after reporting bumper second-quarter subscriber growth in the U.K. ... Ericsson Wins GSM Contract in Libya http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14217.php Swedish telecommunications equipment maker Telefon AB LM Ericsson (ERICY) Tuesday said it will supply its Mobile Softswitch product to Libya's operator Al Madar. ... Motorola Unveils 5 New Handsets Aimed At Mass Market http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14218.php Motorola Tuesday unveiled a new portfolio of products demonstrating its continuing commitment to meet the needs of mass market consumers around the world. ... French Government, Telecoms Cos Agree To Price Cutting Measures http://www.cellular-news.com/story/14219.php Industry Minister Francois Loos said Tuesday the government and the country's telecoms operators have agreed a raft of measures aimed at lowering prices for consumers. ... ------------------------------ From: Wesrock@aol.com Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 20:29:01 EDT Subject: Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? In a message dated 27 Sep 2005 09:40:30 -0700, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com writes: > In reading a book about the Key System railway, older schedules had a > six-digit phone number (2L-4N) while newer ones had seven-digits > (2L-5N). > Would anyone know when Oakland converted? > Also, was six digit dialing (2L-4N) common in a lot of places? I > though most city dial offices were 5 digit for smaller cities and 7 > digit (3L-4N) for larger cities. The seven digits were used as part > of the panel installation for cities expecting growth and to provide > for automatic integrated dialing to/from suburban areas as well. There were all kinds of plans in all kinds of cities. Dallas and Houston at one time had 1L-4D numbers (Riverside-4085 in Dallas, for example, was R-4085).. Oklahoma City had 5D and 6D numbers, later changing to 2L-4D. Tulsa at one time had a mixture of 4D, 5D and 6D numbers, all at the same time. It all depended on the circumstances and the history of the numbering plan, growth, expansion of the dialing area, contiguious tiers, and others facts, not least of which was the engieners and the traffic engineers preferences, along with the preferences of higher managers. The president (the title then meant CEO) of Southwestern Bell agreed to allow Wichita Falls, Texas, to be the guinea pig for ANC (all-number calling, that is, 7D). The reaction was so adverse that he declared no other SWBT city would go ANC during his tenure as CEO (quite a few more years), and none di. Eventually, of course, all changed to 2L-5D or directly to 7D. Wes Leatherock wesrock@aol.com ------------------------------ From: Joseph <JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com> Subject: Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 17:35:58 -0700 Reply-To: JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com On 27 Sep 2005 09:40:30 -0700, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote: > In reading a book about the Key System railway, older schedules had a > six-digit phone number (2L-4N) while newer ones had seven-digits > (2L-5N). > Would anyone know when Oakland converted? My guess is Oakland was converted to 2L-5N prior to the introduction of DDD (direct distance dialing.) That's what happened with Seattle which was 2L-4N prior to being converted to 2L-5N. Also, often when converting from 2L-4N to 2L-5N the central office "exchange" code was changed. The change in Oakland was likely done in the early to mid-sixties since that's when DDD was introduced to most of the big city areas. > Also, was six digit dialing (2L-4N) common in a lot of places? 2L-4N was very common except in exceptionally large cities such as Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia though I bet that originally these cities had 2L-4N as well. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Chicago was 3L-4N throughout the 1930's and 1940's, (that is, from the start of automated calling through the final cutover of same.) The original third letter (as in ALBany and ROGers Park) became the first number in the new 2L-5N system, (which is to say ALBany became ALbany-2, KEDzie became KEdzie-3 and ROGers Park became ROgers Park-4. That cutover occurred, I think, in 1948 when the final conversion from manual to dial took place in the HUMboldt central office. Operators were spreading rumors that after the final cutover, 'hundreds' of operators would be laid off, out of a job. The fact is _no one_ was laid off, and with the opening of Ohare Airport six or eight months after that, Humboldt had more employees assigned there than it ever had in the manual days. PAT] ------------------------------ From: harold@hallikainen.com <harold@hallikainen.com> Subject: Re: Oakland Calif Conversion From 6 to 7 Digit Dialing? Date: 28 Sep 2005 08:25:18 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote: > In reading a book about the Key System railway, older schedules had a > six-digit phone number (2L-4N) while newer ones had seven-digits > (2L-5N). > Would anyone know when Oakland converted? > Also, was six digit dialing (2L-4N) common in a lot of places? I > though most city dial offices were 5 digit for smaller cities and 7 > digit (3L-4N) for larger cities. The seven digits were used as part > of the panel installation for cities expecting growth and to provide > for automatic integrated dialing to/from suburban areas as well. I used to ride the Key System railway. I remember when the SF Bay Bridge ran the trains and trucks on the bottom level and cars on the top level. At that time, I lived in Kensington. My home phone number was LAndscape 6-5520. My father's work number in Berkeley was LAndscape 4-1757. So, in the mid-1950s, I think the SF bay area was pretty much all 7 digit. Harold ------------------------------ From: Joseph <JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com> Subject: Re: Why is VOIP Getting Hot Now? Date: Tue, 27 Sep 2005 17:37:50 -0700 Reply-To: JoeOfSeattle@yahoo.com On 27 Sep 2005 10:53:32 -0700, John <jbradshaw777@yahoo.com> wrote: > I am looking for some insight on this VOIP thing. Why is it, seems to > me, getting hot now? This thing has been around for many years (I > remember using Internet Telephony application almost a decade ago), > why is it getting hot now? Likely because the technology has improved enough that people are using it on a regular basis. > why does it take so long for it to get some > tracking? Is there anything different now that makes it more > appealing than a decade ago? Sure. It works better than it did a decade ago. Also, it's popular now because of the perceived value as compared to pricing for regular wireline service. ------------------------------ Subject: Re: Why is VOIP Getting Hot Now? From: beavis <nobody@nowhere.com> Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2005 13:27:10 GMT Organization: Road Runner In article <telecom24.439.7@telecom-digest.org>, John <jbradshaw777@yahoo.com> wrote: > I am looking for some insight on this VOIP thing. Why is it, seems to > me, getting hot now?... Is there anything different now that makes it more > appealing than a decade ago? Two things: Broadband penetration is much greater than it was before (it simply isn't doable on dial-up), and the adapter devices that let you use a real telephone to make and receive calls. Having to sit at my computer, and only being able to call others at their computers, and only if they were running specific software, narrowed the field greatly. Now I can pick up my regular phone and call my parents on their regular phone line. That's a HUGE difference. That didn't exist ten years ago. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Its even gotten better than that. Now from my computer and VOIP adapter box, I can 'plug into' (assuming properly wired) house wiring and use VOIP anywhere I would use a 'regular' phone. In my own instance, for example, I run the VOIP line into a small PBX type unit, and use it from any other PBX-style phone in my house by lifting a reciever, dialing '8' receiving VOIP dial tone and making my long distance calls. I do the same thing for local calls by dialing '9' to get the local (Prairie Stream Comm) line. Ten years ago I would have sat here at the computer, put on my headset, and puttered around starting up the voice-talk program I used on Yahoo Messenger. Not only that, but I can call inter-room in my house by dialing extensions 101 through 105, and have calls ring through to my wireless headset. Considerably more HUGE. People who visit me here at my house by and large have no idea how the system works; nor do they need to know other than telling them 'dial 9 to make a local call. PAT] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 28 Sep 2005 13:28:51 +0100 From: Paul Coxwell <paulcoxwell@tiscali.co.uk> Subject: Re: Did You Say Dogging or Blogging? Brits Confused > Proponents of the latest Web trends were warned on Tuesday that the > rest of the world may not have a clue what they are talking about. > A survey of British taxi drivers, pub landlords and hairdressers -- > often seen as barometers of popular trends -- found that nearly 90 > percent had no idea what a podcast is and more than 70 percent had > never heard of blogging. > "When I asked the panel whether people were talking about blogging, > they thought I meant dogging," said Sarah Carter, the planning > director at ad firm DDB London. > Dogging is the phenomenon of watching couples have sex in > semi-secluded places such as out-of-town car parks. News of such > events are often spread on Web sites or by using mobile phone text > messages. Speaking as a Brit, I would have had no idea what "dogging" meant. Now I do know, I wish I didn't. -Paul. [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I can tell you and other Brits something of interest also. There is some bird over across the pond in your country running a web site called http://www.sneakypeek.net who uses a tiny little camera (the kind built into a cellular phone) who is taking the most scurrilous pictures of the most intimate moments in men's lives, i.e using toilets or public locker rooms in sports events, etc to take pictures and transmit them all over the net through his 'Sneaky Peek' system. According to _him_, he has 'only been caught doing it' once, and warned not to use his camera/ phone in those places in the future, yet he continues on with it. He mocks the whole system on his home page by displaying a tiny camera with the notation 'watch for me in your locker room, toilet or gymnasium.' I gather he is in Great Britain because the locations he gives for his various picture 'galleries' give UK locations usually. Talk about Big Brother Watching You. PAT] ------------------------------ From: strutsng@gmail.com Subject: How Come www Has Number as in http://www31.website.com? Date: 28 Sep 2005 08:11:22 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com How come I saw some web site has some number after www, how can they do that? i.e. http://www31.website.com, http://www52.website.com If this is the case, then it can be anything? Like http://aaa.website.com ? I know the protocol needs to be http. Usually, it should be just http://www.website.com Please advise. thanks!! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: You are correct that it usually is just 'www' which means 'world wide web' and years ago, when the web was a new thing, most all files used by it were put in a directory called 'www'. But that is not necessary. You can reach me for example either with or without 'www' on the front. If he is saying 'www some number' then a dot and something else thats just because he chose to use that name, maybe to confuse the issue a little. The computer directories do not care what they are called as long as there are no 'illegal' characters in the name such as / or \ or " or . or , etc. PAT] ------------------------------ From: strutsng@gmail.com Subject: Can PC to Phone Talk? Is VoIP the Only Choice for PC to PC Talk? Date: 28 Sep 2005 08:17:23 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com VoIP (voice over IP) is the technology that allows people to talk over the internet (PC to PC talk). Is VoIP the only technology to achieve this? Can PC to Phone talk? For example, I dial some number in internet, and it will call someone on the analog phone? Please advise. Thanks!! [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Technologies to allow people to call from a computer to an anaolog phone (or the other way around use the generic name 'VoIP' (Voice Over Internet Protocol). Not all of the vendors of VoIP allow connections between internet and the telephone network although most of them do that. PAT] ------------------------------ From: Dink <me2@privacy.net> Subject: Scientists Find Mature Galaxy Eight Times Larger Than Milky Way Date: 28 Sep 2005 16:06:21 GMT [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: This is a follow up to the newswire article which was printed here on Tuesday. PAT] http://tinyurl.com/coa2u US astronomers said they had found a vast, mature galaxy using NASA's Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes. They were particularly impressed by the fact stars seemed to have been formed in the galaxy. [...] -- Dink N 30.21, W 97.81 http://snipurl.com/whereiam An armed society is a polite society, as Robert Heinlein noted. ------------------------------ TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecomm- unications topics. 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