Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id JAA27267; Tue, 21 Jan 1997 09:11:11 -0500 (EST) Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 09:11:11 -0500 (EST) From: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Message-Id: <199701211411.JAA27267@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #18 TELECOM Digest Tue, 21 Jan 97 09:11:00 EST Volume 17 : Issue 18 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson BellSouth Gains 37 New Wireless Markets in the Southeast (Stanley Cline) Re: ISPs and All Circuits Busy at BellSouth (Stanley Cline) InterLATA Minutes of Use Data Needed For My Dissertation (D. Burnstein) Re: When Technical Jargon Requires Hyphens (Linc Madison) Re: Monopoly? (Linc Madison) Re: Var-Tech LD -- $5.00/Month and $.10/Minute (Stanley Cline) Re: Var-Tech LD -- $5.00/Month and $.10/Minute (Henoch Duboff) Requesting Info on the Use of E-Switches (J. Hoffman) Re: This Day in Telecom History - the Telegraph (Thomas Cain) 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 public service systems and networks including Compuserve and America On Line. It is also gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup 'comp.dcom.telecom'. Subscriptions are available to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu * The Digest is edited, published and compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson of Skokie, Illinois USA. You can reach us by postal mail, fax or phone at: Post Office Box 4621 Skokie, IL USA 60076 Phone: 847-329-0571 Fax: 847-329-0572 ** Article submission address: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu Our archives are located at mirror.lcs.mit.edu. The URL is: http://mirror.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives They can also be accessed using anonymous ftp: ftp mirror.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/archives A third method is the Telecom Email Information Service: Send a note to tel-archives@mirror.lcs.mit.edu to receive a help file for using this method or write me and ask for a copy of the help file for the Telecom Archives. ************************************************************************* * TELECOM Digest is partially funded by a grant from the * * International Telecommunication Union (ITU) in Geneva, Switzerland * * under the aegis of its Telecom Information Exchange Services (TIES) * * project. Views expressed herein should not be construed as represent-* * ing views of the ITU. * ************************************************************************* Finally, the Digest is funded by gifts from generous readers such as yourself who provide funding in amounts deemed appropriate. Your help is important and appreciated. A suggested donation of twenty dollars per year per reader is considered appropriate. See our address above. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: roamer1@RemoveThis.pobox.com (Stanley Cline) Subject: BellSouth Gains 37 New Wireless Markets in the Southeast Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 02:48:43 GMT Organization: Catoosa Computing Services Reply-To: roamer1@pobox.com Press release from BellSouth, forwarded to TD as courtesy. My notes are in [brackets]. SC Gain from Auction Fills in Wireless Footprint in Nine-State Region ATLANTA - BellSouth Corporation (NYSE:BLS) was the highest bidder for 39 licenses to provide wireless telephone services in 37 Southeast markets in the FCC's BTA (Basic Trading Area) 10 megahertz auction that concluded today. "This was a successful auction for us, and we are quite happy with our accomplishment of filling in our wireless footprint in the Southeast," said Earle Mauldin, President of BellSouth Enterprises. "Our bidding was guided by BellSuth's intent to provide the widesarray of communications services throughout the Southeast," continued Mauldin. "These new licenses will now serve to broaden our reach servicearea for customers, and soon all customers in our nine-state region will be able to use BellSouth wireless telephone service." The 39 new licenses effectively fill in BellSouth's wireless telephone coverage throughout the company's nine-state region that includes Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee. BellSouth bids totaled $205 million for the new licenses. As a result of the five-month auction for the D-, E- and F-block broadband PCS (Personal Communications Services) licenses, BellSouth is gaining 11.8 million POPs. In the coming months, Bell South will be announcing its plans for building out the new wireless networks. BellSouth was the highest bidder for licenses in the following markets: In Alabama: Montgomery, Selma, Opelika, Gadsden and Dothan. [Still no coverage in the "shoals" area. BellSouth is already licensed for cellular in Gadsden, *but not Fort Payne* which IIRC is in that BTA -- I'm not sure why/how that happened. It could be that BLS in fact got a license for Gadsden *in consideration of Fort Payne.*] In Florida: Tampa, Ft. Meyers[sic] (two licenses), Tallahassee, Sarasota, Gainesville, Naples, Pensacola, Lakeland, Ft. Walton, Panama City, Ocala and Ft. Pierce. [They now have licenses in virtually the whole state.] In Georgia: Savannah [This still leaves BellSouth with no way to provide service in the bulk of central/south GA, including Columbus, Albany, Augusta, Douglas, and Newnan. InterCel may be forced to give up the Newnan area, however, as they are licensed for BOTH cellular and PCS -- Powertel -- in that area, and the roaming situation between Atlanta and Newnan is getting ever more edgy.] Louisiana: Shreveport, Monroe (two licenses), Alexandria, Houma and Lake Charles. [They still don't have all of the New Orleans area -- particularly Plaquemines Parish -- an unfortunate example of MSA/RSA <> BTA] In Mississippi: Biloxi, Columbus-Starkville, Greenville, Hattiesburg, Natchez and McComb. [MCTA, the B-side cellular carrier in Jackson and Meridian, *is* BellSouth, but they don't flaunt it.] In Tennessee: Dyersburg. [BellSouth still doesn't have Shelbyville, Alexandria/McMinnville, or Polk County. {sigh} It looks as if BellSouth did get the Paris/Martin area.] [BellSouth was awarded MTA licenses for all of the Carolinas and for the Knoxville and Johnson City, TN areas. The overall coverage, combining the current cellular markets, DCS, and these new licenses, looks good, but the coverage holes -- particularly in Tennessee and Georgia -- are a bit disturbing. Of course, the question is: When will customers in the PCS areas be able to use their service without "roaming" in their cellular markets, and the reverse? Only the equipment manufacturers will be able to answer that question!] BellSouth is a $17.9 billion communications company. It provides telecommunications, wireless communications, directory advertising and publishing, video, Internet and information services to more than 26 million customers in 18 countries worldwide. # # # NOTE: For more information about BellSouth, visit the BellSouth Web page at http://www.bellsouth.com. Also, BellSouth news releases dating back one year are available by fax at no charge by calling 1-800-758-5804, ext. 095650. FOR MORE INFORMATION: Tim Klein 404-249-4135 Al Schweitzer 404-249-2832 Stanley Cline (Roamer1 on IRC) ** GO BRAVES! GO VOLS! dba Catoosa Computing Services, Chattanooga, TN mailto:roamer1@pobox.com ** http://www.pobox.com/~roamer1/ All opinions are strictly my own! ------------------------------ From: roamer1@RemoveThis.pobox.com (Stanley Cline) Subject: Re: ISPs and All Circuits Busy at BellSouth Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 02:49:24 GMT Organization: Catoosa Computing Services Reply-To: roamer1@pobox.com tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) quoted: > Online Calls Cause Telephone Service Disruption Near Nashville When I saw the header, I almost automatically figured out which area of Nashville was affected -- Brentwood. I was right. :) > Users of America Online got a case of the "the busies" at the > beginning of the year. In Chattanooga, both AOL's "AOLNet" access number (actually provided by BBN Planet) and the 14.4 SprintNet number have been busy for weeks from around 2 pm to 2 am. For some odd reason -- I suspect misprogramming of a #5ESS -- calls to the "busy" AOL line do not generate busies, but a "all circuits busy" intercept. (My modem doesn't recognize SIT tones very well!) BBN's POP is run off PRI lines, which I suspect has something to do with the intercept. In Nashville, IIRC, there are *three* AOLNet access numbers in various COs across town. That helps distribute traffic across multiple SWITCHES (something I've long advocated is ISPs having multiple POPs in multiple COs in large calling areas -- in Chattanooga most ISP POPs are concentrated in one CO) but does nothing to address inter-CO capacity. I'm surprised Nashville is having any problems at all. (That's like saying Atlanta is having problems -- it's all but unheard of.) > On Friday, BellSouth and fellow local phone-service provider TDS > Telecom announced that they had added capacity because many calls > between Brentwood and Nashville had received "fast busy signals." AFAIK, the Brentwood area, including the Maryland Farms business park, is served by BellSouth itself. I'm not really sure where TDS is connected in this ... (If this were KNOXville, OTOH, I could guess easily -- and it has nothing to do with US Cellular!) > At least two of Nashville's largest providers -- EdgeNet Media and > Telalink Corp. -- don't dole out unlimited usage. They also haven't In Chattanooga, one provider (HTS/Chattanooga Online) has never adopted flat-rate pricing, instead offering 80 hrs/mo for $20 *then* $1 for each hour above that. Even at those prices, they suffered busies and assorted technical glitches -- despite the fact that their office is two blocks from the downtown BellSouth CO. CDC Internet, also local, was one of the first here to offer flat-rate. After CDC lowered its prices, a flood of other providers -- USIT, Mindspring, Netcom, the various ISPs that use UUNet POPs, IBM/Advantis, Concentric, AOL, etc. -- began to drive much business away from BOTH small ISPs. (I was one of the ones that switched ISPs -- FOUR times.) > providers, such as AT&T, MCI and BellSouth. What about all those others? Nashville is *awash* in ISPs, including one (Voyager Online) based in Chattanooga, and all the ones in Chattanooga, and even more. IOW: Hidden plug for telco ISPs. > choosing instead to compete by offering higher-quality service and > technical support for a higher price. MindSpring still gives unlimited access for $19.95, and *still* has higher quality of service (as compared to the Chattanooga local providers, USIT, and Compuserve) and 24/7 tech support. > "It's not that our network is short (of capacity), it's that it has to > be re-balanced," May says. "We have a lot of latent capacity that has > to be moved around or changed." I strongly agree. The Tennessee BellSouth network is one of the best I've seen -- virtually all COs, even in rural areas, support native ISDN VERY CHEAPLY and offer full CLASS services. =20 The independent telcos, including Sprint, TDS, Century, Citizens, and various cooperatives (Bledsoe, Dekalb, Ben Lomand, Yorkville, etc.) can't even compare ... still no ISDN in suburbs of Chattanooga and Knoxville served by independents when ISDN can be obtained in VERY rural areas served by BellSouth, small local calling areas and/or refusal to participate in "metro area calling" EAS, excessive directory assistance charges -- when BellSouth provides DA, and DA is totally free in BellSouth areas, etc. [Telalink growth 320%] > BellSouth can keep up with that, May says. It doesn't appear this time that BellSouth is pushing everyone toward BellSouth.net, as I'd expect. Stanley Cline (Roamer1 on IRC) ** GO BRAVES! GO VOLS! dba Catoosa Computing Services, Chattanooga, TN mailto:roamer1@pobox.com ** http://www.pobox.com/~roamer1/ All opinions are strictly my own! ------------------------------ From: burnstei@pilot.msu.edu (David Burnstein) Subject: InterLATA Minutes of Use Data Needed For my Dissertation Date: 21 Jan 1997 03:17:36 GMT Organization: Michigan State University My proposal is an empirical analysis of market power in the long-distance telephony market. In particular, I am attempting to measure AT&T's market power while accounting for the possibility of strategic behavior. In particular, the regulated firm, AT&T, may have recognized a link between its current performance and future regulatory restrictions. For example, in 1989 when the FCC switched to price-cap regulation, AT&T may have taken measures to ensure that its earnings were reasonable (i.e., demonstrated good market performance) on the assumption that such behavior would influence the type of regulation imposed in the future. If this strategic demonstration effect has had a significant influence on the market price then measuring AT&T's market power in a static framework will reveal a lower degree of market power than is actually the case, were the model to incorporate a dynamic component that controlled for AT&T's strategic behavior. The model that I have developed incorporates a dynamic component that controls for AT&T's strategic behavior, and as a result, I hope to acquire a more meaningful measure of AT&T market power. The data that I wish to acquire is for interstate (or intrastate, if it is available) interLATA service. In particular I need a more acurate measure of AT&T, Sprint, and MCI's output (i.e. minutes use) than that which is provided by the FCC. I need several years of data, the more recent the better. I am very willing to pay good money for information on how I can attain this data. Sincerely, David Burnstein Michigan State University Department of Economics Marshall Hall E. Lansing, MI 48824-1038 fax: 517-432-1068 email:burnstei@pilot.msu.edu ------------------------------ From: Telecom@Eureka.vip.best.NOSPAM (Linc Madison) Subject: Re: When Technical Jargon Requires Hyphens Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:12:35 -0800 Organization: No unsolicited commercial e-mail! In article , stbrown@nacs.net wrote: > "When a temporary compound is used as an adjective before a > noun, it is often hyphenated [Note: often, not always] to avoid > misleading the reader. ... not 'a free form sculpture' but 'a > free-form sculpture'. Even though 'form sculpture' has no rational > meaning ..., it could cause a moment's hesitation for the reader: One of my favorite examples of this was a phrase that turned up often at a job I once had where my supervisor believed that all hyphens and commas are evil. (I'm not joking, and only very slightly exaggerating.) There were lots of safety documents that referred to "confined space personnel," so I kept looking around to find the imprisoned astronauts. As for telecom relevance, I wrote previously of having cause to call Midway Island, which at the time (1994) still required calling an AT&T operator to manually route the call, using a non-dialable 808 number. This was the same job. Our jailbird astronauts, uh, I mean our confined-space personnel, were doing some hazmat cleanup on some base on or near Midway. ** Do not spam e-mail me! ** Linc Madison * San Francisco, Calif. * Telecom@Eureka.vip.best.com >> NOTE: if you autoreply, you must change "NOSPAM" to "com" << ------------------------------ From: Telecom@Eureka.vip.best.NOSPAM (Linc Madison) Subject: Re: Monopoly? Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 00:38:06 -0800 Organization: No unsolicited commercial e-mail! In article , Eric_Florack@xn.xerox.com (Eric Florack) wrote: > In contrast, look at the cost of the Apple Mac, and it's costs > reletive to the Clones. True it's costs have come down somewhat, but > the cost/capability ratio is nowhere near what you have in the > DOS/WINDOWS world. (I'm including the cost of software, and expansion > parts, here) The reason? The folks making the MAC know they have a > monopoly on MAC hardware. First of all, your analogy is not only not parallel to the telephone situation, the situation you describe does not exist. The cost/capability ratio now dramatically favors the Macintosh clones over anything in the Intel world. The PowerPC 604e chip is intrinsically faster than even a Pentium Pro at the same clock speed, just as a 90 MHz Pentium will beat a 100 MHz 486 at most tasks. Within the next 6 months, you will be able to get a 533 MHz Exponential 704 chip, which is based on the PowerPC architecture. Nothing comparable on the Intel side exists, nor will it in that time frame. (Lest you accuse me of touting "vapor" hardware, the 533 MHz chip exists. I've seen it, and I've used it. It will be *commercially* available by summer.) Furthermore, the folks making the Macintosh know that they DO NOT have a monopoly on Mac hardware. You can buy a Macintosh clone from Motorola, Umax, or Power Computing, and several other vendors are entering the market. You don't want to pay for the extra performance of SCSI hard disks? Fine. You can now buy Macintoshes (both from Apple and from clone makers) that take IDE hard disks. You can't use a cheap PC internal modem card in a Mac. Big deal; you pay $20 extra for an external. There is no premium for the storage devices, the monitors (and that's very easy to make plural on a Macintosh, by the way), or the software, and the CPU is cheaper. It's true that there are some things you can do on a Wintel machine that just aren't possible on a Macintosh. However, the reverse is also true. As a matter of fact, the computer animation for those cute little "Intel Inside" commercials was rendered on a MACINTOSH. The packaging that your Windows 95 upgrade came in was designed on a MACINTOSH. If you want to talk about Apple Computer, kindly get some facts that are less than five years old. For a company that was "dead and buried" in 1980, Apple sure seems to have a lot of activity. I may as well throw in something vaguely telephone-related. When Steve Wozniak was designing the original Apple modem, he wanted to make it able to send out lots of useful signals, including things like blue-box tones. The lawyers persuaded him that it wasn't such a good idea. ** Do not spam e-mail me! ** Linc Madison * San Francisco, Calif. * Telecom@Eureka.vip.best.com >> NOTE: if you autoreply, you must change "NOSPAM" to "com" << ------------------------------ From: roamer1@RemoveThis.pobox.com (Stanley Cline) Subject: Re: Var-Tech LD -- $5.00/Month and $.10/Minute Date: Tue, 21 Jan 1997 02:49:29 GMT Organization: Catoosa Computing Services Reply-To: roamer1@pobox.com Wlevant@aol.com (Bill Levant) wrote: > ...in Digest #11, brand@nortel.ca wrote.... >> VarTech(sp?). Their rate plan is fairly simple. $5.00 a month and 10 >> cents a minute in the US, INCLUDING IN-STATE, any time, day or night. > minutes. Two hours' usage is 120 minutes; the effective rate would be > about $.143 a minute ... definitely no bargain, particularly if you As I've mentioned to various Digest regulars, as well as in misc.consumers, VarTec charges a 3-min minimum per call. Even AT&T isn't that greedy! They *are* making an effort to disclose this (something that VarTec has been accused of not doing) but still, if a call is 30 sec, it costs 30c. That's an effective rate of 60c/min for a 30-sec call! For those who make many short calls (quick faxes, those who often have to deal with voice mail jail, etc.) or aren't disciplined enough to dial 10811, VarTec is NOT cheap by any means. (For the latter problem, one can subscribe to VarTec and get the same rates, and use another carrier, such as Dial & Save/LD Wholesale Club, for the short calls.) I don't think six-sec billing is all that's promised for the average home user, either. I had LCI (which does six-sec billing) and recently switched to AT&T -- my bills with AT&T were *lower* than with LCI. One reason: LCI's in-state rates are much higher than AT&T, especially for nighttime calls! LCI has also raised its calling card surcharge twice, making it less attractive than AT&T's One-Rate plan calling card, VoiceNet, and even prepaid cards for short calls. Stanley Cline (Roamer1 on IRC) ** GO BRAVES! GO VOLS! dba Catoosa Computing Services, Chattanooga, TN mailto:roamer1@pobox.com ** http://www.pobox.com/~roamer1/ All opinions are strictly my own! ------------------------------ From: Henoch Duboff Subject: Re: Var-Tech LD -- $5.00/Month and $.10/Minute Date: 21 Jan 1997 02:53:11 GMT Organization: CHAI.COM [article about $5 monthly charge, etc. snipped] I'm using EconoPhone (1-800-454-7091) without any monthly fees. 11.5 cents per minute, 6-second billing increments. http://www.econophone.com And no, I don't work for EconoPhone ;-) Henoch Duboff http://www.users.fast.net/~hd1/index.html ------------------------------ From: jhoffman@nyx10.cs.du.edu (J. Hoffman) Subject: Requesting Info on the Use of E-Switches Date: 20 Jan 1997 13:32:39 -0700 Organization: University of Denver, Dept. of Math & Comp. Sci. I'm a member of a Telecommunications Group for a large nationwide organization. We intend, very shortly, to up-grade our local Campus ethernet LAN environment with the goal to abandon Shared-Media hubs and concentrators and implement EtherSwitch technology utilizing dynamic bandwidth allocation (10/100Mbps). We have a large installed base of Cabletron LAN concentrators and Hubs. Our desire is to continue to utilize as many of the Cabletron concentrator chassis as possible with "new technology" Cabletron switching modules. We currently also have a "large" Cisco Systems Catalysis-5000 Etherswitch soon to be implemented within our Data Center. Keeping in mind: 1) Cisco etherswitch methodology handles up to layer-2 (i.e. - OSI 7-layer model) switching. 2) Cisco etherswitch methodology "Tags" each packet with three additional bytes of data. 3) Cabletron etherswitch methodology handles up to layer-3 switching. 4) Cabletron etherswitch methodology does not use "packet tagging." Our current inquiry pertains to: 1) Are Cisco and Cabletrons Etherswitching methodologies compatible with one another. (i.e. - can a Cabletron Etherswitch device successfully communicate with a Cisco Etherswitch device ?) 2) If not - pls. denote difficulties encountered. 3) If so - pls. denote problems encountered and learned solutions. Any information which could be provided would be greatly appreciated. Thank you. ------------------------------ From: tacain@spdmail.spd.dsccc.com (Thomas Cain) Subject: Re: This Day in Telecom History - the Telegraph Date: 20 Jan 1997 16:36:54 GMT Organization: DSC Communications Corporation, Plano, Texas USA Nils Andersson (nilsphone@aol.com) wrote: >> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Do either of the letters 'T' in >> ITT mean anything these days for the company which bakes bread >> among other things? How long has it been since International >> Telephone and Telegraph had any involvement with either? PAT] > At some point in the early eighties, ITT started an effort to develop > digital switches. They hired away a bunch of talent from AT&T at a > substantial premium, set up the lab with tight security and developed > away. > I am not sure how technically successful they were, but the marketing > effort that was carried out in parallel flopped, the Norwegian Govt > Telco was the only significant customer. > One day the access cards would no longer open the doors to the lab; > that is how the engineers found out that they had been laid off. > As the one sale did not justify finishing the effort, ITT satisfied > the customer contract by subbing out the bid and they bought I believe > Ericsson switches. Sic transit gloria mundi!!! I worked for ITT in switch design from 1978 - 1982. It was my first job out of college. I was hired to help design a new digital switch, but, before I started, ITT bought out North Electric and cancelled the new switch development. I ended up working on the Metaconta-L for two years instead. Metaconta was an SPC switch with an 8 stage latching reed relay matrix. The switch was very much like a crossbar with the smarts moved out of the marker and into a processor. Metaconta was brought into the U.S. from France and adapted to the U.S. network. It was always easy to tell which areas of the software were never touched in the U.S.; the comments were still in French! That was a 'hugely successful' product; I believe 12 were sold in the U.S. and half of those to Centel in Las Vegas. In 1980 I moved to the former North Electric facility in Delaware, Ohio to work on the digital switch which drove ITT to buy North Electric; the ITT 1210. North Electric called it the DSS-1. I don't now remember how many 1210s were sold, but, it was more than 12! ITT also began development on the 1240 at that time. Most of the development was done in Belgium with some work destined for the U.S. market done in Raleigh, NC. That Raleigh facility is now Alcatel. I always thought the 1240 was a real slick design, but, there was never any strong commitment to the U.S. market. I left ITT about 12-18 months before the doors slammed shut. The story I heard from Delaware was like this. Everyone came to work one morning and noticed LOTS of rent-a-cops around the outside of the building. Shortly after getting to work the data lines to the main compute facility in Raleigh went dead. Then there was an announcement over the PA asking everyone to leave via the front lobby. Everyone was handed an envelope on their way out the door. Everyone stood out front, opened their envelopes, and the rest is history. The funny part was that after they fired everyone, they still had contracts to meet! They then hired some of the guys back as contractors to finish up some committed work. A friend in that group said it was great because they just played cards and worked the phones looking for jobs! We always wondered if ITT had ever intended to make money in the U.S. switching business or not. I had a good time there, though, and still have contacts in the industry with friends from back then. I give my ITT experience a lot of credit for getting me started in this industry. I learned the telephone business during a 9 month stay in Onalaska, Wisconsin while working on the Metaconta. Metaconta was before the days of generic system loads. It had conditional assembly for various features in the switch, so, every load was different. Our custom was to send an engineer to every installation to babysit, install, test, and patch the system until it was ready for cutover. This was typically a 6 - 12 month job. During those 9 months working in a switchroom with installers and the local switch techs, I learned telephony in the real world. The people at LaCrosse Telephone were some of the greatest people I've ever met! It was an education that I could not have received in any training program. To this day I still try very hard to get my new people all the real world exposure possible. Tom Cain Voice: +972.477.8192 DSC Communications Corporation M/S 122 FAX: +972.519.3563 1000 Coit Road Plano, Texas 75075 Internet: tacain@spd.dsccc.com ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #18 *****************************