Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id DAA06425; Wed, 5 Feb 1997 03:38:07 -0500 (EST) Date: Wed, 5 Feb 1997 03:38:07 -0500 (EST) From: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu (TELECOM Digest Editor) Message-Id: <199702050838.DAA06425@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson@massis.lcs.mit.edu Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #31 TELECOM Digest Wed, 5 Feb 97 03:38:00 EST Volume 17 : Issue 31 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Re: Telegraph Questions (oldbear@arctos.com) Re: Telegraph Questions (John R. Grout) Re: Alternate Directory Providers (Lou Jahn) Re: Alternate Directory Providers (John R. Covert) Re: Country Codes Profile For Turkmenistan; Former USSR Nation (B Goudreau) Re: X2/56K: What if They Gave a War and Nobody Showed? (Gordon Hlavenka) Re: X2/56K: What if They Gave a War and Nobody Showed? (Eric Elder) 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: oldbear@arctos.com (The Old Bear) Subject: Re: Telegraph Questions Date: Mon, 3 Feb 1997 09:58:14 -0500 Organization: The Arctos Group - http://www.arctos.com/arctos lwinson@bbs.cpcn.com (Lee Winson) writes: > In old movies, when they're reading from a telegram, they use the word > "stop" between sentences. Yet, didn't Morse code and Teletypewriters > have punctuation, so there was no need for a full word? Indeed, I > recall reading in a 1948 secretary's book _not_ to use the word "stop" > in telegrams. Tucked away in my family archives are some old Western Union telegrams from the 1940s announcing important events (like *my* being born.) These are remarkable in that they consist of strips of paper tape, cut and pasted (apparently by hand) onto a Western Union telegram form. Apparently printed like "ticker tape" and with the text in all uppercase letters (as Baudot code generates) punctuated with =STOP= (with the equal signs as shown) between sentences. In the early 1960s, I used to stay with my grandparents at a resort hotel, and being bored, made friends with the hotel desk clerk who used to let me operate the hotel plug-board switchboard at times and to help sending and receiving Western Union telegrams for the guests. Telegrams were sent by having the guest hand write the message on a paper form which was placed on a small machine with a rotating drum and then scanned to Western Union. After sending a message, it was important to remove it from the drum and replace it with an incoming telegram form which was printed on special paper (the precursor of thermal fax paper?) which could record the next incoming telegram as a pinpoint of light "burned" it into the paper as the drum rotated. Then, in my first job after grad school in the late 1970s, I recall sending telegrams from a Western Union TWX machine (a Teletype Model 33) where one would use the designator "PMS" in the message header, indicating that the destination was a physical address and not another telex or TWX teleprinter. PMS stood for "Postal Message Service" and, it was my understanding, was a designator which dated back to the days of the Western Union messenger boys who have been immortalized in so many movies of the 30s and 40s. (PMS was not be confused with Mailgrams, another Western Union product which provided the printing of the message at a site close to the addressee and the depositing of the message into the US Mail at the main post office for next day delivery via ordinary first class mail.) > Would anyone know if they really did use the word "stop" in telegrams, > and if so, why did they and when did they stop? Even after all that ... I have no idea why =STOP= on the teleprinter, unless to delimit paragraphs -- most telgraph-ese paragraphs being single sentences. > Speaking of telegrams, in old movies they are mentioned quite > frequently, indeed, people appear to send telegrams in situations > where today we'd use long distance telephone. I know years ago Long > Distance was very expensive -- could I assume telegraph rates were > relatively cheap? Also, not everyone had a home telephone and long distance calling was quite inconvenient, requiring operator assistance and common delays in setting up the call. The telegram had been around for decades and was easy and reliable -- and predicable because one paid by the word for a pre-written text, unlike telephony where one could never be certain if the call would turn into a conversation, even if brief. I do not know if Western Union rates were distance sensitive. Somehow, I recall that one paid by the word, regardless of where in the Western Union system the message was going. > (Now an oral Western Union telegram is quite expensive , delivery, if > available, is even more.) Anyway, I guess at some point long distance > phone rates declined to the point where it became cheaper to telephone > rather than telegraph. Would anyone know approximately when that was? To have someone dictate a telegram over the phone and then to messenger its final delivery is quite labor intensive compared with today's automatic switching of telephone circuits. Interestingly, the Telex network remains well used in Europe where language problems frequently make written communication easier than telephony. Even so, FAX will eventually replace the TLX system. Cheers, The Old Bear [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: A curious thing about telegrams was that like phone calls you could send them 'collect' asking the recipient addressee to pay for them, but unlike phone calls, the recipient got to read the message and *then* decide if if he wanted to pay for it or not. If so, he got to keep the paper it was printed on; if not the messenger (if delivered to you) or front desk cashier/ clerk (if you called for it in person at one of the Company's public offices or at a telegraph agency) took the paper back from you and kept it. A message also went back to the originating public office or agency telling them payment was refused and to get the money from the sender. None the less, the recipient was aware of the message even if he did not have the paper it was printed on. The public telegraph offices were curious places. The ones operated by WUTCO itself were always very ornate; i.e. marble floors and counters; nice brass containers with blank telegraph forms to be filled in by the customer; fountain pens fastened with little chains to the table (just like the post office used to have) where the customers would sit to compose the messages they wished to send. Large brass spitoons and ashtrays around the room; incadescent lights suspended from the ceiling on chains with rather elegant globes on them; ceiling fans throughout the room which always seemed to be on low speed and spinning sort of slowly; of course one or two Western Union clocks of the fancier style in wooden case with a visible pendulum and a constant din in the background from the machinery and a telephone that never seemed to stop ringing. Behind the marble counter at which the clerk (larger offices like Chicago had three or four clerks on duty at the same time) was stationed, one would see the telegraph machines. Typically the telegrapher was male and the counter clerk was female, although sometimes the telegrapher was female also. One telegrapher was expected to oversee three or four machines; sending stuff out on one machine while two or three others were getting incoming messages. It was very rare except in the wee hours of the morning (when typically only one person was on duty serving both as clerk and telegrapher) that one or more machines would not be chattering and clacking as it printed out whatever it had to say. But sometimes it would happen that all the machines would go idle during a slow traffic period and the silence in the room was quite obvious. Maybe the silence would last all of a minute or two, or maybe just ten seconds ... but invariably the silence would be broken by a humming noise as one of the machines came on followed by a different noise as the gears engaged and it started to receive and print out a new incoming message. The counter clerk ruled the office like a little kingdom. After you composed your outgoing message you would walk up to the counter to the clerk, paper in hand. If the clerk was on the phone taking a mess- age to be set out you waited. If the clerk was talking to you then the phone would ring and ring and ring, the clerk seemingly oblivious to it except to perhaps lift it off hook after ten or fifteen rings to say in the mouthpiece 'hold until I am available', not really caring who it was; they would wait in line like everyone else. The clerk would read over what you had written, stopping now and then to ask you to decipher some part of your writing that was illegible ("what is this word here?" she would ask and point at it; you told her the word or the name and she would 'pencil it in' with block letters the telegrapher would understand). Counting the words she would then say "that will be sixty cents" or whatever it came to. You gave her the money, she opened the cash box to put it in or make change, and once payment had been made (unless you were sending it 'collect') and the illegible handwriting corrected to the point the telegrapher could read it the clerk would stamp it with indicia indicating the payment, the date/time, and other accounting department administrivia. Then she stuck it on a spindle; the telegrapher would reach over and pull it off the spindle and start it on its way. About that time the phone would ring again and the clerk would roll her eyes, reach over and answer to take another phoned-in telegram to be sent out. The clerks were quite unctious at times, and their demeanor and attitude changed with each customer. Naturally they got to read the message first in the process of calling out the person's name to see if they were in the waiting room waiting for a telegram to arrive. A message comes that Cousin Itt graduated from high school yesterday and the clerk would call for the recipient. Mr. and Mrs. Jones walk up to the desk, collect the piece of paper and stand there to read it. The clerk would smile and say something like, 'congratulations folks, he sounds like a real intelligent boy ...' and then beam and smile as the Joneses were doing the same. The next clatter from the machine brought a message that grandmother had passed away yesterday after a long illness and will you please come to the funeral ... the clerk would call for Mr. and Mrs. Smith who approached the counter, already expecting the worst. The clerk hands them the piece of paper which they read silently, probably with Mr. Smith with his arm around his wife as they read it. Tears begin to form in Mrs. Smith's eyes and that was the signal for the clerk to say, "honey, I sure am sorry to have had to give you this news ... " with her lower lip sort of protruding and her own eyes glistening a little. She would offer Mrs. Smith a tissue and ask sympathetically if they needed assistance in composing a reply. "If you reply while you are still here in the office it will only cost you fifty cents to send a message letting them know if you will be going to the funeral or not." Ditto with the outgoing messages; joyous news of newborn children and promotions at work mixed with messages of grief and sorrow; the clerks would laugh and smile with one customer and grieve with the next customer. Federal communications laws prohibited the clerks and telegraphers from ever discussing with anyone the content of any messages they processed. They did sometimes talk in generalities though with personal friends and other employees. About 1961 I had a roomate for a short time who was a clerk and telegrapher for the telegraph agency in Hammond, Indiana, where the agency was located in the local bus station. He told me once of seeing a young woman about eighteen or nineteen years of age get off the bus and come straight into his office full of smiles and happiness to send a message to her parents saying she had arrived safely and would be in touch again in a couple days. He mentioned her being so cheerful and asking questions about this new town she would be living in, etc. He said the next morning he happened to walk out in the depot waiting room area to get his morning coffee and he saw her standing in a corner with her suitcase sitting next to her, with tears running down her face. He said presently she walked in, laid the exact amount of money on the counter with her message to her parents asking them to meet her when the bus would arrive later. She said 'goodbye, and thanks for being so nice to me yesterday ...' and then walked out, still crying. She picked up her luggage and got on the bus. "Someone must have hurt her very badly," he said, and he wondered later if he could have said or done anything to ease her pain a little. "But the agency I worked for was under contract to WUTCO to provide telegraph services and the contract plainly said that no employee was ever to have any personal discussion with a customer about their messages. We were never to release names, message text or anything like that. Had I spoken to her in a personal way at all and WUTCO decided that I had violated a customer's trust, well they could not fire me because I did not work directly for WUTCO but they would have put a lot of pressure on the agency to fire me." He quit the job because he said the clerks would get a lot of hassles from constantly ringing phones and sometimes long lines of cranky, beligerant customers. Most of the public offices were phased out during the 1970's, and the WUTCO agents of today have nothing to do with telegrams at all; they are just in the money transfer side of things. But there was a time they brought Americans messages of great joy alternating with messages of tremendous sorrow. PAT] ------------------------------ From: j-grout@glhpx2.cen.uiuc.edu (John R. Grout) Subject: Re: Telegraph Questions Date: 03 Feb 1997 09:02:55 -0600 Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana Reply-To: j-grout@uiuc.edu lwinson@bbs.cpcn.com (Lee Winson) writes: > Speaking of telegrams, in old movies they are mentioned quite > frequently, indeed, people appear to send telegrams in situations > where today we'd use long distance telephone. I know years ago Long > Distance was very expensive -- could I assume telegraph rates were > relatively cheap? (Now an oral Western Union telegram is quite > expensive , delivery, if available, is even more.) Telegraphy used to be cheaper because inter-city bandwidth using wired trunks (or, internationally, radio links) was so expensive and limited that one could introduce the significant labor costs of the telegraphy system (operators, pick up and delivery persons) and still save money by maximizing the use of the scarcest resource. Since intra-city bandwidth was relatively less expensive, service for many larger or communication-intensive businesses used a slightly-different tradeoff between labor and bandwidth ... these businesses still used telegraphy, but had their own wire link to the local Western Union office to lower pickup and delivery costs. As terrestrial microwave, fiber optic and satellite trunking technology was introduced, the cost of bandwidth decreased, leading to use of Telex, TWX, and fax technology. John R. Grout j-grout@uiuc.edu Department of Computer Science University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ------------------------------ Date: 03 Feb 97 13:24:10 EST From: Lou Jahn <71233.2444@CompuServe.COM> Subject: Re: Alternate Directory Providers First - the "New Telecom World" as created by the T/C Act is forcing different business methodogies to deliver services, this includes Directory Assistance (DA). DA was originally provided by AT&T to enhance Callers ability to find targeted numbers to increase traffic. Later PUC's found it a service worth mandating. Then as DA became a priced service, the PUCs often priced it under the true/cost to a LEC to deliver DA service. Bell Atlantic receives $0.57/DA-call in Pennsylvania, yet only $0.25/call in NJ (after six free calls). The service and platforms are the same. In 1984, the courts created a dual delivery of DA numbers. LECs were not permitted to carry your DA inquiry across NPAs, hence IXCs owned NPA-555-1212 delivery while LECs owned 411 and/or 555-1212 service. The court also "arbitrarily" determined that $0.75 was a fair price to allow IXCs (mostly AT&T) to charge for NPA-555-1212 DA access. Since the LEC actually owned the subscriber relationship (e.g. the tele-number assigned, Pub or Non-Pub relationship) they retained ownership of the existing (1984) DA platforms and subsequent service. Immediately, all IXCs started with "outsourced" DA to the LECs. The IXC carried your call to the LEC owning the NPA (and subscriber) for a look-up. Most RBOCs were getting between $0.22-0.25 per call from the IXC to provide the actual number look-up. The IXC kept the rest of the $0.75 for transport, local access and billing charges. Today many of the IXCs charge $0.90 or more for NPA-555-1212 access. Since my LD rate is $0.11/minute - I could save money if I were allowed to dial NPA-411. Most importantly, the RBOC DA service was restricted by law from providing enhanced DA service to the IXCs using their basic DA service. And of course, came the issue of branding. Call Completion (CC) is an example of a desireable enhanced DA service. At one time AT&T was asking NPA-555-1212 callers if they desired CC before turning the caller over to an RBOC DA bureau. If the caller said yes (via DTMF) AT&T added a shadow operator to follow the call with the DA operator and they took the number and "advanced the call" by entering the number released by DA causing a DA/CC call. This was expensive and cumbersome. Also you have to remember the clever MCI trick announced last year called 1-800-GET-INFO. While this was advertised as a DA system, it actually was a play for capturing a portion of AT&T's then 60% LD market share by giving out numbers and picking up Call Completion for MCI to carry the LD call, even if you were presubscibed to AT&T. AT&T quickly struck back with 1-900-555-1212 and started using alternate DA providers. There is also the new markets with the creation of CLECs. If you were the CLEC VP of Marketing and spent a ton of money to capture say 5,000 subscribers from an ILEC, would your next move be to provide the list of your successes to your competition? It easily helps their analysis and reaction to your ability to sell and build programs to capture subscribers. Hence CLECs are also looking for alternate DA providers that enhance their differentiation and provide their brand on the DA call handling. Years ago a third party firm was inserted into Yellow Page Directory publications in the LA aera which is split between Pac Tel and GTE for similar reasons (related to trying to capture the others AD spaces). Now why are some alternative providers having a problem with accuracy? It stems from many of the RBOCs refusing to "rent or license" their listings for the alternate DA provider. Thus some systems use "complied" listings. If they pick up records from financial sources (of even Motor Vehicle Agencies), they will include Non-Pub numbers. When a person with Non-Pub completes their driving license or credit application, they gave little thought that that record list may be rented to a mail distributer, who in turn rents their list to "want-a-be" telephone providers. If the listing came from printed directories, they can have up to 18-20% error rate by the next publication cycle. Another problem occurs in complied listings. The telephone companies have an inventory of telephone numbers and who is the currently "using" the number. Complied lists are generally an inventory of people which includes their telephone number. As a subscriber drops their service, the telco issues a delete of that record to the DA database. Complied listings nver get such deletes and infact may have multiple records of say John Smith or J. Smith, etc all carrying different telephone numbers if Mr Smith moved. Alt. DA firms can access existing LEC DA systems via Electronic Data Access but it is well over priced and eats up operator time. It is used to assist the internal DA system with much reluctance. Unfortunately for Callers, the number of alternate DA providers are growing as the new telephone markets appear. CLECs will find these firms helpful in equalizing their position against ILECs. Today a CLEC can offer listings and Call Completion for all of North America using 411 or 555-1212. If they desire, they can do so at costs far less to callers than the 90 cent/call IXC plan. The CLEC gets branding. They get the same caller system or interface in each CLEC area they choose to enter. IXCs have always outsourced their DA business starting with going to the RBOCs. Thus as alternate DA providers add service options that assist the IXC to meet its competitors or that help the IXC expand services (e.g. gaining call completion revenues), IXCs will utilize alternate DA firms to a higher degree. Meanwhile, the FCC has determined that RBOCs must open their listings for competitive use. As the RBOCs move to comply with this ruling, the accuracy and services of alternate DA providers will improve. In addition, alternate providers offer DA services that RBOCs to not. Since they are creating a new service definition, they can provide FAX, pager and other methods of contact not available from a basic LEC DA system. You will be finding far more DA delivery by alternative channels as the FCC ruling assists their access to LEC listings. When the listings access is resolved, you will also find better and lower priced services available for callers. Louis Jahn Listings Services Solutions Inc. (An Alternative National DA Provider) Box 10, Amherst Commons Lumberton, NJ 08048 609-702-8232 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 3 Feb 97 16:13:34 EST From: John R. Covert Subject: Re: Alternate Directory Providers Mark J. Cuccia had written: > As far as *I* am concerned, AT&T is *again* shooting itself in the > foot by contracting out and routing to this third party for directory! and then Lynne Gregg replied: > AT&T has always subcontracted directory assistance service here in the > U.S. to the local operating company (RBOC, LEC). BUT NOT ANYMORE. And that was Mark's point. The Local Exchange Carriers have up-to-date directory information. It was wonderful when calling 10288-1-NPA-555-1212 caused AT&T to connect you to the local exchange carrier. You usually got numbers within a few days of their being installed. But not anymore. AT&T now contracts with a third party with no direct access to directory information. The data is now often several months out of date. A major downgrade in quality of service. /john ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 3 Feb 1997 11:48:22 -0500 From: goudreau@dg-rtp.dg.com (Bob Goudreau) Subject: Re: Country Codes Profile For Turkmenistan; Former USSR Nations > [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: David questions whether Russia (the > former Soviet Union) should have a single digit country code in the > form of '7'. He raises a good point, however I think the same > question should be raised about the USA/Canada/Carribbean countries > which use '1' to the exclusion of everyone else. Yes, but the privilege of +1's shortness is tempered by the fact that it has to be shared among *several* countries (almost 20) instead of monopolized by a single one, as +7 was when the USSR was a unitary state, or as +7 might be again if Kazakstan and Tajikistan left and only the Russian Federation remained. Really, the +1 case is no more selfish than, say, the +4 zone, which has only 11 countries (soon to be 12 with the Czech/Slovak split of +42). > I would prefer to see Canada and the USA on separate country codes, > possibly of the form '12' and '13'. I think those would be particularly *undesirable*, since it would not allow for a permissive dialing period during which calls originating from outside of the NANP could be dialed using either the new or old country codes. Consider the ambiguity of +1 334 555 1212 vs. +13 345 551 212X, for example. Of course, if you used *three*-digit codes ending in 9 (e.g., +139), things could work (because the N9X series of NPAs are currently reserved), but heck, I don't think the US or Canada deserve to get knocked down all the way to (shudder) *three*-digit country code status! :-) :-) Some of us have in the past kicked around some ideas about what it would take to split up the NANP in a way that allowed graceful transition periods. The best approach that I came up with (and which many other folks independently developed) exploits the fact that no existing NPAs begin with 0 or 1; thus, +10 and +11 could be introduced as the new codes for Canada and the US without disturbing existing +1 dialing during the permissive (parallel running) period. The smaller (ex-+1-809) NANP countries would get 3-digit 1NX country codes, either after the US/Canada withdrawal phase is complete, or simultaneously (but only if they use +1N9 codes, for the reason described earlier, and obviously only 8 of them could exploit this early-departure option). > I suppose using '10' would be sort of confusing since we here in the > USA have the option of dialing '10xxx' as part of a long distance > number when we want the call routed to a particular carrier, and > having to dial something like 01110 or 01111 to reach Canada would > be sort of a drag also. But is there anything preventing the US and Canada from continuing to coordinate their numbering spaces in order to keep them disjoint (and thus still dialable from the other country with just 1+NPA), even though callers from *outside* countries would have to provide the correct country code? Of course, full canonical international dialing should be available between the US and Canada anyway, even if short-cut dialing continues to exist. But this change would also be an opportune time to change the international direct-dial prefix from 011 to 00, since otherwise, operator assisted international calls to other +1X countries (01 1X) could be confused with international direct-dialed calls to elsewhere in the world (011 X). > What sort of hassles would be caused for the Russian people if '7' > was replaced with some two or three digit number beginning with '7'? They shouldn't be directly affected unless the country code change is accompanied by alterations in the internal numbering plan (such as area code changes); callers within Russia would still use the same old trunk prefix (81? I think) to reach another area code within the country. The big issue is continuity for callers trying to reach Russia from elsewhere, since they would have to know about the country code change. Ideally, a permissive dialing regime could be set up for this case as well, again with an eye for an unambiguous scheme. For +7, this looks easy -- there appear to be *lots* of digits that are not used as the initial digit of any area code even now: 1, 2, 6, 7 and 9. So +71 would be my suggestion for the new Russian Federation country code. Bob Goudreau Data General Corporation goudreau@dg-rtp.dg.com 62 Alexander Drive +1 919 248 6231 Research Triangle Park, NC 27709, USA ------------------------------ From: cgordon@worldnet.att.net (Gordon S. Hlavenka) Subject: Re: X2/56K: What if They Gave a War and Nobody Showed? Date: 3 Feb 1997 13:57:34 GMT Organization: AT&T WorldNet Services On Wed, 29 Jan 1997 dave@tricon.net said: > (1) Convince consumers to spend $90 for an upgrade (which costs them > almost nothing) According to USR's website (http://x2.usr.com/upgrades/index.html), the upgrade cost varies from free to $7. (Some of the "free" stuff expired 1/31, and no mention is made of new prices.) > (2) Place pressure on ISP's to buy expensive USR terminal equipment. And they'll upgrade the ISP's equipment for free. (Granted, the ISP must be using USR's equipment in the first place ...) USR is making a big marketing-based move here: They (and the rest of us as well) know that the Lucent/Rockwell crowd are just a few months down the road with _their_ 56K technology. So USR wants to be the first ones out of the gate and build up market share. If they miss (they're already a bit late) those other guys will steal the thunder that USR has so carefully rumbled up over the last couple of months. Let's say a consumer has an upgradeable USR modem. Would they pay a one-time fee of $7 to cut their downloading times by a third? I think so. Now, three months later, would that same consumer be likely to pay an additional $150 for a Lucent/ Rockwell modem that would further decrease their download times by as much as ten percent? Probably not. A lot of consumers are going to fall into the "early adopter" category, since most of them are already tired of waiting for Web pages to load. They will buy USR "X2" modems (indeed; they've already bought upgradeable modems) not because the technology is better, but because it's available. The tired old example of VHS/Betamax shows that superior technology doesn't always prevail. Not that I'm passing judgement on any of the 56K contenders -- the point I'm trying to make is that having the "best" technology isn't necessarily important. Marketing is. This means ISPs who do not currently have USR equipment may consider buying USR for their next port expansion, since many of the ISPs' customers would start to favor USR-compatible connections. If the technology works, EVEN IF ONLY TO 50K, then USR stands to establish X2 as a "defacto" standard simply by being the first ones to deliver. Disclaimer of vested-interests: I sell hardware. When I sell modems, I sell USR modems exclusively. I do this for my own reasons, and not because of any "sweetheart deal" with USR or anyone else. My total profits from modem sales in 1996 were less than $500, and I can't be bought that cheaply. Gordon S. Hlavenka O- cgordon@worldnet.att.net ------------------------------ From: Eric Elder Subject: Re: X2/56K: What if They Gave a War and Nobody Showed? Date: Mon, 03 Feb 1997 13:17:21 -0800 Organization: Lucent of Largo Netcare Services Reply-To: eelder@mailhost.paradyne.com Ed Ellers wrote: > Dave Sieg wrote in article lcs.mit.edu>: >> While the technology is still far from proven in the field, and a >> standard is still 12-18 months away, WOULDN'T IT BE INTERESTING if >> ISP's "exercised their power" at least to the extent of saying: "This >> stinks! > Yes, it would be interesting ... especially to the FTC. The prospect > of a group of providers deciding among themselves *not* to offer a > certain improved service to the public is exactly what the antitrust > laws are supposed to prevent! Yes, but many ISP's simply won't be able to afford to offer this service. Some writers in the comp.dcom.modems conference expect the service to cost nearly as much as ISDN. ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #31 *****************************