Return-Path: Received: by massis.lcs.mit.edu (8.7.4/NSCS-1.0S) id AAA23316; Fri, 30 May 1997 00:34:02 -0400 (EDT) Date: Fri, 30 May 1997 00:34:02 -0400 (EDT) From: editor@telecom-digest.org Message-Id: <199705300434.AAA23316@massis.lcs.mit.edu> To: ptownson Subject: TELECOM Digest V17 #137 TELECOM Digest Fri, 30 May 97 00:34:00 EDT Volume 17 : Issue 137 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Calling Cards (LEC, AT&T, Other LD Companies) (Mark J. Cuccia) Is a $50 Billion Merger What Deregulation Was Really All About? (Tad Cook) FTC Settles Global Dialing Scheme Case (Tad Cook) Lawsuit Targets Spammers and Mass E-Mailers (Eric Hunt) AT&T Bails Out of California Local Service (Tad Cook) Virtual CivicNet '97 (Lisa Kimball) 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: * subscriptions@telecom-digest.org * 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: 847-727-5427 Fax: 773-539-4630 ** Article submission address: editor@telecom-digest.org ** Our archives are available for your review/research. The URL is: http://telecom-digest.org (WWW/http only!) 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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. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 29 May 1997 11:56:25 -0500 From: Mark J. Cuccia Subject: Calling Cards (LEC, AT&T, Other LD Companies) Dave Stott wrote: > In today's (5/28/97) {Wall Street Journal}, page C5, there appears a > "Notice to AT&T Customers." > Here are the general changes -- my questions are in parentheses. > Basically AT&T is changing calling card calls for both customer and > operator dialed calls to $0.35 per minute, regardless of time or > distance. (I wonder if that includes intraLATA calls?) I think that these charges are if you are under an optional promotion plan, such as the new AT&T "one-rate" plans. As for inTRA-LATA calls, yes these rates would probably apply as well, as long as the calling-card call was placed by accessing the AT&T OSPS network, by either: (10(10)288)+0+ten-digits, or 800-CALL-ATT access, or 800-321-0ATT access, etc. > On calling card calls placed via 1-800-CALLATT and billed to an AT&T > card, the service charge drops from $0.90 to $0.35 per call. If you > use another method for accessing the AT&T network (1-800-321-0288?), > the charge drops from $0.90 to $0.60. If you bill to a LEC calling > card (can you still do that? Where?) the fee drops from $1.20 per > call to $0.60 per call. Finally, if you access their network other > than 1-800-CALLATT and bill to a LEC card, the fee is now $0.95. I don't think that there is any charging difference between the two 800 access numbers. The differences might be if you used (10(10)288)-0+ vs. use of an 800- number, or maybe the difference between a '0+' like access vs. the use of a '0-' like access. "Zero-minus" means that you came into a live AT&T operator 'cold'. You _verbally_ quote to her the number you wish to call, rather than having previously dialed/touchtoned it into the system. It can mean being connected to an AT&T operator 'directly', or by requesting the local telco (LEC) operator to connect you with the AT&T operator. As for the differences between a LEC-issued and an AT&T-issued card ... AT&T will still accept the LEC-issed (NYNEX, BellSouth, GTE, other local independent, Canadian local telco, etc) calling cards. But they seem to carry a higher surcharge. Also billing an AT&T-handled call to a local telco issued calling card will _NOT_ give you any discounts you might have in an AT&T promotion or plan. HOWEVER, AT&T has been cancelling their mutual card-honoring arrangements with the local telcos, over the past year and a half. For inTRA-LATA calls handled 'directly' by the local telco's inTRA-LATA network, you can NOT bill such calls to an _AT&T_ issued card in most cases. I think that NYNEX was the first area to have this happen. BellSouth's TOPS operators won't bill BellSouth-handled inTRA-LATA calls to an AT&T-issued card since December 1996. There might come a time when the LEC-issued card can't be used by AT&T, as the LECs want to become Long-Distance carriers, and AT&T wants to become a local telco. I don't have anything specific on what _could_ happen in the future, however. LEC-issued cards _can_ be used to place MCI and Sprint handled calls. Also, LEC-issued cards are 'accepted' and billed (at exorbitant surcharges) by many small carriers/resellers, _especially_ the AOSlime at private payphones and hotel/motel/hospital/etc. 'guest' PBX systems. A LEC-issued card can be based on your ten-digit telephone number plus a four-digit "PIN", _or_ it can be based on the LEC's RAO (Revenue Accounting Office) code. Such RAO-based cards are of the format: NXX-0/1XX-xxxx, plus a four-digit (nxxx) "PIN". RAO's for non-line-number-based card purposes range from 2XX through 7XX. The long-distance companies _must_ be given non-discriminatory access to the LEC's card-validation LIDB's, etc., although the LEC's can charge the LD companies and AOSlimers a fee for such access. MCI will accept a local-telco-issued card via 800-COLLECT (800-265-5328), although they will add _their_ surcharges for such calls. Likewise, Sprint will accept LEC-issued cards via 800-210-CARD (800-210-2273), and at _their_ surcharges. But the LD carriers don't have to allow local telcos access to _their_ card or account/authorization-code databases. Therefore, many MCI and Sprint (and now AT&T) 'proprietary' cards are _not_ accepted by the LEC's for inTRA-LATA calls placed via the LEC's inTRA-LATA card/operator systems. MARK_J._CUCCIA__PHONE/WRITE/WIRE/CABLE:__HOME:__(USA)__Tel:_CHestnut-1-2497 WORK:__mcuccia@mailhost.tcs.tulane.edu|4710-Wright-Road|__(+1-504-241-2497) Tel:UNiversity-5-5954(+1-504-865-5954)|New-Orleans-28__|fwds-on-no-answr-to Fax:UNiversity-5-5917(+1-504-865-5917)|Louisiana(70128)|cellular/voicemail- ------------------------------ Subject: Is a $50 Billion Merger What Deregulation Was Really All About? Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 23:01:29 PDT From: tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) Portions of an article from Wednesday's {Wall Street Journal}: Calling Ma Bell: Is a $50 billion merger what deregulation was really all about? By JOHN J. KELLERand BRYAN GRULEY The Wall Street Journal How big is too big? The disclosure that AT&T Corp. is discussing a possible $50 billion-plus merger with two of the seven regional Bell companies that it spun off more than a decade ago is sparking hot debate over whether such a megagiant would simply be too big for the country's -- and consumers' -- good. AT&T is in serious discussions with SBC Communications Corp., the Texas Bell that itself completed a $16.5 billion acquisition of another Bell sibling, Pacific Telesis Group, only two months ago. The effort could ultimately collapse as negotiators tussle over terms and power structure. Even if an accord is reached, federal regulators will give hard scrutiny to a deal so big -- twice the size of the largest merger in corporate history -- that it would create the largest U.S. collection of telecom assets since the old American Telephone & Telegraph Co. was broken up in 1984. Critics will complain that AT&T is trying to rebuild the Bell System monopoly that the federal government tore apart in 1984 and to return to an era of few rivals and less choice for customers. AT&T and SBC will say, if they can pull off a merger pact, that they are girding for the global telecom wars and that, once combined, they will be stronger and better able to provide consumers with more competition rather than less. Either way, the fact that AT&T and SBC would dare discuss such an audacious plan underscores a ringing truth: This era of gazillion-dollar mergers aimed at erecting ever larger -- but ever fewer -- world-scale competitors isn't what lawmakers and regulators had in mind. "The forces of evil unleashed by the new telecom act are now obviously running far ahead of the forces of good. This cannot happen. This can't go forward," complains Mark Cooper, research director of the Consumer Federation of America. Last year, Congress tore down decades-old barriers to competition so that all kinds of telecom rivals could have at it. The aim was to let consumers choose among dozens of competitors selling local, long-distance and wireless telephone service and sundry other services ranging from video to Internet access. Instead, giant telecom carriers seem far more interested in combining than in invading one another's turf. Consumers have new choices in only a few markets since the Communications Act of 1996 was enacted, but multibillion-dollar deal-making has been all over the map. In addition to the SBC-PacTel deal, Bell Atlantic Corp. is close to completing its acquisition of Nynex Corp. MCI Communications Corp. is about to be acquired by British Telecom PLC, and Sprint Corp. already is 20 percent-owned by the German and French carriers. Other big shoes may yet drop, involving other Bells or perhaps GTE Corp. With AT&T moving closer to a Bell deal, the pending BT-MCI combination could end up launching its own purchase of a Bell company. An AT&T-SBC merger is different mainly in that it would be so much bigger, combining the largest long-distance company with the largest local-service company (Bell Atlantic-Nynex will eclipse SBC once that deal closes). Investors seemed to welcome a deal between the companies. In heavy New York Stock Exchange composite trading Tuesday, AT&T ended at $37.50 a share, up $1.37 1/2, while SBC was at $57.62 1/2, up 75 cents. A merged AT&T-SBC would have annual revenue of almost $80 billion, net income approaching $9 billion, 240,000 workers, and the most powerful local and long-distance connections in the industry. It would be larger than most foreign national carriers. But are such enormous combinations good for consumers? And will the politicians and regulators who hailed deregulation because of their faith in the "free market" stand aside now that the market has found unprecedented size desirable? Don't count on the politicians to stay out of this fight. Rep. John Dingell, the Michigan Democrat who was one of the principal drafters of the telecom law, says: "This reminds me of Humpty Dumpty: All the king's horses and all the king's men are engaged in putting Ma Bell together again. If there was a reason for splitting the company before, those reasons probably still remain valid." The AT&T-SBC effort "creates huge competitive problems. This isn't what was supposed to happen," says Anne Bingaman, the former Justice Department antitrust chief who lobbied hard for the telecom law. A high official of the Federal Communications Commission adds: "It's getting out of hand, this merger mania." White House officials were caught by surprise and shocked, individuals in government and industry say, to realize that their support of the telecom law would lead to such a megadeal. ------------------------------ Subject: FTC Settles Global Dialing Scheme Case Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 23:14:34 PDT From: tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) FTC settles case involving global dialing scheme WASHINGTON (Reuter) - An Iowa man accused of luring unwitting consumers to make lengthy calls to Guyana and the Caribbean for free travel offers agreed to pay $111,000 to settle fraud charges, regulators said Wednesday. The Federal Trade Commission said it is the first action by the United States against a pay-per-call service that zaps consumers with sky-high phone bills for overseas calls. The FTC alleged in December that Daniel Lubell solicited consumers to call what turned out to be international numbers to enter a free Hawaiian vacation sweepstakes, and to get information about free or discount travel. Lubell, who lives in Bettendorf, Iowa, did business as Mercantile Messaging and DB&L Inc. As a part of the settlement, he did not admit or deny guilt. The FTC said Lubbell did not tell consumers they would incur a hefty charge on their phone bill -- up to $2.33 a minute, or more than $30 -- to hear an entire taped message. He also failed to inform consumers they could enter the sweepstakes only by mail, or that they first had to buy an airline ticket to benefit from the information being peddled, according to the FTC. The 15-minute recorded message explained how to get bumped from oversold flights to get free airline tickets, the FTC said. The message also gave consumers an address to write to get an entry form for the sweepstakes, the agency added. In addition to the fine, the FTC settlement bars similar violations in the future. The FTC is considering extending consumer safeguards for 900-number calls to other pay-per-call services that involve overseas calls and use a prefix other than "900." The agency's existing 900-number rules require clear cost disclosures and a means for settling billing disputes. The newer services offer callers astrological and travel information, psychic advice and phone sex, among other topics. "International audiotext schemes have grown dramatically in the recent past as scam artists try to evade the 900 number rule's cost-disclosure and free preamble message requirements," said Jodie Bernstein, director of the FTC's bureau of consumer protection. ------------------------------ From: ehunt@bga.com (Eric Hunt) Subject: Lawsuit Targets Spammers and Mass E-Mailers Date: Thu, 29 May 1997 09:29:43 -0500 Organization: Lil' Ole' Me Lawsuit targets spammers and mass e-mailers By Kirk Ladendorf American-Statesman Staff A group of Austin Internet businesses has filed suit against a San Diego company in hopes of establishing a precedent against using improper technical tricks to promote spamming -- the practice of flooding Internet users with junk e-mail. The main plaintiff in the suit is Tracy LaQuey Parker of Austin, who sells flower and gardening information over the Internet. She says the San Diego company illegally used her e-mail address as the return address for a mass e-mail. Parker said her e-mailbox and that of her Internet service provider were inundated with returned copies of the San Diego firm's message. Calls to the San Diego company, C.N. Enterprises, were not answered Wednesday. Internet experts say such electronic junk mailing is an increasing nuisance. Spammers often use false return Internet addresses on their mass e-mailings. Doing so allows them to avoid angry electronic responses from Internet users and thousands of return messages that result from sending e-mail to invalid or outdated addresses. Joining Parker in filing the suit in Travis County District Court are Zilker Internet Park, Parker's Internet service provider, the Texas Internet Service Providers Association and the Austin chapter of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The groups said they were joining the lawsuit to seek a broad legal precedent against spamming and the use of forged e-mail addresses. "These forgeries (falses return addresses) dump huge volumes of unwanted junk mail onto Internet companies and their customers," said Gene Crick, president of the Texas Internet Service Providers Association. "TISPA would like to see the court grant a broad and clear injunction prohibiting this practice." The lawsuit is based on common laws guarding against nuisance and trespass, according to Parker's attorneys. It seeks unspecified damages. Parker claims that C.N. Enterprises and Craig Nowak of San Diego improperly used her business's Internet address as the false return address on a mass e-mailing it did on March 31 and April 1 for a business promotion. The e-mailing was an electronic advertisement promoting information about free cash grants for college students for $19.95. Those who wanted the information were told to mail or fax their replies. Parker said her business, Flowers.com, which sells flower and garden information over the Internet, had to deal with more than 6,000 electronic responses to the mass e-mailing from C.N. Enterprises. Parker said the flood of responses resulted in a major inconvenience to her business and Zilker Internet Park. "There are plenty of examples of legitimate commercial uses of the Internet," Parker said. "This isn't one of them." John Quarterman, an owner of Zilker Internet, said that spamming is a growing problem that costs Internet service providers much time and money. "We have put many technical blocks in place to limit it,'' Quarterman said. "With this lawsuit, we are taking the next step to help stop this abuse.'' The lawsuit was filed on behalf of Parker and the others by lawyers Pete Kennedy and Roger Williams of George, Donaldson & Ford of Austin. Copyright 1997, Cox Interactive Media, Inc. All rights reserved. ------------------- Eric Hunt __ ehunt@bga.com (preferred) Austin, TX \/ hunt@metrowerks.com =20 http://www.realtime.net/~ehunt [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I think this is a *marvelous* action being taken. Apparently a lot of people are going to claim that spammers have free speech rights, and that existing laws do not apply to them, etc. There is however no right to appropriate someone else's email address for spam you want to send out. I have recently received spam which gave my name as the sender (!) so I think I will look into this a bit more also; suing the spammer for giving my email address as the sender. Anyone else have this problem? I certainly do wish an attorney would come forward to start giving Scamford some grief. Speaking of Scamford, someone mentioned to me today that Cyber Promotions was one of a couple spam outfits which have agreed with AGIS to suspend further spamming until some 'standards' have been agreed upon. Further news on this would be appreciated. PAT] ------------------------------ Subject: AT&T Bails Out of Cali ocaService Date: Wed, 28 May 1997 22:49:56 -0700 (PDT) From: tad@ssc.com (Tad Cook) AT&T Bails Out of Local Telephone Service in California BY HOWARD BRYANT, SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS, CALIF. Knight-Ridder/Tribune Business News May 29--AT&T Corp., which trumpeted a new era in telephone competition last year by offering local telephone service in Sacramento to compete with Pacific Bell, has dramatically scaled back service in that region, and put all plans for local telephone service in California on hold. AT&T executives blamed its main competition -- Pac Bell -- for its decision. For business purposes, Pac Bell owns the vast majority of the state's local telephone network. Since AT&T is a long-distance company, it must lease, or "resell" space on Pac Bell's telephone network. Therefore, any customers AT&T receives must have their billing and telephone information converted from Pac Bell to AT&T. AT&T is charging, both verbally and in complaints filed jointly with MCI Communications Corp. to the California Public Utilities Commission, that Pac Bell has dragged its feet in switching customers to AT&T's databases, a move that technically keeps the customer with Pacific Bell or sometimes without service. AT&T spokeswoman Alice Nagle said customers who currently receive their local service from AT&T will continue to do so, but the company's retreat is clear. AT&T has stopped all pro-active marketing, specifically outward telemarketing, to gain new customers. AT&T has offered no timetable for when it will resume, but Nagle said AT&T would begin soliciting customers only when Pac Bell has proven it can handle the demand. "Our hands are tied," Nagle said. "We are completely at their mercy." But Lee Bauman, Pacific Bell vice president for local competition, said AT&T was using the backlog issue as a smoke screen. Bauman said what AT&T is really trying to do is to slow down Pac Bell's entry into the $100 billion long-distance market. Under the 1996 Telecommunications Act, Pac Bell cannot offer long-distance service until it first proves that competition exists in the local market. AT&T's pullback would severely hurt competition and leave Pac Bell out of the long-distance market. "Fundamentally, AT&T is doing everything they can to keep us out of long distance," Bauman said. "That's the real reason. If it was purely something having to do with our ability to process orders, they would adjust their program, not discontinue it." Regina Costa, telecommunications analyst for San Francisco-based TURN, a consumer-advocacy group, said she was not surprised by AT&T's move. "It doesn't surprise me at all that Pac Bell has a backlog of orders," she said. "We've been hearing this all over the state, even from companies that are at each other's throats. There has to be a system in place to switch customers. Right now, a good one doesn't exist." Costa said the AT&T-Pac Bell rift is similar to the early days of competition in the long-distance market, when MCI endured the difficult position of looking bad to its customers because a reliable system to switch customers from AT&T was not yet in place. She also agreed with Pac Bell's assessment of AT&T's strategy, adding that AT&T was probably telegraphing its displeasure with these early days of local phone competition. "The truth is, they probably don't have many customers," she said. "When Pac Bell is making it difficult for people even to get the service, why should AT&T look bad in trying to sell it? By cutting back, I think they are trying to send a message." AT&T declined to say how many local phone customers it has in California. AT&T's backing out of the competition with Pac Bell comes at a curious time. AT&T is rumored to be negotiating a $50 billion merger with SBC Communications Inc., Pac Bell's new parent company. By owning SBC, AT&T would then not have to compete with it. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 29 May 1997 10:27:31 -0400 From: Lisa Kimball Reply-To: lisa@tmn.com Organization: Metasystems Design Group Subject: Virtual CivicNet '97 "Hundreds from Around the World Discuss Internet and Community for Five Weeks at Virtual CivicNet Online Conference" Virtual CivicNet kicked off last week as over 200 participants shared success stories and struggles to build community networks -- grass-roots online services that provide local content, training and support. In a keynote address delivered over Memorial Day weekend Catherine Weldon, Director of Content of Community Networks Inc. said, " Community networking occurs when people and organizations collaborate locally to create opportunities and solve problems." Virtual CivicNet participants hail from countries worldwide including U.S., Canada, UK, Republic of Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Northern Ireland, Finland, Korea, Australia, Sweden, Mexico, Greece, Germany, The Netherlands and India. They haven't had to leave home to attend the conference because it is taking place entirely on the web (http://www.civicnet.org/civicnet). Andrew Cohill, of Blacksburg Electronic Village in Virginia said, "We were not able to afford to attend [a face to face conference], so we are very happy that we can attend online." Each can log on from their home or office computer from anywhere in the world, whenever it's convenient during the conference which takes place May 22 - June 30. Participants respond enthusiastically to the online format, "This conference format is great and has advantages over physical conferences. You have less chance of missing things and everyone can participate equally", said Lance Singbeil, Pharos Internet Publishing, Vancouver, British Columbia. The salon style online conference finds entrepreneurs, community network organizers, journalists, public officials, artists, teachers, researchers, funders, librarians, and investors working together to face shared issues --all with a wide diversity of community work experience as well as experience on the Web. John Glass, of Sociological Practice Training Institute, said, "I think that this is a monumental event that pioneers how we can truly create a global sense of community." Some of the key issues currently being discussed on Virtual CivicNet include: How do we market and draw interest to community nets? How can small manufacturing companies access external markets? What are the commercial players *not* doing that would be valuable services to the community? Who has experience with cyberspace incubators where smaller local businesses get help moving onto the Web? Can for profit and not-for profit community serving networks co-exist? What are the drivers of the future of communities? What is the critical mass required for a successful exchange of ideas regarding community planning or specific community issues? "It is important that values expressed in community networking influence emerging commercial services interested in developing local content markets" said Richard Civille, Executive Director the Center for Civic Networking, a conference co-organizer who developed the agenda. "We want this content to be beneficial to community life and civic affairs." Registration in Virtual CivicNet is $50 For more information http://www.civicnet.org/civicnet Contact: Richard Civille, Center for Civic Networking 202-244-5399, rciville@civicnet.org ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V17 #137 ******************************