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The Telecom Digest for February 16, 2011
Volume 30 : Issue 41 : "text" Format
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====== 29 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Bill Horne 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, and other stuff of interest.
Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2011 22:42:09 -0800 (PST)
From: Lisa or Jeff <hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Cell phone texting spam--article
Message-ID: <53712807-aa5c-4f9c-8d28-2478717e2f41@n10g2000yqf.googlegroups.com>
This is an issue that bugs me--spam sent to cell phone as text
messages that the recipient must pay for, and the lack of
responsiveness from the cell phone carriers. I got a few such spams
that I had to pay for and my only option was to turn off texting
capability; an option I think is wrong but I had no other reasonable
choice.
An article in the Phila Inqr discusses this further. See:
http://www.philly.com/philly/business/20110213_Consumer_10_0__Paying_for_cell_phone_spam.html
Can't the cell phone carriers use ANI to trace back to the offending
source? If the caller spoofed their callback number (as I suspect
they do), couldn't they be prosecuted for that?
Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2011 07:22:05 -0800 (PST)
From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: AT&T iPhone customers: go grab your free 1000 minutes
Message-ID: <966424.20635.qm@web111711.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
--- On Fri, 2/11/11, Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote:
> From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
> Subject: AT&T iPhone customers: go grab your free 1000 minutes
> To: redacted@invalid.telecom-digest.org.
> Date: Friday, February 11, 2011, 8:33 PM
>
> AT&T iPhone customers: go grab your free 1000 minutes
>
> by Erica Sadun
> Feb 11 2011
>
> Loyal AT&T iPhone customer? AT&T wants to say thank
> you to iPhone
> owners by sending you 1000 free rollover minutes. All you
> have to do
> is text.
>
> ...
>
> http://www.tuaw.com/2011/02/11/atandt-iphone-customers-go-grab-your-free-1000-minutes/
>
My text messages are charged at 20 cents each. I have never
originated a text message. Most of my incoming text messages are
the monthly message from AT&T (marked "Free") acknowleding
payment of my bill. They simply clutter up in box since payment
shows up on my credit card website immediately if I want to know.
Occasionally I have to pay 20 cents for a text message that in
most cases was just a wrondg number.
I have never run over my alloted minutes for phone calls.
Wes Leatherock
wleathus@yahoo.com
wesrock@aol.com
***** Moderator's Note *****
A. Because it disturbe the natural top-to-bottom flow of a written communication.
Q. Why is Top-Posting wrong?
Bill Horne
Moderator
Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2011 16:06:21 -0500
From: danny burstein <dannyb@panix.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Class action settlement concerning a case of SMS (cellphone) spam
Message-ID: <Pine.NEB.4.64.1102151600440.1876@panix5.panix.com>
Courtesy of their web page (which I was directed to via a paid advert
on something or another I was reading. Not trying to be vague... I
just don't recall).
I have nothing to do with this group and don't have any further info,
but I'm hopeful this action will be a nail in the coffin for these and
similar expletive deleteds.
------ [web page]
Lozano v. Twentieth Century Fox
...
IF YOU RECEIVED A TEXT MESSAGE ADVERTISING THE DVD RELEASE OF THE MOTION
PICTURE ROBOTS IN SEPTEMBER OR OCTOBER 2005, PLEASE READ THIS NOTICE
CAREFULLY AS YOU MAY BE ENTITLED TO A $200 PAYMENT FROM A CLASS ACTION
SETTLEMENT.
...
... if you are a person in the United States or its Territories
who received an unsolicited text message advertising the DVD
release of the Twentieth Century Fox motion picture Robots in
September or October 2005 ...
----------
rest:
http://www.lozanotextsettlement.com/
- I have no idea as to what the chances would have
been at trial.
Note that this spam was sent by (or on behalf of) a
real and locatable business solidly located in the US.
Most other spams are on behalf of more tenuous entities.
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2011 18:24:16 -0500
From: Telecom Digest Moderator <redacted@invalid.telecom.csail.mit.edu>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Moderation will be slow for a few days
Message-ID: <20110215232416.GD30945@telecom.csail.mit.edu>
To the readers:
I returned home from a vacation yesterday, and found that my Internet
service had been cut off. I have been using Speakeasy for many years,
but they were bought out by Best Buy, and have been combined with
and/or resold to "MegaPath", along with Covad (which used to be the
transport provider Speakeasy used).
I called Speakeasy customer service, and they told me that MegaPath
has abandoned service to the town of Sharon, Massachusetts, and I
presume to many other communities as well. The tech-support person
told me I had to call a "Retention specialist" to find out what my
options are.
This morning, I managed to reach the "Retention Specialist" - which
none of the people in the Sales department seemed to know about - and
I was given these options:
1. Continue to receive DSL service via Verizon instead of Covad. They
offered me the same price I'm currently paying (~$47/month) for
768/128 DSL. Since Verizon sells the service directly for
$20/month, I told them I wasn't interested.
2. Receive data service from Speakeasy via Comcast, for about
$77/month if I would settle for a dynamic IP address, and about
$110/month if I wanted to keep a fixed IP address. Comcast sells
the service for about $60/month, so I again said "No".
3. A T1 line for over $400/month. I said "No" a third time.
The representative told me that MegaPath sent me a letter, but I
haven't seen it if they did. I can understand that Speakeasy must do
what the new owners want, but I'm mad as hell because I've received
shoddy service from MegaPath.
Years ago, I contracted with Speakeasy for DSL service because of its
customer care, cluefull tech support, Linux friendliness, and "bits
are bits" attitude: things which I thought merited a premium rate
because they were very hard to find in the past. Now, however, the
rules have changed again: It seems that some animals are more equal
than others, and small towns that don't produce the obscene levels of
profit that major players feel they deserve by divine right are being
thrown in the dustbin. The general lack of knowledge and brusque
treatment I received today make it clear that MegaPath does not value
me as a residential customer, and does not deserve my money.
I'll be moderating the Digest from the computer at my local Library,
which through the grace of God and enlightened librarians allows me to
use an SSH client. That will mean that your posts may take several
days to process, so please bear with me while I search for the least
distasteful of my new Internet options.
Bill
--
Bill Horne
Moderator
P.S. Thanks to John Levine for getting the word out.
Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2011 15:14:59 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: The Dirty Little Secrets of Search
Message-ID: <p062408d7c97debf23c0d@[10.0.1.2]>
The Dirty Little Secrets of Search
By DAVID SEGAL
February 12, 2011
PRETEND for a moment that you are Google's search engine.
Someone types the word "dresses" and hits enter. What will be the
very first result?
There are, of course, a lot of possibilities. Macy's comes to mind.
Maybe a specialty chain, like J. Crew or the Gap. Perhaps a Wikipedia
entry on the history of hemlines.
O.K., how about the word "bedding"? Bed Bath & Beyond seems a
candidate. Or Wal-Mart, or perhaps the bedding section of Amazon.com.
"Area rugs"? Crate & Barrel is a possibility. Home Depot, too, and
Sears, Pier 1 or any of those Web sites with "area rug" in the name,
like arearugs.com.
You could imagine a dozen contenders for each of these searches. But
in the last several months, one name turned up, with uncanny
regularity, in the No. 1 spot for each and every term:
J. C. Penney.
The company bested millions of sites - and not just in searches for
dresses, bedding and area rugs. For months, it was consistently at or
near the top in searches for "skinny jeans," "home decor," "comforter
sets," "furniture" and dozens of other words and phrases, from the
blandly generic ("tablecloths") to the strangely specific ("grommet
top curtains").
This striking performance lasted for months, most crucially through
the holiday season, when there is a huge spike in online shopping. J.
C. Penney even beat out the sites of manufacturers in searches for
the products of those manufacturers. Type in "Samsonite carry on
luggage," for instance, and Penney for months was first on the list,
ahead of Samsonite.com.
With more than 1,100 stores and $17.8 billion in total revenue in
2010, Penney is certainly a major player in American retailing. But
Google's stated goal is to sift through every corner of the Internet
and find the most important, relevant Web sites.
Does the collective wisdom of the Web really say that Penney has the
most essential site when it comes to dresses? And bedding? And area
rugs? And dozens of other words and phrases?
...
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/business/13search.html
Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2011 23:26:05 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: A Cordless Phone That Plays Nice With Wireless Phones
Message-ID: <p062408f9c97fb09588bb@[10.0.1.2]>
A Cordless Phone That Plays Nice With Wireless Phones
By SAM GROBART
FEBRUARY 8, 2011
You can go without a land line and just use your smartphone. People
do it all the time.
It didn't work for me. I tried - really - but the my house and AT&T's
wireless signal were like Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton: a
paroxysm of affection, only to then pull away in bitterness,
ultimately separating for good.
So it came time to return to the world of the land line. And while I
was out gallivanting with my smartphone, some interesting
developments were happening in old-style telephony, it turns out.
The most intriguing of which is Panasonic's Link-to-Cell feature,
found on some of its cordless handsets. Link-to-Cell allows your
cordless phone to answer calls placed to your mobile phone. If
someone dials your mobile when you are at home, all the handsets in
the house will ring and you can answer the call from any of them. The
feature uses Bluetooth to establish a wireless connection between up
to two mobiles and however many compatible cordless handsets you have.
...
http://gadgetwise.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/08/a-cordless-phone-that-plays-nice-with-wireless-phones/
TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly to telecom-
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End of The Telecom Digest (6 messages)
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