TELECOM Digest Mon, 28 Feb 2000 15:57:19 EST Volume 20 : Issue 4
Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson
Re: 7D Dialing Across NPA Boundaries (Arthur L. Rubin)
7D Dialing Across NPA Boundaries (John Beckett)
Long Lines Bells (Margaret Hill)
Re: TELECOM Archives Censored as "Pornography" (Arthur L. Rubin)
DoubleClick Looks to Regain Surfers' Trust (Monty Solomon)
http://www.dialpad.com ("contact_phoff")
First Long-Distance Call via Underground Cable (Ian Ellis)
The DLC Epidemic Spreads to the Northeast (Ed Ellers)
Re: TELECOM Archives Censored as "Pornography" (Judith Oppenheimer)
An Electronic Spy Scare Is Alarming Europe (Monty Solomon)
Prof Can Post His Crypto (Monty Solomon)
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From: Arthur L. Rubin <216-5888@mcimail.com>
Subject: Re: 7D Dialing Across NPA Boundaries
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 07:32:30 GMT
Organization: EarthLink Network, Inc.
Ed Ellers wrote:
> Um, I would suggest that Louisville, Kentucky is also a major city!'
> We still have 7D dialing between parts of the 502 and 812 NPAs, and
> since the state (wisely IMHO) changed the 270 addition from an overlay
> to a split I expect we'll have it for some time to come. (The state
> decision came during the permissive 10D dialing period, and -- guess
> what? -- permissive 10D hasn't been turned off. Not that it does any
> harm, of course.)
As an aside, has anyone suggested requiring the local phone companies
to have permissive 11D dialing for calls within the same area code?
I've been unable (as yet) to program my dialers (under Windows 3.1)
to handle the 602/623/480 NPA split. (For those not familiar with the
split, calls are 7D within each NPA, 10D between them,
and 11D (with, I believe, some 10D exeptions near the border with 520)
to other NPAs. All calls within those NPAs are local.
Arthur L. Rubin 216-5888@mcimail.com
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 06:50:53 -0500
From: jbeckett <jbeckett@southern.edu>
Subject: 7D Dialing Across NPA Boundaries
> Linc Madison (LincMad001@telecom-digest.zzn.com) wrote:
> "That feature still exists in many places, but fewer and fewer with
> each passing year. The last major city with such an arrangement was
> Kansas City, which is currently phasing out 7D FNPA local calling due
> to the shortage of prefixes."
Perhaps Chattanooga, TN is no longer considered a "major city" - Arbitron has
dropped it from 82 to 101 since I moved here. But we've had 7D FNPA dialing
the whole time.
John Beckett, Associate Director of Information Systems
Southern Adventist University - Collegedale, Tennessee USA
jbeckett@southern.edu http://is.southern.edu/internet
(423) 238-2701 FAX (423) 238-2431
From: Margaret Hill <mhill@ccis.net>
Subject: Long Lines Bells
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 06:58:34 -0500
Hi Patrick. I recently purchased a charm bracelet with 2 bells on it.
The bells look like the "Bell System" bells and are inscribed:
"1 Year Attendance Award LONG LINES". Are you familiar with LONG LINES?
Was this once a telephone company? Any information you could share
would be greatly appreciated.
Margaret Hill
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: "Long Lines" was the informal name for
AT&T's long distance operation. "Bell System" was another informal
name for AT&T. PAT]
From: Arthur L. Rubin <216-5888@mcimail.com>
Subject: Re: TELECOM Archives Censored as "Pornography"
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 07:32:25 GMT
Organization: EarthLink Network, Inc.
Bennett Haselton wrote:
> Hi Patrick,
> I found the URL
> http://massis.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/
> Internet access in schools.
Are you sure it's not detecting m_ASS_is? (Emphasis mine.)
As an aside, I accidentaly activated an Internet blocking program on
my machine at work (it's now bypassed, but not technically deactivated),
and some computer programs on our intranet were censored. Apparently,
where ABCD represents a 4-letter word, some of the code read:
t(i)=a(A); /* B(0) */
CDe=tmp
Arthur L. Rubin 216-5888@mcimail.com
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2000 23:02:04 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: DoubleClick Looks to Regain Surfers' Trust
http://www.mercurycenter.com/svtech/news/indepth/docs/double022700.htm
BY CHRIS O'BRIEN
Mercury News Staff Writer
HEY, Web surfers. Somebody is watching you.
Every time you call up a Web page, somebody, somewhere, is tracking
your every more. They're noting which site you visit and how long you
spend there.
During the infancy of e-commerce, perhaps nobody has done this as
routinely and quietly as DoubleClick Inc., the largest online
advertising company. The company collects this data, dissects it, and
then uses it to create profiles and send you those flashing banner ads
that have become the hallmark of most free Web sites.
That seemed innocuous enough because the profiles remained anonymous.
But now DoubleClick finds itself at the center of a firestorm of bad
publicity because it wants to link that information to your real name
and address. Critics say this creates the potential for DoubleClick to
become a kind of online Big Brother who would know when Web browsers
searched for information on jeans, Alzheimer's or sex toys, and then
pass this information to our bosses and insurance companies.
Should we be scared?
For the moment, privacy advocates and DoubleClick officials agree that
the information gathered remains fairly basic. And the company's ability
to analyze that data and use it to target you with ads remains
primitive.
DoubleClick wants to change that. The first step is to build more
sophisticated profiles that include your shopping habits in the real
world and your online patterns.
Many of DoubleClick's online advertising competitors plan to do the
same. And real world companies have been tracking credit card use for
years.
But privacy advocates are hoping to prevent this practice from becoming
commonplace in cyberspace, where watching your Web surfing is like
following along as you wander the aisles of a store and eventually pay
the cashier. They say the rapid online exchange of information also
creates the opportunity for more abuses.
``The problem is there is an enormous amount of data and there's no
protection,'' said Jason Catlett, president of Junkbusters, a non-profit
privacy organization. ``They are hurting e-commerce by turning the Web
into a surveillance tool.''
How it works
DoubleClick, based in New York, is a champion of the banner ad.
The company has built its success around a piece of software it
developed called DART (Dynamic Advertising Reporting and Targeting).
DART works like this:
When you visit AltaVista, your computer sends a message over the
Internet requesting the Web page. Written into the AltaVista page is a
short ``tag'' that sends a request to DoubleClick for a banner ad.
If this is the first time you've ever visited a Web site that does
business with DoubleClick, DART will place a cookie on your hard drive.
The cookie is computer code that gives you an identification number,
according to Eddie Smith, DoubleClick's vice president of product and
business development.
This ID number tells DoubleClick the Internet address of your computer
and the approximate geographic location, California or the Bay Area, for
example. Every time you visit a page with a DoubleClick banner ad, the
company's network will recognize you and place information in your
DoubleClick file.
That file then keeps a record of which Web sites you visit, which pages
you clicked through, which ads have been sent to you and whether you
clicked on them.
This helps DoubleClick target you in a few ways.
The sites you visited are grouped by broad categories, such as travel or
sports. As you visit more sites, DoubleClick knows you're more likely to
be interested in an ad for day trading rather than an ad for a cruise.
In addition, if a shoe company has placed five banner ads with
DoubleClick, the system knows you've seen the first three and to send
you the fourth next time.
But the DoubleClick network has plenty of limitations.
The system has only a small fraction of a second to decide which ad to
send. So DoubleClick sticks to broad categories that gives it limited
insight into your online behavior.
DoubleClick also gets only a tiny snapshot of your overall online
experience. The company works with 1,500 Web sites, just a few compared
with the millions of sites on the Web.
Also, cookies have their own problems. If a family of four shares a
computer, it has only one DoubleClick cookie, which doesn't distinguish
between family members.
For now, the company estimates that fewer than 5 percent of the 1.5
billion ads it serves daily are chosen based on a user's profile. In the
vast majority of cases, the user is simply getting a sports-related ad
because they are visiting a sports Web site, Smith said.
Increased precision
If DoubleClick could be more precise in targeting you with ads, it could
make more money.
To increase the sophistication of its system, DoubleClick bought
marketing firm Abacus Direct last year for $1.7 billion. Abacus' most
attractive feature was a huge database of purchases based on information
from 1,500 retail and catalog companies.
These individual retailers can't see your entire buying history.
Instead, someone who contributes to Abacus might use it to decide which
customers to target with a catalog. The company could give the database
a list of 1,000 names and Abacus might then identify the 300 most likely
to purchase something.
This is considered valuable because your past purchases give a more
accurate prediction of your future purchases than merely looking at
which Web sites you visit. DoubleClick wants to merge your Abacus
profile with your online profile, dramatically increasing what they know
about you.
This won't be easy.
There's little overlap between the two databases. So to link them,
DoubleClick needs you to provide your name and address online so it can
match that to your cookie ID. The company would then find your
corresponding file in Abacus.
DoubleClick says it will ask permission before gathering this
information from users. And executives insist this will be a good deal
for consumers because they'll be shown ads that more closely mirror
their interests.
``Users will have all the information they need to make an informed
decision,'' said Jonathan Shapiro, senior vice president for Abacus.
``What we want most of all is to bring the right message to the right
user at the right time.''
Privacy watchdogs
But this strategy has angered privacy groups.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), has filed a complaint
with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, which is investigating
DoubleClick to see whether it misled consumers about how their data
would be used. In addition, the Michigan Attorney General's office and a
Marin County woman have filed lawsuits against DoubleClick claiming the
company has crossed the privacy boundaries.
``I think a lot of people have the sense that they're losing control of
their private information,'' said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of
EPIC. ``We'd like to see them go back to the anonymous approach. There's
got to be a way to do online advertising that doesn't require them to
know who you are.''
DoubleClick executives say they'll work hard to reassure their online
partners and consumers that the company can be trusted. They also argue
that it's in everyone's interest to make advertising work as efficiently
and effectively as possible.
``This has to be done in balance with privacy issues,'' said Smith of
DoubleClick. ``But it also has to be balanced with the needs of our
constituency and advertisers. It's the people who pay for advertising
who allow much of the content on the Web to remain free to the rest of
us.''
Contact Chris O'Brien at cobrien@sjmercury.com or (408) 920-5464.
copyright 2000 Mercury Center
Reply-To: contact_phoff <contact_phoff@hotmail.com>
From: contact_phoff <contact_phoff@hotmail.com>
Subject: http://www.dialpad.com
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2000 23:43:34 -0800
Organization: contact_phoff
I heard that there might be a sound card available that would enhance the
sound quality of the calls made from dialpad.com but have not been able to
locate or identify the sound card that would make this difference. Does
anyone out there know of the sound card I am looking for.
May You Be Blessed With Good Health & Abundance, or as Spock might
say, "Live Long and Prosper" :-)
Patricia A Hoffman
Hoffman Enterprises
The "ONE-STOP-SHOP"
http://www.OppsKnocks.com
Voice Mail: 1-760-280-6459
Fax: 1-954-827-7689
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2000 15:28:07 -0500
From: Ian Ellis <ian@iglou.com>
Reply-To: ian@iglou.com
Subject: First Long-Distance Call via Underground Cable.
Elesewhere on the net, I have read:
"February 26: In 1914, first long-distance phone conversation via
underground cable was made."
I cannot find any verification for this date. Can you help?
If it is correct, a little more information would be helpful. I will
enter it on my "Today in Science History" (educational) site.
Thank you.
From: Ed Ellers <ed_ellers@msn.com>
Subject: The DLC Epidemic Spreads to the Northeast
Date: Sun, 27 Feb 2000 01:19:50 -0500
I see from The Washington Post that Bell Atlantic has now started shafting
some of its customers in the same way that BellSouth is shafting me --
namely, by using digital loop carrier systems to provide a poor imitation of
a phone line, one which unnecessarily distorts the signal and therefore
blocks the use of V.90 modem connections.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPcap/2000-02/27/007r-022700-idx.html
(no registration required)
From: Judith Oppenheimer <joppenheimer@icbtollfree.com>
Subject: TELECOM Archives Censored as "Pornography"
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 21:34:23 -0500
One of the keywords that triggers blocking is "chat." If memory serves
correctly, Pat put a chat section on his site.
That's probably the (erroneous, inaccurate, inappropriate, inapplicable, and
just plain stupid!) problem.
Judith
Judith Oppenheimer, 1 800 The Expert, 212 684-7210
mailto:joppenheimer@icbtollfree.com
Publisher of ICB Toll Free News: http://icbtollfree.com
Publisher of WhoSells800.com: http://whosells800.com
Moderator TOLLFREE-L: http://www.egroups.com/group/tollfree-l/info.html
President of ICB Consultancy: http://1800TheExpert.com: 800 #
Acquisition Management, Lost 800 # Retrieval, Litigation Support,
Regulatory Navigation, Correlating Domain Name & Trademark Issues.
Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2000 02:29:11 -0800
From: Bennett Haselton <bennett@peacefire.org>
Subject: TELECOM Archives Censored as "Pornography" (??)
Hi Patrick,
I found the URL http://massis.lcs.mit.edu/telecom-archives/
blocked as "pornography" by an Internet blocking program used to censor
Internet access in schools. Obviously the people who added that site to
the list didn't bother to check what it was -- and you even have an "All
ages" label from SafeSurf!... (The RSAC label does give it a "1" for
language, but hardly enough to make it illegal for minors and worth
censoring from high schools.)
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2000 22:01:21 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: An Electronic Spy Scare Is Alarming Europe
By SUZANNE DALEY
PARIS, Feb. 23 -- Fears that the United States, Britain and other
English-speaking countries are using a cold-war eavesdropping network to
gain a commercial edge roused passions across Europe today, even after
Washington and London roundly denied the notion.
The subject kept the European Parliament in Brussels entranced for hours
and drew banner headlines across the continent. One political cartoon
showed Britain in bed with the United States, despite Britain's
membership in the European Union.
http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/02/biztech/articles/24spy.html
Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2000 22:30:05 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Prof Can Post His Crypto
http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,34550,00.html
Prof Can Post His Crypto
Reuters
WASHINGTON -- The United States will allow a computer scientist to put
instructions for writing a powerful computer data-scrambling program on
his Web site, but his high-profile lawsuit challenging U.S. export
restrictions on encryption may continue, his lawyer said on Thursday.
President Bill Clinton in January dramatically liberalized once-strict
U.S. export limits on encryption programs, which scramble information
and render it unreadable without a password or software "key." The
changes recognized that encryption, used in everything from Web browsing
software to cellular telephones, has become essential for securing
electronic commerce and global communications.
The move also followed a 6 May, 1999 decision by a U.S. Appeals Court
panel that the old rules barring University of Illinois professor Daniel
Bernstein from posting instructions for his "Snuffle" program on the
Internet were an unconstitutional violation of the scientist's freedom
of speech.
In a private advisory letter sent last week, the U.S. Commerce
Department confirmed that the new encryption export policy permitted
Bernstein to post instructions, called source code, for his program on
the Internet for all to see. Any other computer programmer could easily
compile the source code into a functioning program.
"In light of the changes in licensing and review requirements for
publicly available source code, the new regulations do not interfere
with his planned activities as you have described them," the Commerce
Department letter said in response to a letter from Bernstein's lawyer.
Under the old rules, Bernstein had to obtain an export license for each
person who wanted to view his Web site from outside the United States --
an impossible task given the Net's global reach.
But the new rules allow anyone to post encryption source code on the
Internet as long as they also send a copy to the government and do not
charge royalties for use of the code.
"We are still considering our options," said Cindy Cohn, Bernstein's
lawyer. Cohn said the Commerce Department letter failed to clear up some
questions about the new rules.
The department did make clear that a Web site which merely picked up
code posted by someone else, a practice known as mirroring, would not be
held responsible for following the export rules. And Bernstein or others
would not have to notify the government again each time they posted bug
fixes or updates.
Bernstein's lawsuit came about because under the old rules, a book
containing computer source code could be shipped out of the United
States without restriction but the same source code posted on the
Internet or put on a floppy disk could not be "exported" without a
license.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals last year
decided two to one that the old rules violated the First Amendment by
restricting Bernstein's speech. But in January, the full court asked the
panel to reconsider the ruling in light of the new Clinton policy.
Copyright 1999-2000 Reuters Limited.
Copyright 1994-2000 Wired Digital Inc. All rights reserved.
End of TELECOM Digest V20 #4
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