Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (12/16/83)
TELECOM Digest Friday, 16 Dec 1983 Volume 3 : Issue 119
Today's Topics:
MCI phone at DCA terminal
AP story on MCI charge phones.
CNA Service for Northwestern Bell
cheap telephones
FCC moves to regulate telephone `sex-services'.
Rates from the MCI phone at DCA terminal
Guess who reads the Digest?
Telephones killed by radio contest.
MCI Rates...
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Date: 14 Dec 1983 1816-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: MCI phone at DCA terminal
This was announced a few weeks ago in the digest... AT&T also plans to
introduce this service once they are separated on 1 Jan.
The point brought up about emergency numbers is interesting, but this
is of course a state-by-state issue. I remember something about it
only being required on outdoor phones. The PUC should be contacted,
though.
MCI should be glad to provide this service as a measure of public good
will.
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Date: 14 Dec 1983 16:20-PST
Subject: AP story on MCI charge phones.
From: the tty of Geoffrey S. Goodfellow <Geoff @ SRI-CSL>
a011 2217 28 Nov 83 PM-Credit Card Calls,420 Card Caller Telephones
For AT&T, MCI By NORMAN BLACK Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The American Telephone & Telegraph Co. and MCI
Communications have selected the next battlefield in their war for
long-distance phone calls - the nation's airports, bus stations,
convention centers and hotel lobbies.
AT&T announced Monday it would soon start installing special
''Card Caller'' telephones and distributing new credit cards that
would allow travelers to dispense with the hassle of punching in
special codes or using an operator. More than 47 million of the new
cards will be mailed free-of-charge in January to customers who now
have a Bell System calling card, AT&T said.
The heavy plastic cards will be specially encoded, allowing
customers to simply insert the card in the new phones to
automatically bill their local number.
MCI, which operates the nation's second-largest long-distance
network, immediately responded with an announcement of its own - it
will begin installing special ''card-reading'' telephones next week
tied to the MCI network that will accept MasterCard and Visa.
''There are about 120 million holders of MasterCard and Visa and
they'll be able to call anywhere in the continental United States and
Hawaii from these phones using those cards,'' said MCI spokesman Gary
Tobin. ''They won't have to be MCI subscribers.''
Both companies said they had been moving toward credit-card
phones for some time and claimed the other was merely an imitator.
Both agreed, however, they would now have to fight for ''shelf
space'' for their new phones.
Of the two systems, AT&T's is the most advanced from an equipment
standpoint. Its new ''Card Caller'' phone features a small, built-in
computer and a video screen to display instructions and the number
that's being dialed. While AT&T executives refused to discuss such
possibilities Monday, they agreed their new phones have the
capability for more futuristic uses, such as displaying ''electronic
mail'' or directory information.
The AT&T phone can also be used regardless of whether a traveler
is placing a local call or a long-distance call because AT&T will be
paying the Bell companies to handle billing services.
MCI's phones, on the other hand, won't feature any type of
display screen and can be used only when placing an interstate
long-distance call. But they will have an attached ''card reader''
that will scan a MasterCard or Visa just as AT&T's phone will
''read'' its card.
The immediate object of both systems is to make it easier for
travelers to place a phone call when they're away from home, in the
process fighting for an estimated $2 billion a year in long-distance,
pay-phone business.
ap-ny-11-29 0116EDT ***************
I wondered many of the same things that prindle@NADC did with respect
the credit card verification and security against fraud and such.
However, its MY opinion that MCI and AT&T are wasting their time and
money with respect to these new fangled public pay phones.
Why?
Because with cellular radio coming to a town near you in the next year
or so, why should you want to waste your time lining up to use or find
a pay phone when you have the convenience of placing your call as you
stroll thru the airport or the like.
If I were a MCI stock holder, I'd sell short!
Geoff
P.S. It would be interesting for someone to actually place one or more
successful calls on MCI public phones and see how their "appear" on
their VISA or MasterCharge bill (i.e. does each call get a `separate'
charge or do they get bunched? if bunched, daily, weekly, monthly,
???).
------------------------------
Date: 14 Dec 1983 1929-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: CNA Service for Northwestern Bell
Now we have two places with public CNA -- all of Northwestern Bell,
plus Chicago.
The Northwestern Bell Service is particularly interesting in the way
it is priced. People in Omaha have to pay 50 cents to use it. But
anyone outside the Omaha area only has to pay the current LD charge
for calling it -- i.e. whatever it costs to call Omaha by whatever
carrier you choose to use.
If I call it on a Band 5 WATS from Massachusetts at night, it may cost
as little as 5 cents if the interchange of information between me and
the operator is fast enough, say 20-25 seconds.
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 83 17:21:18 PST
From: Theodore N. Vail <vail@UCLA-CS>
Subject: cheap telephones
Denber writes of telephones for $4.88 (the price of popcorn and a
movie). There are numerous stores around here (West Los Angeles and
Santa Monica) selling telephones for around that price and I have seen
receive-only telephones (no buttons or dial) for only 99 cents. But
where can you see a movie and buy popcorn for only $4.88?
vail
------------------------------
Date: 14 Dec 1983 17:18-PST
Subject: FCC moves to regulate telephone `sex-services'.
From: the tty of Geoffrey S. Goodfellow <Geoff @ SRI-CSL>
a238 1609 14 Dec 83
AM-Telephone Sex,650
FCC Moves To Regulate ''Dial-A-Porn''
By NORMAN BLACK
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal Communications Commission, with
some trepidation, moved Wednesday toward regulating ''Dial-A-Porn''
telephone sex services.
By a unanimous vote, the agency solicited public comment on how
it might enforce a new law signed by President Reagan last week that
declares any commercial service using ''obscene or indecent''
language illegal if it is available to persons under 18 years of age.
Since the law gives the agency only 180 days to establish
regulations, the FCC said it was setting a deadline of Jan. 23 for
comments.
The commission's action came just one day after Car-Bon
Publishers Inc., a New York firm that publishes High Society magazine
and whose call-in sex line prompted the new law, went to federal
court in Manhattan with a suit aimed at overturning the statute as
unconstitutional.
High Society, a magazine that features pictures of nude women,
began offering its telephone sex service last spring as a promotional
gimmick. The service allows individuals to call a special phone
circuit in New York City and listen to tape recordings of women -
supposedly those in the latest issue of the magazine - simulating
sex.
There is no special charge for the service in New York, because
much of the city is on measured service and thus local phone calls
are billed separately or counted toward an allowance. Persons outside
New York who dial the number must pay the normal long-distance
charges.
While originally designed as a promotional gimmick, the service
has proven highly lucrative for High Society because of the huge
number of people who have been calling. The magazine pockets two
cents for each call, and the service has attracted up to 500,000
calls a day.
The callers, to the chagrin of state and federal governments,
have included public employees listening in during work hours.
Several state governments - Virginia, for one - have received
unexpectedly high long-distance bills because of calls to High
Society's number.
On Wednesday, the Pentagon acknowledged it had discovered that
136 such calls had been made from the Defense Intelligence Agency in
February, March and April. The agency's phones have now been equipped
with a special ''electronic block'' to prevent such calls in the
future, the Pentagon said.
Under the law signed by Reagan Dec. 8, the FCC is authorized to
impose civil fines, and the attorney general to seek criminal
penalties, against any person or firm operating a phone service
judged to be ''obscene or indecent'' if available to minors.
Operators of such a commercial service face maximum penalties of up
to $50,000 and imprisonment for six months.
The law specifically directs the FCC to develop standards for
determining when a phone sex service has taken reasonable steps to
ensure that minors can't call it and thus is immune from prosecution.
It was that provision that attracted commission scrutiny
Wednesday, with FCC General Counsel Bruce Fein stating he was not
sure how the agency should comply with the directive.
The FCC offered several possibilities for public comment, such as
restricting the services to ''those hours when a majority of parents
can be expected to be home and therefore responsible for their
children's behavior;'' for example, from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m.
The agency also noted any service requiring credit card
information might be acceptable, while acknowledging that would have
no effect on High Society's service.
''Comments are sought, however, on whether some automated
variation of a screening device might be feasible, such as an access
code that requires no operator assistance,'' the FCC said.
The agency also noted it might consider limiting advertisements
of such phone numbers to the inside pages of magazines available only
to persons over 18, but at the same time questioned whether it had
authority ''to impose restrictions on advertising.''
In a related development, the author of the new law asked the FCC
Wednesday to levy fines totaling $15.8 million on High Society. Rep.
Thomas J. Bliley, R-Va., argued the FCC should levy the maximum
penalty of $50,000 a day dating back to Feb. 1, when the service
first began.
Bliley contends the phone sex service was illegal even before the
new law was enacted and that it is ''time the FCC got off the dime
... and put these guys out of business.''
ap-ny-12-14 1909EST ***************
With 1984 just two weeks away, I find the `Owellan' implications of
this proposed law worthy of considerable note:
Who declares/decides if a given dial-up service is obscene or
indecent? Would the law have certain words (the like George Carlin
magic 7) which are not allowed?
The text of the story seems to revolve around "voice sex services",
but what about computer based bbs systems, such as the MRC BBS in
Mtn.View?
And just HOW does one propose to PREVENT the under 18ers from
accessing such voice or computer based systems electronically? When
you walk into your local ol' sex shoppe, they can ask for your ID or
Drivers License....but how would the equivalent of being `carded' be
done over a phone connx?
Lastly, anyone know how/why High Society goes about accumulating 2
cents per call made to their porn number? I would be interested in
having the same accumulation technique/service put on my home and
office phone lines.
Geoff
------------------------------
Date: 14 Dec 1983 2051-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: Rates from the MCI phone at DCA terminal
I just called MCI Customer Service (800 MCI-MCI0) to find out what the
rates are for non-MCI customers who use the phone and charge to their
VISA/MC accounts.
They insisted that there was no higher charge (even though the news
article quoted an MCI spokesman stating that non-customers would pay a
higher rate).
So DCA to Boston would cost 25 cents a minute. The AT&T rate is 26
cents a minute (with the first minute being 9 cents more when direct
dialled -- but an additional $1.05 for using the AT&T card).
MCI customer service told me that if I was charged any additional
charge for using my VISA/MC, I should call customer service and have
it taken off, since customer service had told me that there was no
charge.
[I'd check again right before using one of those phones... and get the
name of the customer service rep to whom you spoke...]
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 83 22:54:12 EST
From: A B Cooper III <abc@brl-bmd>
Subject: Guess who reads the Digest?
By his own admission, the President (I believe) of MCI Digital
Information Services Corporation--those folks who bring you MCI Mail,
reads this Digest every weekend from home. His name escapes me, but
he was the keynote speaker at the Computer Networking Symposium
sponsored by IEEE and NBS in Silver Spring, Maryland early this week.
I say welcome and wonder if any AT&T or Sprint execs are "read-in" as
well.
This truly is a wonderful forum. Imagine the speed of the feedback
channel!.
Brint
[Well! TELECOM really does have an impressive audience! Distribution
goes out over USENET, so all the AT&T Companies get copies. My
presonal regards to the President of MCI Information Services
Corporation! --JSol]
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 14 Dec 83 21:46:19 EST
From: Ron Natalie <ron@brl-vgr>
Subject: Telephones killed by radio contest.
About a month ago telephone service in NW Washington, D.C. was totally
disrupted because a local radio station was having some phenomenal
call-in contest. People in the area just picked up their phones and
got no dial tone.
Just wait until the ATT long distance goes belly up when MTV decides
to give away a rock star to the one hundredth caller at 1-900-....
-Ron
[Most large cities have had mass calling prefixes, which restrict the
number of connections from outside exchanges to 2 or 3 per exchange.
Boston: 931, Los Angeles: 520, New York: 955. Radio stations are all
connected to that exchange. If everybody in your exchange dials the
station number, they will get circuit jam signals before you run out
of resources. 1-900 numbers are all CCIS. The network won't connect
your line to a long distance trunk without first checking to see if
the line at the other end is busy. --JSol]
------------------------------
Date: 15 Dec 1983 1437-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: MCI Rates...
More on MCI rates from the pay phones at DCA terminal.
Today, I was quoted a daytime rate of 42 cents per minute (the same as
the AT&T rate) and was told that there is a 15 cent connect charge.
???
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End of TELECOM Digest
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