[9665] in Commercialization & Privatization of the Internet
Re: Telecommunications Competition Act of Washington State
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Bruce Gingery)
Sat Jan 15 20:18:07 1994
Date: Sat, 15 Jan 1994 18:00:52 -0700 (MST)
From: Bruce Gingery <lcbginge@antelope.wcc.edu>
To: stpeters@dawn.crd.ge.com
Cc: adamfast@u.washington.edu, karl@mcs.com, com-priv@psi.com
In-Reply-To: <9401152006.AA06730@spare-parts.crd.Ge.Com>
On Sat, 15 Jan 1994, Dick St.Peters wrote:
[previous quote-backs and early portions omitted]
...
> There's another interesting way to view this: the phone company's view
> was that they provided a high level service with premium support. The
> smooth operation of this network required that amateur customers not
> muck with the wiring or attach foreign equipment, or the whole
> telephone network would be at risk. Yet today we own our own phones,
> do our own on-premises wiring, provide our own support, and if we have
> to holler for help from the phone company when it ain't their problem,
> we pay for it enough so we don't do much hollering. If the telephone
> network can survive amateur homeowners actually physically attaching
> wires to it ... (Hopefully, a few com-priv regulars are smiling with
> amusement by now ... so I'll leave the thought unfinished.)
As your above tongue-in-cheek description points out, the "smooth
operation of this network required that amateur customers not muck with
the wiring or attach foreign equipment" was in nearly all cases, the way
that the technologically capable sought to preserve and extend their
monopoly and in most cases, have it re-enforced by weight of laws.
As for ADVANCEMENT... The Bell System would, as I recall, lease you a
300bps modem for an exhorbitant price. If you needed to go faster, you had
to lease (at an equivalent cost) an "adapter" that did little except
pretty well guarantee that 3rd party equipment would NOT work to go faster.
The repeater drop-out tone (now heard as CNG tone on Fax calls) was
available THEN. Lots of technology was available then if you had enough
blood in your nose.
To be fair, DTMF equipment generally requires hookup with the red/green
voice pair properly polarized, and the telco's couldn't have continued
selective (silent to other customers) on party lines as long as they did,
if they had gone with modular plugs sooner. After all, it's pretty hard
:-P to keep track of FOUR wires, and six to eight are prohibitive for the
"amateur". Ever build a serial cable? Many parts ARE inedible.
Other supported fictions CONTINUE today. It's cheaper to process DTMF
signalling than Pulse, yet most local telco's still charge a SURCHARGE for
Tone Dialing! Why? Because they've grandfathered with local "monopoly
watcher" "Public Service" governmental groups -- they can get away with it.
That's the heritage of government re-enforced monopoly. Ask some of
our British friends about the BABT, and just how BABT approved modem
techology advances. Or Bundesposte in Germany -- and from what I've read
about the German situation, they've been re-enforcing the laws that have
been suppressing technological advances. Applause to both communities for
their advances in spite of governmental meddling.
Is absolute anarchy workable? Probably not. Has pseudo-anarchy as we
have seen for years on InterNet worked? Definitely.
Bruce Gingery lcbginge@antelope.wcc.edu
