Move to keep Analog Cell Phones

Donald Newcomb wrote:
> "Jack D. Russell, Sr." <[email protected]> wrote in
> message
> news:[email protected]...
>> Puhleez..."Citation, please". How much more polite can you get? Maybe
>> "Citation, pretty please"?
>
> It's just John's manner. Like a child who's learned that he can
> always get a response by just asking "Why?" to every answer. Most of
> us who have been here for a while understand and tune it out. Let it
> drop. One thing's for sure, if you don't, John will keep it going
> until the cows come home. He seems to have a lot of free time.

Rubbish.



(Sorry, couldn't resist. If you get the joke fine; if not, let it go.
And to Joe: this was sarcasm, and not anything directed at Donald.)


--
Mike | As the light changed from red to green to yellow
| and back to red again, I sat there thinking about
| life. Was it nothing more than a bunch of honking
| and yelling? Sometimes it seemed that way.

---

› See More: Move to keep Analog Cell Phones

"clifto" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Proconsul wrote:
> > Cellular service is NOT a public utility, NOT a government regulated
> > monopoly; it is a private competitive business.
>
> Careful there; there's a fine line being tread. Cellular service uses
> scarce and extremely valuable public resources. That's not to say that
> all cell service is a "right", but then there are certain "rights" that
> can and should be mandated, such as free universal 911 service. If the
> providers can't or won't agree to such minimal giveaways, then get them
> the hell off our scarce frequencies and we'll put those to better use.


Television and broadcast radio use the same 'extremely valuable public
resources'. And while the government has required certain public service
functionality (akin to requiring 911), and I don't remember anyone ever
trying to use this same argument with them. There is no fine line- it is a
private business.

>
> Note I said _minimal_ giveaways. Me, I'd throw in a few more (e.g. free
> service for police/fire/emergency for official business only), but
> there's a fine line being tread.

What fine line?

>
> --
> If John McCain gets the 2008 Republican Presidential nomination,
> my vote for President will be a write-in for Jiang Zemin.

"Donald Newcomb" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> "Proconsul" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:BF1B9FBA.3FF7%[email protected]...
> > There are no "rights" associated with cellular service....and the silly
> > notion that some public resource is being "provided" by government is
just
> > another liberal "stretch" of reality to give "govamint" yet another
power
> it
> > doesn't have to regulate private business. Licensing, as a matter of
> ordered
> > regulation, to make order out of chaos makes some sense, but not when
> > "conditions" are included.
>
> It's not silly at all. As I said before, the ether is the property of the
> people ('ager publicus'), not the corporations'. The government acts as
the
> trustee of the people's commonwealth and licenses it's use for the
public's
> benefit, not for private gain.

Really? Want to tell that to:

Time-Warner
NBC
CBS
ABC
Charter Communications
Fox
Clear Channel Communications (need more? There are hundreds)

All have exactly the same arrangement with the government and all use the
airwaves for private gain. Of course, the bias exhibited in this thread is
hilarious and I don't expect you to understand what I just posted.




>Every license granted must demonstrate that
> it benefits the public.

And the FCC has determined that wireless communication benefits the public.
What's your point?

>If you disagree with this, I'm sorry, but you are
> also disagreeing with the law, which is your right, but it won't get you
> very far.

Wouldn't your disagreement with the staus quo be the same thing? After all,
the licences were issued by a government entity as mandated by law.

"Jack D. Russell, Sr." <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> BTW...I must have missed the link to your cellular info/help website or
> links to your nationally syndicated tech TV show appearances. Could you
> be so kind as to post them again. I like to give credit where credit is
> due. Have a good one.

Of course, one thing to remember is that this is not the "Transactions of
the IEEE" or the "Journal of Molecular Biophysics". It is an unmoderated
Usenet "alt.*" discussion forum. While this is a pretty good alt.* group,
everyone should understand that Usenet in general and alt groups in
particular are traditionally the home of unsubstantiated rumor of the first
order. Insofar as any facts at all are presented in the "alt" hierarchy
should only be regarded as pure happenstance.

If you need a citation, here it is:
1. Personal communications.

But the fact remains that NextWave erected a practically non-functional CDMA
network for the sole purpose of providing a minimal, legally mandated,
signal simply to meet the letter of the law WRT to providing service to the
licensed area. If you were to ask them, they were "conducting customer
service trials" on their active network, but it was a network that never had
a single real customer, either retail or wholesale.
--
Donald Newcomb
DRNewcomb (at) attglobal (dot) net

[POSTED TO alt.cellular.cingular - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <[email protected]> on Tue, 9 Aug 2005 23:07:04 -0500, "Donald
Newcomb" <[email protected]> wrote:

>"Jack D. Russell, Sr." <[email protected]> wrote in message
>news:[email protected]...
>> BTW...I must have missed the link to your cellular info/help website or
>> links to your nationally syndicated tech TV show appearances. Could you
>> be so kind as to post them again. I like to give credit where credit is
>> due. Have a good one.
>
>Of course, one thing to remember is that this is not the "Transactions of
>the IEEE" or the "Journal of Molecular Biophysics". It is an unmoderated
>Usenet "alt.*" discussion forum. While this is a pretty good alt.* group,
>everyone should understand that Usenet in general and alt groups in
>particular are traditionally the home of unsubstantiated rumor of the first
>order. Insofar as any facts at all are presented in the "alt" hierarchy
>should only be regarded as pure happenstance.

I disagree. alt newsgroups are no different from the Big Eight, a mixture of
wheat and chaff and weeds. Unless we want them all to degenerate into chaos
and irrelevance, we need to do whatever we can to help raise the level of
discourse, and to encourage people to follow Usenet guidelines, as well as
newsgroup charters.

Usenet discussion is slowly but surely becoming an endangered species, thanks
in large part to unchallenged rumormongers and childish bullies. "All that is
necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." -Edmund Burke

--
Best regards, HELP FOR CINGULAR GSM & SONY ERICSSON PHONES:
John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/#Cingular>

In <4zfKe.8358$p%[email protected]> John Navas <[email protected]> writes:

[ snip ]

>Usenet discussion is slowly but surely becoming an endangered species, thanks
>in large part to unchallenged rumormongers and childish bullies. "All that is
>necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." -Edmund Burke

With that "quotation" from Edmund Burke being a prime example
of such misinformation.

He never said (nor wrote) it.

One cite, among many others (including professional historians)

http://www.tartarus.org/~martin/essays/burkequote.html
--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
[email protected]
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

[POSTED TO alt.cellular.cingular - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <[email protected]> on Wed, 10 Aug 2005 05:12:32 +0000 (UTC),
danny burstein <[email protected]> wrote:

>In <4zfKe.8358$p%[email protected]> John Navas <[email protected]> writes:
>
>[ snip ]
>
>>Usenet discussion is slowly but surely becoming an endangered species, thanks
>>in large part to unchallenged rumormongers and childish bullies. "All that is
>>necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." -Edmund Burke
>
>With that "quotation" from Edmund Burke being a prime example
>of such misinformation.
>
>He never said (nor wrote) it.
>
>One cite, among many others (including professional historians)
>
> http://www.tartarus.org/~martin/essays/burkequote.html

Doesn't seem to be an authoritative source -- if you've actually got something
from "professional historians" then by all means post your citations.

Of note from that personal webpage:

Jesus's `give us this day our daily bread'

That quote actually comes from Matthew 6. Luke 11 is slightly different.
Since this isn't actual writing by Jesus, these aren't really better than
unverified accounts of what Burke said (theological arguments aside).

That said, what's most troubling about this site is that the "proof" boils
down to I-couldn't-find-it,-so-it-must-not-be-true, which doesn't really
qualify as scholarly research.

This isn't just a Web phenomenon (as your webpage suggests) -- it also appears
widely in books (which are presumably subject to a much more thorough vetting)
-- see <http://print.google.com/print?q=triumph-of-evil+do-nothing>
In a quick review of the results, I could find no challenge to that quotation
-- can you?

p.s. Would you prefer: "The world is a dangerous place, not because of those
who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing." -Albert
Einstein

--
Best regards, HELP FOR CINGULAR GSM & SONY ERICSSON PHONES:
John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/#Cingular>

In <y%hKe.8381$p%[email protected]> John Navas <[email protected]> writes:

>p.s. Would you prefer: "The world is a dangerous place, not because of those
>who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing." -Albert

How about: "we, the jurors, find the murderer not guilty"?
(referring to a famous case in Calif about a decade ago...)

--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
[email protected]
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]

"Scott" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Really? Want to tell that to:
>
> Time-Warner
> NBC
> CBS
> ABC
> Charter Communications
> Fox
> Clear Channel Communications (need more? There are hundreds)
>
> All have exactly the same arrangement with the government and all use the
> airwaves for private gain. Of course, the bias exhibited in this thread
is
> hilarious and I don't expect you to understand what I just posted.

Understand that networks (e.g. CBS) are seldom licensees. This is why when
Whathername Jackson had her "wardrobe malfunction" it wasn't the network
that was fined directly but the licensees who aired the "malfunction". In
that private gain occurs when using licensed spectrum it is considered a
byproduct of the public service performed. By analogy, a grocery store
serves the public interest by providing food. It also may make a profit
while
doing so. The public service performed is the more efficient distribution of
food. So if the FCC issued licenses for grocery stores (which they don't),
they might decide that licensing a new store in a particular area served the
public interest in that people would not have to travel as far to buy
groceries.

> >Every license granted must demonstrate that
> > it benefits the public.
>
> And the FCC has determined that wireless communication benefits the
public.
> What's your point?

Not always. Were a licensee, say, to set up a PCS network that served no one
except himself, the FCC might (or might not, remember we have a Republican
in the White House) decide that the wireless communications provided did not
serve the public interest and reclaim the license. However, the point here
is not to argue that licensees all have to be saints and philanthropists. It
is that wireless carriers are not perfectly private enterprises, operating
in a totally free market, based entirely on their own private resources.
Rather, they are strongly dependent on the use of exclusive licenses for use
of scarce public resources. Without those licenses they could not function.
And the owners of those scarce resources (being the public) may demand, as a
condition of licensure, that the licensees perform certain services. As an
example, public coast stations (a.k.a. ship to shore operators) have always
been
required to carry emergency communications free of charge. So the debate is
not if a licensee should be required to perform specific services as a
condition of his license, but rather, just exactly what those services
should be.

> >If you disagree with this, I'm sorry, but you are
> > also disagreeing with the law, which is your right, but it won't get you
> > very far.
>
> Wouldn't your disagreement with the staus quo be the same thing? After
all,
> the licences were issued by a government entity as mandated by law.

Did I say I disagreed with the status quo? I believe that I was merely
recapitulating the status quo. I don't think that I ever said what service a
licensee should provide to the public, only that the public has a right to
put conditions on the license. That is the status quo and has been for over
70 years.

Remember that this particular subthread started when our esteemed colleague,
Mr. Proconsul, argued that the government should not place demands on
wireless carriers because they were just private enterprises trying to make
a profit in a highly competitive market. All I was trying to do is point out
that our colleague may have neglected to fully consider one small fact about
the operation of wireless carriers: their use of public resources to make
that profit. BTW, nothing I've said here is novel, socialistic or anything
like that. The principles of the management of the 'ager publicus' go back
thousands of years.
--
Donald Newcomb
DRNewcomb (at) attglobal (dot) net

John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
news:4zfKe.8358$p%[email protected]:

> I disagree. alt newsgroups are no different from the Big Eight, a
> mixture of wheat and chaff and weeds. Unless we want them all to
> degenerate into chaos and irrelevance, we need to do whatever we can
> to help raise the level of discourse, and to encourage people to
> follow Usenet guidelines, as well as newsgroup charters.
>
> Usenet discussion is slowly but surely becoming an endangered species,
> thanks in large part to unchallenged rumormongers and childish
> bullies. "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good
> men do nothing." -Edmund Burke
>
> --
> Best regards, HELP FOR CINGULAR GSM & SONY ERICSSON PHONES:
> John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/#Cingular>
>
>

So? Why does John Navas show up on so many newsgroups, if they are as you
say? Is someone forcing you to read this drivel?



--
Larry

[POSTED TO alt.cellular.cingular - REPLY ON USENET PLEASE]

In <[email protected]> on Wed, 10 Aug 2005 12:24:16 -0400,
Larry <[email protected]> wrote:

>John Navas <[email protected]> wrote in
>news:4zfKe.8358$p%[email protected]:
>
>> I disagree. alt newsgroups are no different from the Big Eight, a
>> mixture of wheat and chaff and weeds. Unless we want them all to
>> degenerate into chaos and irrelevance, we need to do whatever we can
>> to help raise the level of discourse, and to encourage people to
>> follow Usenet guidelines, as well as newsgroup charters.
>>
>> Usenet discussion is slowly but surely becoming an endangered species,
>> thanks in large part to unchallenged rumormongers and childish
>> bullies. "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good
>> men do nothing." -Edmund Burke

>So? Why does John Navas show up on so many newsgroups, if they are as you
>say? Is someone forcing you to read this drivel?

My participation this year is in fact much less than last year.

Thanks for you concern.

--
Best regards, HELP FOR CINGULAR GSM & SONY ERICSSON PHONES:
John Navas <http://navasgrp.home.att.net/#Cingular>

On Sat, 06 Aug 2005 13:51:20 -0700, Proconsul <[email protected]> chose to
add this to the great equation of life, the universe, and everything:

>On 8/6/05 1:08 PM, in article [email protected], "Jer"
>wrote:
>
>>> My additional comments were more for others than for you - as I see it, you
>>> "grok" reality better than most who post here......
>>
>> FWIW, I love the grok term. It's been a while since I cranked up the
>> Way Back machine.
>
>It puts things in perspective - especially when you are dealing with those
>who don't "grok" what grok means.....
>
>As one character from Robert A. Heinlein's novel ³Stranger in a Strange
>Land² says:
>
>'Grok' means to understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of
>the observed - to merge, blend, intermarry, lose identity in group
>experience. It means almost everything that we mean by religion, philosophy,
>and science - and it means as little to us (because we are from Earth) as
>color means to a blind man.
>
>In common usage, "Do you grok?" seems close in meaning to "Do you get it?"

In that case, I'm not sure I get how either of those definitions relates to
"I grok Spock" bumper stickers.

--
David Streeter, "an internet god" -- Dave Barry
http://home.att.net/~dwstreeter
Remove the naughty bit from my address to reply
Expect a train on ANY track at ANY time.
"Oh, Cosmo Schmosmo. If you had a brain, you wouldn't be readin' Cosmo."
- Whoopi Goldberg

"Donald Newcomb" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>
> "Scott" <[email protected]> wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> > Really? Want to tell that to:
> >
> > Time-Warner
> > NBC
> > CBS
> > ABC
> > Charter Communications
> > Fox
> > Clear Channel Communications (need more? There are hundreds)
> >
> > All have exactly the same arrangement with the government and all use
the
> > airwaves for private gain. Of course, the bias exhibited in this thread
> is
> > hilarious and I don't expect you to understand what I just posted.
>
> Understand that networks (e.g. CBS) are seldom licensees. This is why when
> Whathername Jackson had her "wardrobe malfunction" it wasn't the network
> that was fined directly but the licensees who aired the "malfunction". In
> that private gain occurs when using licensed spectrum it is considered a
> byproduct of the public service performed.

True to an extent, except that each one of the companies listed above does
hav espectrum licences in at least one market, and a much higher number of
markets for most- they do own and operate stations, just not all that use
their programming.


>By analogy, a grocery store
> serves the public interest by providing food. It also may make a profit
> while
> doing so. The public service performed is the more efficient distribution
of
> food. So if the FCC issued licenses for grocery stores (which they don't),
> they might decide that licensing a new store in a particular area served
the
> public interest in that people would not have to travel as far to buy
> groceries.
>
> > >Every license granted must demonstrate that
> > > it benefits the public.
> >
> > And the FCC has determined that wireless communication benefits the
> public.
> > What's your point?
>
> Not always. Were a licensee, say, to set up a PCS network that served no
one
> except himself, the FCC might (or might not, remember we have a Republican
> in the White House) decide that the wireless communications provided did
not
> serve the public interest and reclaim the license. However, the point
here
> is not to argue that licensees all have to be saints and philanthropists.
It
> is that wireless carriers are not perfectly private enterprises, operating
> in a totally free market, based entirely on their own private resources.
> Rather, they are strongly dependent on the use of exclusive licenses for
use
> of scarce public resources.

As are television stations, radio stations, any company with an SMR license,
and the list goes on and on. And that is just for those compnaies that use
spectrum. What about logging and energy companies operating on federally
held land? The use of scarce public resources is a common argument in the
cellular arena, but it is spoken like they have a unique place in the mix.
The fact is that they are far from the only industry profitting from use of
public resources.

>Without those licenses they could not function.
> And the owners of those scarce resources (being the public) may demand, as
a
> condition of licensure, that the licensees perform certain services. As an
> example, public coast stations (a.k.a. ship to shore operators) have
always
> been
> required to carry emergency communications free of charge. So the debate
is
> not if a licensee should be required to perform specific services as a
> condition of his license, but rather, just exactly what those services
> should be.

But you can't change the game midstream. Part of the FCC process for
granting these licenses was a period for public comment- that is the time to
air the concerns, not after the fact.

>
> > >If you disagree with this, I'm sorry, but you are
> > > also disagreeing with the law, which is your right, but it won't get
you
> > > very far.
> >
> > Wouldn't your disagreement with the staus quo be the same thing? After
> all,
> > the licences were issued by a government entity as mandated by law.
>
> Did I say I disagreed with the status quo? I believe that I was merely
> recapitulating the status quo. I don't think that I ever said what service
a
> licensee should provide to the public, only that the public has a right to
> put conditions on the license. That is the status quo and has been for
over
> 70 years.

And the public had the opportunity to do this.

>
> Remember that this particular subthread started when our esteemed
colleague,
> Mr. Proconsul, argued that the government should not place demands on
> wireless carriers because they were just private enterprises trying to
make
> a profit in a highly competitive market. All I was trying to do is point
out
> that our colleague may have neglected to fully consider one small fact
about
> the operation of wireless carriers: their use of public resources to make
> that profit. BTW, nothing I've said here is novel, socialistic or
anything
> like that. The principles of the management of the 'ager publicus' go
back
> thousands of years.
> --

I understand and I apologize if I came off a little huffy. And while I
don't necessarily agree with everything you said, at least it was presented
in a sane and logical manner. We may have to agree to disagree.

"Scott" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> But you can't change the game midstream. Part of the FCC process for
> granting these licenses was a period for public comment- that is the time
to
> air the concerns, not after the fact.

I'm actually of two minds on this point. The first one is that I believe
that in a perfect world there would be no changes during the original
license term. Any new conditions would have to be accepted as part of the
license renewal process. The other side of me says, "Turn-about's fair play"
and "Sauce for the goose....". So, the FCC's lawyers should include exactly
the same verbage in the license agreements that the wireless carriers
include in their T&C, allowing them to change the rules by sending
customers a text message. So the FCC could just send the president of
Cingular a SMS notifying him that they'd changed the rules and if he
continued to broadcast a signal on his licenses, it would signify acceptance
of the change. Nothing, after all, could be more fair: This is exactly how
the carriers deal with their customers. And the "Golden rule" does say "Do
unto others...." ;-)

> I understand and I apologize if I came off a little huffy. And while I
> don't necessarily agree with everything you said, at least it was
presented
> in a sane and logical manner. We may have to agree to disagree.

There's nothing like a *good* debate.

Regards,
--
Donald Newcomb
DRNewcomb (at) attglobal (dot) net

"Donald Newcomb" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...

>
> I'm actually of two minds on this point. The first one is that I believe
> that in a perfect world there would be no changes during the original
> license term. Any new conditions would have to be accepted as part of the
> license renewal process. The other side of me says, "Turn-about's fair
play"
> and "Sauce for the goose....". So, the FCC's lawyers should include
exactly
> the same verbage in the license agreements that the wireless carriers
> include in their T&C, allowing them to change the rules by sending
> customers a text message. So the FCC could just send the president of
> Cingular a SMS notifying him that they'd changed the rules and if he
> continued to broadcast a signal on his licenses, it would signify
acceptance
> of the change. Nothing, after all, could be more fair: This is exactly how
> the carriers deal with their customers. And the "Golden rule" does say "Do
> unto others...." ;-)

But then you would be degrading the value of a nice cash cow. Part of the
current value of the license is that knowledge that all terms have been
negotiated before the purchase. By putting a "we'll see" into the mix, you
may very well see companies say, "That's fine- help us pay for the cost. "
Do you really have enough faith in the government to hold its ground and not
subsidize any additional criteria? These subsidies would effectively
diminish the return on the spectrum

>
> > I understand and I apologize if I came off a little huffy. And while I
> > don't necessarily agree with everything you said, at least it was
> presented
> > in a sane and logical manner. We may have to agree to disagree.
>
> There's nothing like a *good* debate.
>
Agreed.