That's fine for the ISP and the ISP's customers. What is not clear is upstream.
This entry sounds more like the ISP can issue self-signed certs to its customers for them to connect to its mail server.
What is not clear is if the ISP will have to have a different, paid for, signed cert to communicate with anybody on connections NOT under its control.
I am all for improving mail, but look at what happened with signed certs on http. I do not want to see something like that start again. Not unless there is an "open" period where anyone can submit their own CA key to be included free of charge and have them recognized automatically by mail servers after X date. And this "open" period would need to be widely publicised. If not, then we end up right back with just a few companies offering certs for outrageous prices and little to no competition.
One more thing, you can sure bet that as soon as something like this is created, big players are going to figure out how to charge the world for delivering mail. It will be represented to their customers as a way of controlling and preventing spam and viruses, perhaps even called secure mail or something like that. Imagine if AOL or MSN/Hotmail required an MTA license, with a fee, in order to deliver mail from your server. No big deal you say, if enough people are inconvenienced they'll leave. Sure they will, but not enough to make any difference, after all they have "secure mail" now. Of course, the AMTP with required certs signed by a CA just makes all this easier to implement and track, technically I guess the same model could be attempted with SMTP.
It would almost seem better if they could use a model more like SSH. Here's my idea, feel free to dissect it and tell me where I left huge gaping holes (point of view is from your server):
1. Remote MTA attempts to deliver mail to local MTA. Remote MTA is unknown. A key exchange similar to SSH is performed - primary difference is the local MTA gets the key from the remote MTA (instead of the remote SSH client getting key and remote user accepting it) and sends it to the postmaster. 2. The remote MTA queues the message for X hours/days/weeks/whatever and retry at appropriate intervals. 3. Postmaster gets mail alerting of new MTA wishing to connect, including details about the remote end. Postmaster would reply to local MTA with confirmation to accept mail from remote MTA. [This could be automated any number of ways, i.e. automatically accept key from MTAs that correctly resolve forward and reverse lookups and that are not on a black list (host or IP based). This would mean only those that failed the forward/reverse test would be sent for manual review. Other rules could be created as well.] 4. If postmaster replies to deny the request, or if the local MTA expires the request after a period of time, and the remote MTA reconnects and gets a denied message, then the remote MTA would immediately bounce the message.
This is just a rough idea. I am pretty sure the proposal for AMTP is meant to force a bit of control to a third party for authentication purposes to prevent abuse of mail like we have now. However, I don't like being forced to give up that control to be compliant with the AMTP approach.
The idea I propose, while still allowing each to create their own identity, still gives the Admin of the local MTA the full control to determine what/how/who/etc. In addition, the remote ends could in theory remain anonymous.
Of course, both methods fail to address hosts that act as relays. If a relaying host has a CA, then it can be used as a relay. Similarly, my idea, if an lax system allows mail from anyone, and acts as a relay, it has the potential to cause problems. With my idea, the local MTA can just bar the remote MTA from his system once he realizes it is an open relay.
I would not be surprised to see serious exodus of businesses in the state if this goes into effect. And probably a lot of new growth opportunity along the GA/FL border.
Seems like this would do more harm than good. It might make expansion and/or relocation in other states more cost effective. This means growth that would have been in FL, which in turn would mean additional tax revenue, will likely go elsewhere. And, if it leads to companies downsizing and relocating out of FL, then you end up with a loss of revenue for the state.
Call this the Barney Fife tax -- they'll be shooting themselves in the foot with it.
DeCSS is one implementation of a process to decrypt a DVD.
The person that wrote it used a language to describe and express for himself a process. It just so happens that process decrypts DVDs. What if it added two numbers together?
Is code art? Depends on who you ask. Some coders definitely view coding as an art form. How a program is written, the manner and/or order in which it executes, the minimum or maximum number of lines it takes to do something, the elegance of the design or implementation of a design. All of that is an art. The medium just happens to be in a language that a computer can interpret.
Is code speech? I believe Borland took this issue to some court in response to Lotus 1-2-3's suit against Quattro Pro because Quattro Pro supported 1-2-3's macro language. I don't remember all the details, but one issue that was raised was the issue of language. If you created a language, and people learned that language as a means of expression, can copyright law prevent others from using that language? A quick google did not reveal any real answers, except that Borland won at an appeal court and the supreme court deadlocked (one justice recused himself due to IBM owning Lotus).
I agree, getting rid of the DMCA would fix a lot of problems. The DMCA flies in the face of so many entrenched precedents, not the least of which is reverse engineering and fair use. In this case, you could even argue that DMCA is impairing freedom of speech.
Would you continue to use a particular phone book if it failed to supply you with accurate or consistent phone numbers?
Funny you should use that particular example. I recently moved and got a new phone number. Turns out this phone number used to belong to a pet store. They went out of business about 1 to 2 years ago. Only problem, just about all the private printed phone books still have them listed in the yellow pages. I've actually started asking people where they got the phone number. About half get it from current "private" phone books. The others get it from phone books 2 years or older. I get so many calls for that pet store that I've considered starting my own pet store.
The reference to the Sharp and Casio from 1991 included the product line that predated those products. It should be possible to identify something that could meet the requirements of prior art prior to 1989.
As for the password authentication requirement, that is a matter of debate. If a storage program was made that prompted for a password before revealing data, would that count? That was possible with the Radio Shack using BASIC. Don't know about the 1983 "personal diary", but the term diary leads one to believe that something should be able to be kept hidden. Odds are, somewhere between 1983 and 1989 someone would have put a password on something storing this data.
Thanks for pointing out that Mar 01 1989 date. I missed it when I was reading.
An additional advantage of this single multi-function card represents its use as key, master key or any other an access to e.g. buildings, cars enabling system or means.
and from their website:
Presented here are just some of the applications that will benefit from the e-pass concept...
e-Casino
e-Music
e-Pharmaceuticals
e-Entertai nment and others
There is so much prior art in this that I can't see them winning.
In the mid 80's I had a Radio Shack pocket computer that could be used to store important information, programmed in BASIC with various applications, and more. It was about the same size as a palm height and depth, but was just a bit longer. It also only had one or two line LCD display.
Then in 1990/1991 there was the Casio B.O.S.S. and the Sharp OZ-9500 (and lower models) data organizers. These were much more like Palms in that they had multiple applications that could be run. The Sharp had cards that could be slid in to give extra functionality. Plus, both had "secret" or "private" storage areas for information you didn't want displayed unless you entered a password. My wife had the Casio while I had the Sharp.
The closest PDA to have something like e-pass describes is the Rex. It appears to have been first made in 1997.
The reason I bring up the later models is patent protection. Did e-pass target them to get them to license that e-pass patent? If not, why not? Because the Rex was actually closer to what the e-pass patent describes.
I can't imagine (well actually, I can, this is the American legal system we're talking about) they are going to prevail. From what I've seen, their patent is fairly specific. And, at the very least, any patent they have for a "small" general computing device would seem to violate somebody else's patent for a general computing device. Let's hope the judge is smart enough to use real legal reasons to throw this out in round 2.
Thanks for your comments. You make a very interesting point I had not considered -- the customer does indeed control and provide the critical internet connection to complete the last-mile connection used by VonAge.
This is probably why you see legalese about not using these services (including ISP services) in critical/life threatening situations in a lot of service agreements (or at least the ones I've read).
A balance has to be struck between the ability of the customer to provide stable connectivity, the customer's ISP to provide stable connectivity, and of VonAge to properly maintain adequate resources to connect to the customer. In this scenario, VonAge's only real responsibility for maintaining emergency services and minimal uptimes is within its network and its connectivity to the Internet, as that is all that it can directly control. If the customer has connectivity, and attempts to make a call, but VonAge's bandwidth is overly saturated, then that is where I'd see a problem with VonAge. Of course, how would a customer prove that is where a problem lies?
If a telephone carrier is required to provide certain measurements indicating service levels to a state PUC, then shouldn't VonAge be required to provide similar reporting appropriate to it's network? This is a hypothetical question - I've been fortunate to only have had a couple of dealings with PUC filings and other state regulatory matters, so I don't know all the details of what carriers are required to file, plus each state has different requirements, and I believe the FCC has some too.
The only time it is likely to be 100% IP data is if it is a Net to Net call, or you have VonAge and you call another VonAge user.
In order for them to offer the services they are offering, they have to have some level of interconnect with telephone carriers. In fact, they claim that have the ability to provide services in over 1300 rate centers right now. That is not from an IP connection. They might be backhauling some of the interconnect via an IP connection, but they still have an interconnect.
This is further shown by their job posting for a Telecom Billing Analyst whose job will include "reconciling the Carrier invoices".
In just a quick search of their site, I do not find anything that claims their network is 100% IP based. We do know, based on their connection to customers, that they do use IP based connections for the last-mile.
I do find reference to "using our global network and advanced routing technologies". That can imply any number of network technologies.
It would be my guess that they have multiple carrier-grade SIP gateways with interconnect to local carriers in multiple data centers. These data centers provide their hubs for rate centers surrounding it, and then they backhaul interconnect circuits to these gateways at the data centers.
Beyond that, they are probably using either a private network that they can push IP traffic on, or perhaps the regular Internet, to interconnect the SIP gateways with each other. It is entirely possible that they even back haul this to a regular switch at some point, dropping from the IP connection into a regular T1 or DS3 and feeding it to the switch.
My guess is more towards the private network for the back-end simply because you can have more control over QoS issues.
I'll grant that it is highly likely that there is a significant amount of IP network bandwidth being used for VonAge infrastructure beyond the last-mile.
Look at it this way. You can take a DS3 that is made up of nothing but voice traffic. Instead of feeding it into the telco network you plug it into a Cisco or other high speed router. You tell the router not to touch anything on that DS3, just pass it through. That router is plugged into a fiber connection and travels across the country. At the other end you configure the router to drop that DS3 out. You now have a DS3 going across the country, travelling on an IP backbone. You plug that DS3 into switches on either side of the country. You sell voice service from point A to point B. Are you a long distance company (ignoring the limited scope of your calling area, this is just an example)? If not, why not? Simply because you used an IP connection instead of physical plant?
This is no different than the annoying patents that people are getting for applying regular practices to the Internet and calling them new. Most people agree these patents are silly and should be thrown out since the only difference between the original method and the new method is that there is an Internet layer. Same thing here.
The only difference between the service provided by VonAge is that they are using an IP based delivery mechanism for the last-mile, and probably for infrastrcuture of "their global network". And that is it. They are a phone company. And that's my point.
VonAge is completely different than the Net2Phone or Deltathree (or whatever they call themselves now) or any of the other one-way service providers that terminate calls for you. VonAge has taken the next step and provides full two-way PSTN interconnected service. And I think that is great. I think that is the natural evolution of the whole VoIP service industry.
VonAge proves that once again copper is not the only way to get to subscribers homes. Remember when the telcos were so scared cable companies were going to become telephone companies? That still could happen, and has in some areas. That coax into the home is another great connection to the customer. Don't forget wireless. Cell phones are everywhere, b
They don't provide the same service simply because they don't drop a piece of copper into your house. That's the reason telco services are regulated in the first place, they have a natural monopoly which cannot be replaced.
Telco started being regulated because they were a natural monopoly, similar to the manner in which a lot of "public utilities" were/are regulated.
First, I am not advocating the removal of regulations on telcos. Your correct, most do have a natural monopoly, especially the copper going to customers, and that aspect needs to be scrutinized and regulated carefully.
Regulations on telcos cover more than just rates. In many states they also provide a minimal level of service, provide a mechanism for customers to complain when carriers misbehave, and so on. Furthermore, the state makes some money off the telecommunications taxes the carriers are required to collect.
CLECs don't drop copper to your house necessarily. They lease their last mile connection. They don't have to, they could use a fixed wireless connection for the last mile. In fact, I believe there are several places utilizing fixed wireless for the last mile in stead of leasing copper. Are these companies phone companies? Should they have to comply with the same regulations for carriers, minimum grade of service, etc. as other telephone companies? If so, how are they different than VonAge?
VonAge is using an internet connection instead of copper or fixed wireless. They provide the exact same service. It should be expected that they be treated as a telephone company, and follow the same relevant rules and regulations. Of course, their copper shouldn't be regulated since they don't have copper, but that's about it.
So your agreeing the only difference is the last mile connection from them to the customer. They are using internet connections instead of copper. Correct?
I'll grant that as a valid difference. However, the copper "last mile" is not the only thing that defines a phone company.
In fact, several areas have more than one company competing for phone service. Most of these competing companies don't have copper going to the customers. Those companies lease the "last mile" connection to the customer, copper in their case. VonAge is just using the Internet to avoid having to lease the "last mile" connection.
VonAge has an interesting product, and a great way to control costs. But, they are still a phone company. At the very least they should have to comply with the same rules and regulations as the companies that don't have their own "last mile" connection (CLECs).
I think the most telling bit from the article is this:
"Somebody has to question how do you defend an order when the commissioners are writing appellate briefs for the other side," Brecher said. "They?ve got a problem. You?ve got two commissioners who believe what they have done is illegal and don?t have a problem articulating it. There is still a lot of uncertainty here."
followed by this:
Indeed, Commissioner Michael Copps was particularly harsh in his comments accompany the order's release. ?The bad news is that this decision plays fast and loose with the country?s broadband future.? Copps said. ?Make no mistake about it, today?s decision chokes off competition in broadband. Consumers, innovation, entrepreneurs and the Internet itself are going to suffer.
?Instead of preserving, protecting and defending competition, the Commission has torn away access to the network architectures that undergird broadband competition. As a result, consumers, including our nation?s small businesses-the engines of so much entrepreneurial activity and economic growth-may well be stuck without competitive choices and prices when it comes to critical broadband services. This is not a brave new world of broadband, but simply the old system of local monopoly dressed up in a digital cloak."
So at least some of the commissioners there know and realize just what this new ruling has the potential to do, and who it will hurt. Too bad they appear to have been overruled in the process, either that or they were somehow 'encouraged' to go along with the ruling.
Too bad most of the general populace has absolutely no interest in and no concern with things like this. Even worse, it seems more and more evident every day that most people seem to not be able to think for themselves.
If they are offering the exact same services as a phone company, with the only exception being that they use the Internet for the last mile to the subscriber and/or use the Internet for a portion or all of transit, then they should be required to follow the same rules as a regular phone company.
Why should they (VonAge) be given an exemption just because they use the Internet for a portion of their service when the service they are offering is identical to a regular phone company? What makes them unique? I'm willing to change my opinion if someone can make a good point on how VonAge is really not a phone company.
Ah yes, the old "data calls require conditioned lines and you have to pay extra for conditioned lines". Yes I remember that far too well. The thread of SBC to implement higher fees for data lines was one of the reasons a popular multi-line "cb simulator" service went down in the mid-80s in the Houston area. In the end SBC was stopped, but they did cause problems for BBS operators and especially multi-line BBS systems and chat systems (cb simulator as the system was called back then).
Good or bad, and we know most telcos have been pretty bad, they should all be required to play on roughly the same playing field. They are still a regulated monopoly in most places. Any competition in most areas is mostly just for show and not real competition or a real threat to the telco in an area (there are a few areas with real competition, but not many).
There are lots of fees and "taxes" that go directly to the carriers. Look at the wireless LNP and E911 fees that are appearing on wireless bills. Those services were required by the FCC, and the carriers were allowed to charge for them. Except the few cents (to a $1 or so) that carriers are charging, per month, per subscriber, is adding up to MILLIONS of dollars, in many cases dwarfing the actual cost and giving the carriers a new profit center.
Yes, the system if flawed. Yes, the system needs work. Yes, telcos have treated its customers very badly. And yes, Vonage is a telephone company and should be required to act as such and should be treated as such.
VonAge is Phone to Phone. It just so happens it goes through a data network and/or a PC in the process.
If it were PC to Phone then you would not be able to rx incoming calls, have a phone # for incoming calls, etc. More importantly, somewhere VonAge has done something to enable it to allow for number porting, so subscribers can totally convert their home phone to a VonAge account and even keep their own phone number.
Explain how that is only PC to Phone? Explain how that is not a regular phone company?
Again, just because they use the Internet for any part of the transport, or the last mile connection to the subscriber, does not excuse them from following the rules that other phone companies have to follow. Heck, they even CALL THEMSELVES a phone company.
Sadly your correct, and I just went and proved it.
My question was not meant for personal injury, but more in the context of equipment damage and warranties.
If the battery were provided by Nokia, and this happened, then Nokia would be one to cover the damage under their warranty under its terms.
If the battery was provided by the store that sold the phone (as indicated in another reply), then she should be able to get a new phone from the store without having to pay for it.
If she bought the battery at a third location, or even a flea market, then she'll end up having to pay for another phone herself or attempt to get that third party to cover the costs.
I was not referring to lawsuit for personal injury or other punitive measures, though you could not tell that by my original comment.
Typically, I find most carrier stores (not all, I have had the pleasure of dealing with a couple of good stores/carriers that knew how to take care of their customer -- a rarity today) are pure retail: "Sorry, your not eligible for a discounted phone for another 8 months, your welcome to buy any phone here at full price if your phone is not working."
It's about time things like this started to happen.
First, I don't think outbound only service, often called PC to phone, should arbitrarily be considered phone service and regulated.
Second, I don't think PC to PC service should be touched at all.
However, from what I've seen of VonAge, they ARE a telephone company and should be treated exactly the same as a telephone company.
Consider, VonAge offers: 911 dialing, Keep your phone number (local number portability), in-coming and out-going calls, 3 way calling, call waiting, call forwarding, caller ID, etc. etc. etc.
What makes VonAge different from any other phone company service a local service area? They happen to use the Internet as the "last-mile" connection instead of leased or owned copper.
Unlike PC to phone service, VonAge acts exactly like phone service from any *LEC or RBOC.
I commend MN's decision to treat these people the same as they would any other phone company in the state.
I have not read MN's ruling, however, and if they also target PC to PC (or LAN to LAN), or PC to Phone, based services then I think they need to scale things back.
Just because something uses the Internet for some of its transport does not mean that it should be excluded from following the same rules and laws any other provider would have to follow for the exact same service.
Analog does not always transmit at full power. If memory serves there are 7 power levels that are used and the cell sites can tell the phones to step down their power to one of those 7. It all depends on the quality/level of the signal being received by the site. If it isn't that good, the site says turn up the power. Problem with lots of handhelds is that the antennas are in cars or have other obstables to transmit through thus they are told to transmit at the higher power levels.
Handheld cell phones are limited to somewhere around 0.6 watts. Typically, the newer digital phones (at least from about 3 years ago) would typically have max analog power near 0.5 watts. In digital mode they often can go lower, with CDMA phones transmitting lower still (in theory).
In this case it would appear the phone was dropped. When the phone was turned back on it suddenly ignited. This would seem to indicate a severe short somewhere, and no safety circuit to cut power in case of short, if any such circuits exist on any batteries to begin with.
Typically you hear about two kinds of damage to cell phones. The most common I've heard of is batteries catching fire or exploding during the recharge process. And this is perfectly understandable -- feel a battery while it is getting recharged, they can get pretty warm. Some phone batteries would get so warm while inside the phone on the recharger or plugged into a cig. adapter that they would melt the plastic case of phone itself. I know some "rapid" car cig. adapter chargers from phone vendors have special circuits to control the charging, and the generic cheap adapters don't have the same circuit (if at all).
The other heat related problems I've heard of with cell phones is from extremely long transmissions. Say a handheld phone plugged into a cig adapter and used for 200+ minutes. The transmitter can get pretty warm, and I've heard of some of the smaller/thinner plastic phones (early MicroTAC? don't remember for sure) had plastic melt.
I've never heard of a phone bursting into flames, melting the case, or otherwise get hot when it was not directly related to recharging or extended use. At least not until now.
Something had to be pretty severely damaged or there was no safety cut off circuit somewhere to allow a cold phone to burst into flames like that. Sometimes those bargain batteries and accessories aren't such a bargain after all.
Here's my question. Did she get the battery used in this phone from the same store she got her phone from? I've bought several phones over the years, and the last few years you just about could not find OEM parts, the carrier stores had the cheap stuff there in packaging with their carrier names on it. So, if she bought her phone from a carrier store, and they gave her the battery, then would that carrier assume the liability for this happening, since it was not a Nokia battery involved?
McBride proudly dumped two phone-book-sized binders of press clippings on the stage during his SCO Forum keynote on Monday as proof that his company had become more relevant in the high technology industry. SCO has issued 46 press releases since filing suit against IBM on March 7. Last year it issued only 29 press releases between March and August.
Release more press releases. This means your more relevant.
Of course they don't say what phone books. Houston phone books are broken in 2 to 3 3" ring binder sizes. While other area phone books are like 1/2" to 1" binders, but only half a regular page of paper.
Releasing press releases hardly makes you more relevant. It just makes you more noisy. Although, in a time where TV shows can make you an "american idol", perhaps making noise is all it takes now, after all, everywhere we look it seems noise or appearance is replacing substance and quality.:(
Ten years from now BillG will be remembered for the security problems his products created and the extremely expensive and seemingly never ending cost of trying to keep script kiddiez, virii, and worms from taking down the network.
Twenty years from now BillG will be remembered for ongoing abuse of monopoly status, security problems, and his lack of original vision, proved by his quote about nobody needing more than 640k.
Read NTBugTraq. You'll find the "horror stories" your dismissing.
If your network didn't get affected - good for you. If you didn't have any applications stop working due to automatic updates or manually installed patches, even better. More than likely your not doing anything very advanced on your network making admin a lot easier.
But oh yes, you posted as an AC, so your probably just full of hot air and a troll.
Or even the few lazy SysAdmins that believed the M$ app that said the patch was installed, or took the time to disable DCOM if they didn't need it, and then found out they were still vulnerable to this worm? Do you mean those lazy SysAdmins?
If Dell, HP, IBM, for Vendor X sells a PC to a customer, and Automatic Update causes that PC to no longer boot or work properly, that customer is going to back to where they bought the PC. Who is expected to pay the support? The vendor? Microsoft? The customer? My guess it'll be the customer one way or the other.
What if the machine is in a small or home-office business handling some critical task and the Automatic Update causes a failure or some data to be lost? Will M$ be liable and pay damages? Doubtful.
If the patch requires a reboot, will it also automatically reboot the machine?
I can see so many ways this is going to cause all kinds of problems.
My guess is that the "Home" version of the OS will have automatic update turned on by default, and probably difficult to turn off since M$ users don't know how to do anything for themselves, therefore if they try to turn this off they must really be trying to turn it on so they'll leave it on. (Hmm, that sounds kind of like turning off DCOM but it still being active).
The "Pro" of "Office" or "Server" or whatever they call the more expensive version used by IT departments will probably have this turned off so automatic update doesn't take out people's networks. Especially people big enough to be more than just a minor irritant.
Can you image a Fortune 100 company having 1/3 or 1/2 of it's systems down and its IT department totally consumed and in knots trying to fix a problem that looks like a virus. First just a couple of systems would have problems, but as their clocks hit a certain time and the Auto Update goes out and installs the new code, more and more systems fail.
And then there are the systems that report they have the update installed, but really they don't for whatever reason. Following NTBugTraq on this last virus has been more interesting than for past viruses. Several systems had DCOM turned off, all the tools said it was off, but the systems were still vulnerable. Other systems reported the patch was installed, but they were still vulnerable.
This auto update sounds like such a can of worms. M$ may just be giving more people the push they need to check out alternatives. Here's hoping.
At that Q&A session, SCO Senior Vice President Chris Sontag said there are millions of lines of offending code involved and that it's highly unlikely the matter could be resolved by removing that code.
Millions of lines of offending code involved. From their VP.
Every time there's a press release the number grows. Just last week didn't they say something like 168,000 lines of code?
Now it's millionS -- not just 1, but plural, aka many. My guess, based on their claim of derivative work, is that they are saying that 5,100,081 (2.5.37, per previous post) lines are infringing. This doesn't mean they are direct copies, just infringing.
At first, SCO's action surprised and stunned me. Then it became funny to watch them "foaming at the mouth" in the various press releases. Now things are just getting annoying. I'll be glad when they're squashed and this is all over. I'll be even more glad if the SEC finally gets involved and wins a guilty verdict. Perhaps we should change the SCO logo to a crooked SCO, kind of like that crooked E from Enron?
Hire a professional. A real professional. It won't necessarily "be cheap" but it will be safe. When the powers that be balk, ask them which would be "cheaper", getting this fixed and staying operational, or having the whole thing go *POOF* and take the location out of service and still have to get it fixed.
If you are the unlucky person that has to fix it, then find the main that feeds that panel and TURN IT OFF.
Don't even think about trying to fix this problem while it is hot. Not unless you've got a deathwish and, if you have any family you care about, a great big life insurance policy that will still pay out after acts of stupidity.
I've worked around a few power systems, and the one thing above all else, give that electrical panel LOTS OF RESPECT. Always assume a circuit is hot, even if "you KNOW you turned it off earlier". Always leave a flag on the circuit that you turned off so that others know it is off on purpose, especially if you have to turn off a main to kill power to that panel. Always remember SAFETY FIRST, even when your working on a "dead" panel. If you have insulated tools, good -- use them. If you have heavy duty insulated gloves -- use them. Never work alone -- always have somebody around that is aware of what your doing and that can check on you from time to time, or better yet, keep you in sight. They don't have to help you work on the circuits, but if something goes horribly wrong and you get zapped, that person can call 911 and get you help.
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That's fine for the ISP and the ISP's customers. What is not clear is upstream.
This entry sounds more like the ISP can issue self-signed certs to its customers for them to connect to its mail server.
What is not clear is if the ISP will have to have a different, paid for, signed cert to communicate with anybody on connections NOT under its control.
I am all for improving mail, but look at what happened with signed certs on http. I do not want to see something like that start again. Not unless there is an "open" period where anyone can submit their own CA key to be included free of charge and have them recognized automatically by mail servers after X date. And this "open" period would need to be widely publicised. If not, then we end up right back with just a few companies offering certs for outrageous prices and little to no competition.
One more thing, you can sure bet that as soon as something like this is created, big players are going to figure out how to charge the world for delivering mail. It will be represented to their customers as a way of controlling and preventing spam and viruses, perhaps even called secure mail or something like that. Imagine if AOL or MSN/Hotmail required an MTA license, with a fee, in order to deliver mail from your server. No big deal you say, if enough people are inconvenienced they'll leave. Sure they will, but not enough to make any difference, after all they have "secure mail" now. Of course, the AMTP with required certs signed by a CA just makes all this easier to implement and track, technically I guess the same model could be attempted with SMTP.
It would almost seem better if they could use a model more like SSH. Here's my idea, feel free to dissect it and tell me where I left huge gaping holes (point of view is from your server):
1. Remote MTA attempts to deliver mail to local MTA. Remote MTA is unknown. A key exchange similar to SSH is performed - primary difference is the local MTA gets the key from the remote MTA (instead of the remote SSH client getting key and remote user accepting it) and sends it to the postmaster.
2. The remote MTA queues the message for X hours/days/weeks/whatever and retry at appropriate intervals.
3. Postmaster gets mail alerting of new MTA wishing to connect, including details about the remote end. Postmaster would reply to local MTA with confirmation to accept mail from remote MTA. [This could be automated any number of ways, i.e. automatically accept key from MTAs that correctly resolve forward and reverse lookups and that are not on a black list (host or IP based). This would mean only those that failed the forward/reverse test would be sent for manual review. Other rules could be created as well.]
4. If postmaster replies to deny the request, or if the local MTA expires the request after a period of time, and the remote MTA reconnects and gets a denied message, then the remote MTA would immediately bounce the message.
This is just a rough idea. I am pretty sure the proposal for AMTP is meant to force a bit of control to a third party for authentication purposes to prevent abuse of mail like we have now. However, I don't like being forced to give up that control to be compliant with the AMTP approach.
The idea I propose, while still allowing each to create their own identity, still gives the Admin of the local MTA the full control to determine what/how/who/etc. In addition, the remote ends could in theory remain anonymous.
Of course, both methods fail to address hosts that act as relays. If a relaying host has a CA, then it can be used as a relay. Similarly, my idea, if an lax system allows mail from anyone, and acts as a relay, it has the potential to cause problems. With my idea, the local MTA can just bar the remote MTA from his system once he realizes it is an open relay.
I would not be surprised to see serious exodus of businesses in the state if this goes into effect. And probably a lot of new growth opportunity along the GA/FL border.
Seems like this would do more harm than good. It might make expansion and/or relocation in other states more cost effective. This means growth that would have been in FL, which in turn would mean additional tax revenue, will likely go elsewhere. And, if it leads to companies downsizing and relocating out of FL, then you end up with a loss of revenue for the state.
Call this the Barney Fife tax -- they'll be shooting themselves in the foot with it.
DeCSS is one implementation of a process to decrypt a DVD.
The person that wrote it used a language to describe and express for himself a process. It just so happens that process decrypts DVDs. What if it added two numbers together?
Is code art? Depends on who you ask. Some coders definitely view coding as an art form. How a program is written, the manner and/or order in which it executes, the minimum or maximum number of lines it takes to do something, the elegance of the design or implementation of a design. All of that is an art. The medium just happens to be in a language that a computer can interpret.
Is code speech? I believe Borland took this issue to some court in response to Lotus 1-2-3's suit against Quattro Pro because Quattro Pro supported 1-2-3's macro language. I don't remember all the details, but one issue that was raised was the issue of language. If you created a language, and people learned that language as a means of expression, can copyright law prevent others from using that language? A quick google did not reveal any real answers, except that Borland won at an appeal court and the supreme court deadlocked (one justice recused himself due to IBM owning Lotus).
I agree, getting rid of the DMCA would fix a lot of problems. The DMCA flies in the face of so many entrenched precedents, not the least of which is reverse engineering and fair use. In this case, you could even argue that DMCA is impairing freedom of speech.
Would you continue to use a particular phone book if it failed to supply you with accurate or consistent phone numbers?
Funny you should use that particular example. I recently moved and got a new phone number. Turns out this phone number used to belong to a pet store. They went out of business about 1 to 2 years ago. Only problem, just about all the private printed phone books still have them listed in the yellow pages. I've actually started asking people where they got the phone number. About half get it from current "private" phone books. The others get it from phone books 2 years or older. I get so many calls for that pet store that I've considered starting my own pet store.
As for the password authentication requirement, that is a matter of debate. If a storage program was made that prompted for a password before revealing data, would that count? That was possible with the Radio Shack using BASIC. Don't know about the 1983 "personal diary", but the term diary leads one to believe that something should be able to be kept hidden. Odds are, somewhere between 1983 and 1989 someone would have put a password on something storing this data.
Thanks for pointing out that Mar 01 1989 date. I missed it when I was reading.
There is so much prior art in this that I can't see them winning.
In the mid 80's I had a Radio Shack pocket computer that could be used to store important information, programmed in BASIC with various applications, and more. It was about the same size as a palm height and depth, but was just a bit longer. It also only had one or two line LCD display.
Then in 1990/1991 there was the Casio B.O.S.S. and the Sharp OZ-9500 (and lower models) data organizers. These were much more like Palms in that they had multiple applications that could be run. The Sharp had cards that could be slid in to give extra functionality. Plus, both had "secret" or "private" storage areas for information you didn't want displayed unless you entered a password. My wife had the Casio while I had the Sharp.
The closest PDA to have something like e-pass describes is the Rex. It appears to have been first made in 1997.
Around the same time was the Motorola clip-on PDA for the StarTac.
The reason I bring up the later models is patent protection. Did e-pass target them to get them to license that e-pass patent? If not, why not? Because the Rex was actually closer to what the e-pass patent describes.
I can't imagine (well actually, I can, this is the American legal system we're talking about) they are going to prevail. From what I've seen, their patent is fairly specific. And, at the very least, any patent they have for a "small" general computing device would seem to violate somebody else's patent for a general computing device. Let's hope the judge is smart enough to use real legal reasons to throw this out in round 2.
Thanks for your comments. You make a very interesting point I had not considered -- the customer does indeed control and provide the critical internet connection to complete the last-mile connection used by VonAge.
This is probably why you see legalese about not using these services (including ISP services) in critical/life threatening situations in a lot of service agreements (or at least the ones I've read).
A balance has to be struck between the ability of the customer to provide stable connectivity, the customer's ISP to provide stable connectivity, and of VonAge to properly maintain adequate resources to connect to the customer. In this scenario, VonAge's only real responsibility for maintaining emergency services and minimal uptimes is within its network and its connectivity to the Internet, as that is all that it can directly control. If the customer has connectivity, and attempts to make a call, but VonAge's bandwidth is overly saturated, then that is where I'd see a problem with VonAge. Of course, how would a customer prove that is where a problem lies?
If a telephone carrier is required to provide certain measurements indicating service levels to a state PUC, then shouldn't VonAge be required to provide similar reporting appropriate to it's network? This is a hypothetical question - I've been fortunate to only have had a couple of dealings with PUC filings and other state regulatory matters, so I don't know all the details of what carriers are required to file, plus each state has different requirements, and I believe the FCC has some too.
The only time it is likely to be 100% IP data is if it is a Net to Net call, or you have VonAge and you call another VonAge user.
In order for them to offer the services they are offering, they have to have some level of interconnect with telephone carriers. In fact, they claim that have the ability to provide services in over 1300 rate centers right now. That is not from an IP connection. They might be backhauling some of the interconnect via an IP connection, but they still have an interconnect.
This is further shown by their job posting for a Telecom Billing Analyst whose job will include "reconciling the Carrier invoices".
In just a quick search of their site, I do not find anything that claims their network is 100% IP based. We do know, based on their connection to customers, that they do use IP based connections for the last-mile.
I do find reference to "using our global network and advanced routing technologies". That can imply any number of network technologies.
It would be my guess that they have multiple carrier-grade SIP gateways with interconnect to local carriers in multiple data centers. These data centers provide their hubs for rate centers surrounding it, and then they backhaul interconnect circuits to these gateways at the data centers.
Beyond that, they are probably using either a private network that they can push IP traffic on, or perhaps the regular Internet, to interconnect the SIP gateways with each other. It is entirely possible that they even back haul this to a regular switch at some point, dropping from the IP connection into a regular T1 or DS3 and feeding it to the switch.
My guess is more towards the private network for the back-end simply because you can have more control over QoS issues.
I'll grant that it is highly likely that there is a significant amount of IP network bandwidth being used for VonAge infrastructure beyond the last-mile.
Look at it this way. You can take a DS3 that is made up of nothing but voice traffic. Instead of feeding it into the telco network you plug it into a Cisco or other high speed router. You tell the router not to touch anything on that DS3, just pass it through. That router is plugged into a fiber connection and travels across the country. At the other end you configure the router to drop that DS3 out. You now have a DS3 going across the country, travelling on an IP backbone. You plug that DS3 into switches on either side of the country. You sell voice service from point A to point B. Are you a long distance company (ignoring the limited scope of your calling area, this is just an example)? If not, why not? Simply because you used an IP connection instead of physical plant?
This is no different than the annoying patents that people are getting for applying regular practices to the Internet and calling them new. Most people agree these patents are silly and should be thrown out since the only difference between the original method and the new method is that there is an Internet layer. Same thing here.
The only difference between the service provided by VonAge is that they are using an IP based delivery mechanism for the last-mile, and probably for infrastrcuture of "their global network". And that is it. They are a phone company. And that's my point.
VonAge is completely different than the Net2Phone or Deltathree (or whatever they call themselves now) or any of the other one-way service providers that terminate calls for you. VonAge has taken the next step and provides full two-way PSTN interconnected service. And I think that is great. I think that is the natural evolution of the whole VoIP service industry.
VonAge proves that once again copper is not the only way to get to subscribers homes. Remember when the telcos were so scared cable companies were going to become telephone companies? That still could happen, and has in some areas. That coax into the home is another great connection to the customer. Don't forget wireless. Cell phones are everywhere, b
Telco started being regulated because they were a natural monopoly, similar to the manner in which a lot of "public utilities" were/are regulated.
First, I am not advocating the removal of regulations on telcos. Your correct, most do have a natural monopoly, especially the copper going to customers, and that aspect needs to be scrutinized and regulated carefully.
Regulations on telcos cover more than just rates. In many states they also provide a minimal level of service, provide a mechanism for customers to complain when carriers misbehave, and so on. Furthermore, the state makes some money off the telecommunications taxes the carriers are required to collect.
CLECs don't drop copper to your house necessarily. They lease their last mile connection. They don't have to, they could use a fixed wireless connection for the last mile. In fact, I believe there are several places utilizing fixed wireless for the last mile in stead of leasing copper. Are these companies phone companies? Should they have to comply with the same regulations for carriers, minimum grade of service, etc. as other telephone companies? If so, how are they different than VonAge?
VonAge is using an internet connection instead of copper or fixed wireless. They provide the exact same service. It should be expected that they be treated as a telephone company, and follow the same relevant rules and regulations. Of course, their copper shouldn't be regulated since they don't have copper, but that's about it.
So your agreeing the only difference is the last mile connection from them to the customer. They are using internet connections instead of copper. Correct?
I'll grant that as a valid difference. However, the copper "last mile" is not the only thing that defines a phone company.
In fact, several areas have more than one company competing for phone service. Most of these competing companies don't have copper going to the customers. Those companies lease the "last mile" connection to the customer, copper in their case. VonAge is just using the Internet to avoid having to lease the "last mile" connection.
VonAge has an interesting product, and a great way to control costs. But, they are still a phone company. At the very least they should have to comply with the same rules and regulations as the companies that don't have their own "last mile" connection (CLECs).
followed by this:
So at least some of the commissioners there know and realize just what this new ruling has the potential to do, and who it will hurt. Too bad they appear to have been overruled in the process, either that or they were somehow 'encouraged' to go along with the ruling.
Too bad most of the general populace has absolutely no interest in and no concern with things like this. Even worse, it seems more and more evident every day that most people seem to not be able to think for themselves.
If they are offering the exact same services as a phone company, with the only exception being that they use the Internet for the last mile to the subscriber and/or use the Internet for a portion or all of transit, then they should be required to follow the same rules as a regular phone company.
Why should they (VonAge) be given an exemption just because they use the Internet for a portion of their service when the service they are offering is identical to a regular phone company? What makes them unique? I'm willing to change my opinion if someone can make a good point on how VonAge is really not a phone company.
Ah yes, the old "data calls require conditioned lines and you have to pay extra for conditioned lines". Yes I remember that far too well. The thread of SBC to implement higher fees for data lines was one of the reasons a popular multi-line "cb simulator" service went down in the mid-80s in the Houston area. In the end SBC was stopped, but they did cause problems for BBS operators and especially multi-line BBS systems and chat systems (cb simulator as the system was called back then).
Good or bad, and we know most telcos have been pretty bad, they should all be required to play on roughly the same playing field. They are still a regulated monopoly in most places. Any competition in most areas is mostly just for show and not real competition or a real threat to the telco in an area (there are a few areas with real competition, but not many).
There are lots of fees and "taxes" that go directly to the carriers. Look at the wireless LNP and E911 fees that are appearing on wireless bills. Those services were required by the FCC, and the carriers were allowed to charge for them. Except the few cents (to a $1 or so) that carriers are charging, per month, per subscriber, is adding up to MILLIONS of dollars, in many cases dwarfing the actual cost and giving the carriers a new profit center.
Yes, the system if flawed. Yes, the system needs work. Yes, telcos have treated its customers very badly. And yes, Vonage is a telephone company and should be required to act as such and should be treated as such.
No, it isn't.
VonAge is Phone to Phone. It just so happens it goes through a data network and/or a PC in the process.
If it were PC to Phone then you would not be able to rx incoming calls, have a phone # for incoming calls, etc. More importantly, somewhere VonAge has done something to enable it to allow for number porting, so subscribers can totally convert their home phone to a VonAge account and even keep their own phone number.
Explain how that is only PC to Phone? Explain how that is not a regular phone company?
Again, just because they use the Internet for any part of the transport, or the last mile connection to the subscriber, does not excuse them from following the rules that other phone companies have to follow. Heck, they even CALL THEMSELVES a phone company.
Sadly your correct, and I just went and proved it.
My question was not meant for personal injury, but more in the context of equipment damage and warranties.
If the battery were provided by Nokia, and this happened, then Nokia would be one to cover the damage under their warranty under its terms.
If the battery was provided by the store that sold the phone (as indicated in another reply), then she should be able to get a new phone from the store without having to pay for it.
If she bought the battery at a third location, or even a flea market, then she'll end up having to pay for another phone herself or attempt to get that third party to cover the costs.
I was not referring to lawsuit for personal injury or other punitive measures, though you could not tell that by my original comment.
Typically, I find most carrier stores (not all, I have had the pleasure of dealing with a couple of good stores/carriers that knew how to take care of their customer -- a rarity today) are pure retail: "Sorry, your not eligible for a discounted phone for another 8 months, your welcome to buy any phone here at full price if your phone is not working."
It's about time things like this started to happen.
First, I don't think outbound only service, often called PC to phone, should arbitrarily be considered phone service and regulated.
Second, I don't think PC to PC service should be touched at all.
However, from what I've seen of VonAge, they ARE a telephone company and should be treated exactly the same as a telephone company.
Consider, VonAge offers: 911 dialing, Keep your phone number (local number portability), in-coming and out-going calls, 3 way calling, call waiting, call forwarding, caller ID, etc. etc. etc.
What makes VonAge different from any other phone company service a local service area? They happen to use the Internet as the "last-mile" connection instead of leased or owned copper.
Unlike PC to phone service, VonAge acts exactly like phone service from any *LEC or RBOC.
I commend MN's decision to treat these people the same as they would any other phone company in the state.
I have not read MN's ruling, however, and if they also target PC to PC (or LAN to LAN), or PC to Phone, based services then I think they need to scale things back.
Just because something uses the Internet for some of its transport does not mean that it should be excluded from following the same rules and laws any other provider would have to follow for the exact same service.
Analog does not always transmit at full power. If memory serves there are 7 power levels that are used and the cell sites can tell the phones to step down their power to one of those 7. It all depends on the quality/level of the signal being received by the site. If it isn't that good, the site says turn up the power. Problem with lots of handhelds is that the antennas are in cars or have other obstables to transmit through thus they are told to transmit at the higher power levels.
Handheld cell phones are limited to somewhere around 0.6 watts. Typically, the newer digital phones (at least from about 3 years ago) would typically have max analog power near 0.5 watts. In digital mode they often can go lower, with CDMA phones transmitting lower still (in theory).
In this case it would appear the phone was dropped. When the phone was turned back on it suddenly ignited. This would seem to indicate a severe short somewhere, and no safety circuit to cut power in case of short, if any such circuits exist on any batteries to begin with.
Typically you hear about two kinds of damage to cell phones. The most common I've heard of is batteries catching fire or exploding during the recharge process. And this is perfectly understandable -- feel a battery while it is getting recharged, they can get pretty warm. Some phone batteries would get so warm while inside the phone on the recharger or plugged into a cig. adapter that they would melt the plastic case of phone itself. I know some "rapid" car cig. adapter chargers from phone vendors have special circuits to control the charging, and the generic cheap adapters don't have the same circuit (if at all).
The other heat related problems I've heard of with cell phones is from extremely long transmissions. Say a handheld phone plugged into a cig adapter and used for 200+ minutes. The transmitter can get pretty warm, and I've heard of some of the smaller/thinner plastic phones (early MicroTAC? don't remember for sure) had plastic melt.
I've never heard of a phone bursting into flames, melting the case, or otherwise get hot when it was not directly related to recharging or extended use. At least not until now.
Something had to be pretty severely damaged or there was no safety cut off circuit somewhere to allow a cold phone to burst into flames like that. Sometimes those bargain batteries and accessories aren't such a bargain after all.
Here's my question. Did she get the battery used in this phone from the same store she got her phone from? I've bought several phones over the years, and the last few years you just about could not find OEM parts, the carrier stores had the cheap stuff there in packaging with their carrier names on it. So, if she bought her phone from a carrier store, and they gave her the battery, then would that carrier assume the liability for this happening, since it was not a Nokia battery involved?
McBride proudly dumped two phone-book-sized binders of press clippings on the stage during his SCO Forum keynote on Monday as proof that his company had become more relevant in the high technology industry. SCO has issued 46 press releases since filing suit against IBM on March 7. Last year it issued only 29 press releases between March and August.
:(
Release more press releases. This means your more relevant.
Of course they don't say what phone books. Houston phone books are broken in 2 to 3 3" ring binder sizes. While other area phone books are like 1/2" to 1" binders, but only half a regular page of paper.
Releasing press releases hardly makes you more relevant. It just makes you more noisy. Although, in a time where TV shows can make you an "american idol", perhaps making noise is all it takes now, after all, everywhere we look it seems noise or appearance is replacing substance and quality.
Ten years from now BillG will be remembered for the security problems his products created and the extremely expensive and seemingly never ending cost of trying to keep script kiddiez, virii, and worms from taking down the network.
Twenty years from now BillG will be remembered for ongoing abuse of monopoly status, security problems, and his lack of original vision, proved by his quote about nobody needing more than 640k.
Is there even any reason to go on to 30 years?
Read NTBugTraq. You'll find the "horror stories" your dismissing.
If your network didn't get affected - good for you. If you didn't have any applications stop working due to automatic updates or manually installed patches, even better. More than likely your not doing anything very advanced on your network making admin a lot easier.
But oh yes, you posted as an AC, so your probably just full of hot air and a troll.
Or even the few lazy SysAdmins that believed the M$ app that said the patch was installed, or took the time to disable DCOM if they didn't need it, and then found out they were still vulnerable to this worm? Do you mean those lazy SysAdmins?
If Dell, HP, IBM, for Vendor X sells a PC to a customer, and Automatic Update causes that PC to no longer boot or work properly, that customer is going to back to where they bought the PC. Who is expected to pay the support? The vendor? Microsoft? The customer? My guess it'll be the customer one way or the other.
What if the machine is in a small or home-office business handling some critical task and the Automatic Update causes a failure or some data to be lost? Will M$ be liable and pay damages? Doubtful.
If the patch requires a reboot, will it also automatically reboot the machine?
I can see so many ways this is going to cause all kinds of problems.
My guess is that the "Home" version of the OS will have automatic update turned on by default, and probably difficult to turn off since M$ users don't know how to do anything for themselves, therefore if they try to turn this off they must really be trying to turn it on so they'll leave it on. (Hmm, that sounds kind of like turning off DCOM but it still being active).
The "Pro" of "Office" or "Server" or whatever they call the more expensive version used by IT departments will probably have this turned off so automatic update doesn't take out people's networks. Especially people big enough to be more than just a minor irritant.
Can you image a Fortune 100 company having 1/3 or 1/2 of it's systems down and its IT department totally consumed and in knots trying to fix a problem that looks like a virus. First just a couple of systems would have problems, but as their clocks hit a certain time and the Auto Update goes out and installs the new code, more and more systems fail.
And then there are the systems that report they have the update installed, but really they don't for whatever reason. Following NTBugTraq on this last virus has been more interesting than for past viruses. Several systems had DCOM turned off, all the tools said it was off, but the systems were still vulnerable. Other systems reported the patch was installed, but they were still vulnerable.
This auto update sounds like such a can of worms. M$ may just be giving more people the push they need to check out alternatives. Here's hoping.
From the article:
At that Q&A session, SCO Senior Vice President Chris Sontag said there are millions of lines of offending code involved and that it's highly unlikely the matter could be resolved by removing that code.
Millions of lines of offending code involved. From their VP.
Every time there's a press release the number grows. Just last week didn't they say something like 168,000 lines of code?
Now it's millionS -- not just 1, but plural, aka many. My guess, based on their claim of derivative work, is that they are saying that 5,100,081 (2.5.37, per previous post) lines are infringing. This doesn't mean they are direct copies, just infringing.
At first, SCO's action surprised and stunned me. Then it became funny to watch them "foaming at the mouth" in the various press releases. Now things are just getting annoying. I'll be glad when they're squashed and this is all over. I'll be even more glad if the SEC finally gets involved and wins a guilty verdict. Perhaps we should change the SCO logo to a crooked SCO, kind of like that crooked E from Enron?
Hire a professional. A real professional. It won't necessarily "be cheap" but it will be safe. When the powers that be balk, ask them which would be "cheaper", getting this fixed and staying operational, or having the whole thing go *POOF* and take the location out of service and still have to get it fixed.
If you are the unlucky person that has to fix it, then find the main that feeds that panel and TURN IT OFF.
Don't even think about trying to fix this problem while it is hot. Not unless you've got a deathwish and, if you have any family you care about, a great big life insurance policy that will still pay out after acts of stupidity.
I've worked around a few power systems, and the one thing above all else, give that electrical panel LOTS OF RESPECT. Always assume a circuit is hot, even if "you KNOW you turned it off earlier". Always leave a flag on the circuit that you turned off so that others know it is off on purpose, especially if you have to turn off a main to kill power to that panel. Always remember SAFETY FIRST, even when your working on a "dead" panel. If you have insulated tools, good -- use them. If you have heavy duty insulated gloves -- use them. Never work alone -- always have somebody around that is aware of what your doing and that can check on you from time to time, or better yet, keep you in sight. They don't have to help you work on the circuits, but if something goes horribly wrong and you get zapped, that person can call 911 and get you help.