Periodically, we hear fearful reports about the nefarious schemings of DARPA and the government. Having actually read through the publically available DARPA budget, it is purcuing research that could be construed as far more threatening to civil liberties than those so far published. Take for instance TIA. This is not a stand alone program. It would form the underlying foundation/statistical database for an complex system that could identify terrorists(through an optical recognition interface) in a crowd of people through tell-tale characteristics. How useful would that be in Iraq right now?
As long as the information is available to the public in some fashion, there is nothing wrong with scraping/data mining as described. Both ethically and legally, this methodology would be completely acceptable to CI pros. Check out www.scip.org
Not really. I mean the voice quality isn't the same as a wireline connection, but data is still just data. Moreover, there is a whole industry founded on VoIP for international long distance. WiFi is able to handle the VoIP protocols fine. Concern might be raised if all voice traffic shifts over to WiFi. That's why developers are looking at WiFi primarily as a complementary data conduit for cell phones.
I performed a competitive analysis for a Baby Bell (BB) in a midwestern market. They could not understand how a local (W)ISP was providing T-1 equivalency for half the price (and still making a hefty profit). After doing some interviewing and research, it was clear that the BB had no real competitive options that they wanted to pursue. They could not compete on price without deploying wi-fi (thus obsolescing part of their landline infrastructure). The WISP in question was getting its IP connection from a non-BB IXC (e.g. AT&T, WorldCom,Level 3), insulating it from BB pressure. The BB's only competitive option was to impose hefty "disconnect fees" for those clients who switched.
The BB just didn't get it. None of them do. They fought to circumvent competition and enter the long distance market, thinking that there was a pot of gold there. This pot of gold has turned out to be only fool's gold as the profitability of long distance service has plummetted. Moreover, so-called bundled service for business clients (especially for medium and large companies) has also been a mirage. It's not unique-its the standard now. Additionally the lucrative big companies don't want to deal with (read: be dependent on) the BBs.
Here VoIP enters. Big companies can make VoIP pay off and run their own system without help from the BB. Right now, VoIP equipment is still a bit pricey at the consumer level, but the price is dropping and will continue to drop, despite resistance from the BB's.
The BB's are just too slow and conservative. Historically, why not? For a hundred years they've been the dominant game in town. They have crushed their competitors.
There is indeed a glut of long haul fiber. That is the fiber optic connectivity between cities. many different telcos have been laying fiber. What's more, multiplexing equipment keeps on getting better, allowing carriers to place more data on individual wavelengths, increasing the capacity of a given fiber route.
However, when one starts looking at the last mile, connectivity is sorely lacking. It's estimated that only 5% of US commercial buildings have a fiber hook-up. Mind you, these are the biggest office buildings in major U.S. cities so it represents a disproportionate amount of actual office space. Nonetheless, there is a shortage of fiber in the last mile. One of the main problems is that laying metro fiber is much more expensive than long haul fiber. The telco needs all sorts of permits and permissions from the municipality and needs to buy rights-of-way to lay the fiber. Companies can spend thousands of dollars and months just to lay a few feet of fiber.
BTW...Assets of bankrupt telcos are actually averaging close to $0.05 on the dollar.
In case no one noticed, two weeks ago the FCC issued a Notification of Proposed Rulemaking. The FCC is seeking comments on its proposal to exempt data from the 1996 Telecommunications Act. This will give the RBOCs everything they wanted from Tauzin-Dingell and then some. No longer will the RBOCs have to offer data lines to other carriers.
The slow deployment of broadband to residential customers has many reasons:
1)Equipment is a problem. Not all telephone are capable of provisioning DSL. Moreover not all ILEC central offices have DSLAMs which are neccessary for the service. Users must be within 18K feet of Central office or remote in order to have a chance of service.
2)Since the 1996 Telecommunications Act, The ILECs have certainly dragged their feet on deploying new equipment. They did not want to deploy equipment that they would have to allow their competitors to use. It is easier and better in the long run to delay deployment.
3)Availability of broadband runs between 8%-10% nationally. Curiously, your best bet for residential service is to live downtown where there are numerous broadband options and competitors, or out in the country where rural ILECs, untouched by competition are rapidly installing DSLAMs.
4) At present, regardless of how much we want one, there is no killer ap for residential usage. Problem is that its seen as a "chicken/egg" problem. It is still an open question whether the ap will emerge and drive deployment or vice versa. Right now, everyone is standing around with their hands in their pockets hoping something will happen.
5)The ILECs have recently been more aggressive in deploying DSL as their upstart competitors are struggling to avoid bankruptcy and are no longer viewed as a significant threat.
The McCaffee/FBI flap raises questions about other market powers. I am not a conspiracy theorist by nature, but the announcement of the government's change of heart with regard to the Microsoft settlement seems oddly timed. In wartime (WWI & WWII), the U.S. and British governments worked with transatlantic cable companies to keep an eye on communications of foreign governments. With the MS source code still a closely held secret and its broad global market dominance, its a no-brainer for the U.S. government to establish a quid pro quo with Microsoft: a tolerated market monopoly in return for an invaluabble intelligence asset, access to the majority of PC's worldwide.
Jerry Pournelle posted this tonight on one of the SFF Net newsgroups; I
have no reason to think it isn't authentic.
Dear Jerry,
Following is a message which my one of my best friends passed along with
permission to distribute to those who might be interested. It fills in the
details that I missed in my original conversation with him and attempted to
relate to you.
Tom has given me permission to distribute the message - please feel free to
post it if you deem it appropriate.
Sincerely,
Art Russell
Major, US Army (Retired)
Message Follows:
Today was a tragedy for all of America and to my family, a very personal
one. Lynn and my Niece Liz's husband, Jeremy Glick was on United flight 93
this morning. When the Hijackers took control of flight 93. Jeremy called
my niece who in-turn conferenced him to 911. Jeremy relayed to the police
what was happening as the hijacking unfolded. As our niece Liz listened,
Jeremy told the police there were three Arab terrorists with knives and a
large red box that they claimed contained a bomb. Jeremy tracked the second
by second details and relayed them to the police by phone. After several
minutes of describing the scene, Jeremy and several other passengers
decided there was nothing to lose by rushing the hijackers. Although United
Flight 93 crashed outside of Pittsburgh, with the loss of all souls. Jeremy
and the other patriotic heroes saved the lives of many people on the ground
that would have died if the Arab terrorists had been able to complete their
heinous mission.
Please offer your prayers for all of those who perished or were injured in
this tragic of all days and to our niece Liz Glick and her 2-month-old
child, Emerson, who are left without their loving Husband and Father. May
we remember Jeremy and the other brave souls as heroes, soldiers and
Americans' on United flight 93 whom so gallantry gave their lives to save
many others.
Lynn, our four adult children and I are headed to New York to be with our
family during this time of great sadness
Slashdot Mirror
Periodically, we hear fearful reports about the nefarious schemings of DARPA and the government. Having actually read through the publically available DARPA budget, it is purcuing research that could be construed as far more threatening to civil liberties than those so far published. Take for instance TIA. This is not a stand alone program. It would form the underlying foundation/statistical database for an complex system that could identify terrorists(through an optical recognition interface) in a crowd of people through tell-tale characteristics. How useful would that be in Iraq right now?
I went with a new IBM R40. My campus is wireless and the new model has enough oomph to handle desktop and mobile tasks at $1600 MSRP.
As long as the information is available to the public in some fashion, there is nothing wrong with scraping/data mining as described. Both ethically and legally, this methodology would be completely acceptable to CI pros. Check out www.scip.org
The problem is that the telecom manufacturers like Lucent don't want to support WiFi. It is the Cisco's of the world who are leading the charge.
Not really. I mean the voice quality isn't the same as a wireline connection, but data is still just data. Moreover, there is a whole industry founded on VoIP for international long distance. WiFi is able to handle the VoIP protocols fine. Concern might be raised if all voice traffic shifts over to WiFi. That's why developers are looking at WiFi primarily as a complementary data conduit for cell phones.
I think the article is dead on.
I performed a competitive analysis for a Baby Bell (BB) in a midwestern market. They could not understand how a local (W)ISP was providing T-1 equivalency for half the price (and still making a hefty profit). After doing some interviewing and research, it was clear that the BB had no real competitive options that they wanted to pursue. They could not compete on price without deploying wi-fi (thus obsolescing part of their landline infrastructure). The WISP in question was getting its IP connection from a non-BB IXC (e.g. AT&T, WorldCom,Level 3), insulating it from BB pressure. The BB's only competitive option was to impose hefty "disconnect fees" for those clients who switched.
The BB just didn't get it. None of them do. They fought to circumvent competition and enter the long distance market, thinking that there was a pot of gold there. This pot of gold has turned out to be only fool's gold as the profitability of long distance service has plummetted. Moreover, so-called bundled service for business clients (especially for medium and large companies) has also been a mirage. It's not unique-its the standard now. Additionally the lucrative big companies don't want to deal with (read: be dependent on) the BBs.
Here VoIP enters. Big companies can make VoIP pay off and run their own system without help from the BB. Right now, VoIP equipment is still a bit pricey at the consumer level, but the price is dropping and will continue to drop, despite resistance from the BB's.
The BB's are just too slow and conservative. Historically, why not? For a hundred years they've been the dominant game in town. They have crushed their competitors.
Surely, that won't change!
USA Today got the story half right as usual.
There is indeed a glut of long haul fiber. That is the fiber optic connectivity between cities. many different telcos have been laying fiber. What's more, multiplexing equipment keeps on getting better, allowing carriers to place more data on individual wavelengths, increasing the capacity of a given fiber route.
However, when one starts looking at the last mile, connectivity is sorely lacking. It's estimated that only 5% of US commercial buildings have a fiber hook-up. Mind you, these are the biggest office buildings in major U.S. cities so it represents a disproportionate amount of actual office space. Nonetheless, there is a shortage of fiber in the last mile. One of the main problems is that laying metro fiber is much more expensive than long haul fiber. The telco needs all sorts of permits and permissions from the municipality and needs to buy rights-of-way to lay the fiber. Companies can spend thousands of dollars and months just to lay a few feet of fiber.
BTW...Assets of bankrupt telcos are actually averaging close to $0.05 on the dollar.
In case no one noticed, two weeks ago the FCC issued a Notification of Proposed Rulemaking. The FCC is seeking comments on its proposal to exempt data from the 1996 Telecommunications Act. This will give the RBOCs everything they wanted from Tauzin-Dingell and then some. No longer will the RBOCs have to offer data lines to other carriers.
The slow deployment of broadband to residential customers has many reasons:
1)Equipment is a problem. Not all telephone are capable of provisioning DSL. Moreover not all ILEC central offices have DSLAMs which are neccessary for the service. Users must be within 18K feet of Central office or remote in order to have a chance of service.
2)Since the 1996 Telecommunications Act, The ILECs have certainly dragged their feet on deploying new equipment. They did not want to deploy equipment that they would have to allow their competitors to use. It is easier and better in the long run to delay deployment.
3)Availability of broadband runs between 8%-10% nationally. Curiously, your best bet for residential service is to live downtown where there are numerous broadband options and competitors, or out in the country where rural ILECs, untouched by competition are rapidly installing DSLAMs.
4) At present, regardless of how much we want one, there is no killer ap for residential usage. Problem is that its seen as a "chicken/egg" problem. It is still an open question whether the ap will emerge and drive deployment or vice versa. Right now, everyone is standing around with their hands in their pockets hoping something will happen.
5)The ILECs have recently been more aggressive in deploying DSL as their upstart competitors are struggling to avoid bankruptcy and are no longer viewed as a significant threat.
The McCaffee/FBI flap raises questions about other market powers. I am not a conspiracy theorist by nature, but the announcement of the government's change of heart with regard to the Microsoft settlement seems oddly timed. In wartime (WWI & WWII), the U.S. and British governments worked with transatlantic cable companies to keep an eye on communications of foreign governments. With the MS source code still a closely held secret and its broad global market dominance, its a no-brainer for the U.S. government to establish a quid pro quo with Microsoft: a tolerated market monopoly in return for an invaluabble intelligence asset, access to the majority of PC's worldwide.
Jerry Pournelle posted this tonight on one of the SFF Net newsgroups; I
have no reason to think it isn't authentic.
Dear Jerry,
Following is a message which my one of my best friends passed along with
permission to distribute to those who might be interested. It fills in the
details that I missed in my original conversation with him and attempted to
relate to you.
Tom has given me permission to distribute the message - please feel free to
post it if you deem it appropriate.
Sincerely,
Art Russell
Major, US Army (Retired)
Message Follows:
Today was a tragedy for all of America and to my family, a very personal
one. Lynn and my Niece Liz's husband, Jeremy Glick was on United flight 93
this morning. When the Hijackers took control of flight 93. Jeremy called
my niece who in-turn conferenced him to 911. Jeremy relayed to the police
what was happening as the hijacking unfolded. As our niece Liz listened,
Jeremy told the police there were three Arab terrorists with knives and a
large red box that they claimed contained a bomb. Jeremy tracked the second
by second details and relayed them to the police by phone. After several
minutes of describing the scene, Jeremy and several other passengers
decided there was nothing to lose by rushing the hijackers. Although United
Flight 93 crashed outside of Pittsburgh, with the loss of all souls. Jeremy
and the other patriotic heroes saved the lives of many people on the ground
that would have died if the Arab terrorists had been able to complete their
heinous mission.
Please offer your prayers for all of those who perished or were injured in
this tragic of all days and to our niece Liz Glick and her 2-month-old
child, Emerson, who are left without their loving Husband and Father. May
we remember Jeremy and the other brave souls as heroes, soldiers and
Americans' on United flight 93 whom so gallantry gave their lives to save
many others.
Lynn, our four adult children and I are headed to New York to be with our
family during this time of great sadness
All of my best,
Tom