At the end of the regular legislative session last week, key state leaders stood tall and told the phone companies to take a hike.
Now the phone companies are pressuring state leaders to add their special interest legislation to a special session called on school finance.
Please take action to stop this right now by using this link to contact the Texas state leaders!
Victory... first round. (From SaveMuniWireless)
The Texas Legislature has declared sine die: the session is over. HB 789 is dead. Texas has turned its back on special interest legislation to ban muni networks.
There were some tense moments after the conference committee adjourned. The phone company lobbyists refused to admit defeat and continued pushing for their legislation. Now, however, it's beyond the reach of even the powerful telco lobby.
So, we win—for now.
Although we prevailed this time, the struggle continues. Our challenge is to turn this debate around. Rather than battling special interest legislation, we need to develop a true broadband policy that serves the interest of Texas.
Thanks to everybody who has supported us and helped to achieve this remarkable victory. Please stay tuned. There is an awful lot of work to do.
The phone company moves nearly all voice traffic as digital rather than analog signals. Your analog line gets converted to a digital signal by sampling it 8,000 times per second at 8-bit resolution (64,000 bits per second). Nearly all digital data now flows over fiber optic lines, and the phone company uses different designations to talk about the capacity of a fiber optic line.
If your office has a T1 line, it means that the phone company has brought a fiber optic line into your office (a T1 line might also come in on copper). A T1 line can carry 24 digitized voice channels, or it can carry data at a rate of 1.544 megabits per second. If the T1 line is being used for telephone conversations, it plugs into the office's phone system. If it is carrying data it plugs into the network's router.
A T1 line can carry about 192,000 bytes per second -- roughly 60 times more data than a normal residential modem. It is also extremely reliable -- much more reliable than an analog modem. Depending on what they are doing, a T1 line can generally handle quite a few people. For general browsing, hundreds of users are easily able to share a T1 line comfortably. If they are all downloading MP3 files or video files simultaneously it would be a problem, but that still isn't extremely common.
A T1 line might cost between $1,000 and $1,500 per month depending on who provides it and where it goes. The other end of the T1 line needs to be connected to an ISP, and the total cost is a combination of the fee the phone company charges and the fee the ISP charges.
A large company needs something more than a T1 line. The following table shows some of the common line designations:
BellSouth. By any means necessary?
Fighting municipal fiber builds isn't a cause that justifies throwing away all your ethics. Bellsouth's behavior in Louisiana should have consequences throughout the company. When BellSouth's Bob Blau makes a speech in D.C., the respect he's earned is diminished if his company falsifies the truth down south. Some great work from the Lafayette Independent, picked up by David I. and Broadband Reports.
"Engaging in the sleazy business of push polling is a bridge too far for us.... Cox Communications allegedly used the tactic last summer when City-Parish President Joey Durel announced his fiber-to-the home intentions. But this latest incident was the first time that the sponsors behind this type of blatant push polling were immediately identified and we could pin the tail on the donkey. As soon as the push poll started last week, a number of city residents contacted local media when they were dragged through the spin cycle. ...
Consider its dark side. Think about the unsuspecting recipient of a call who believes he or she is actually participating in a genuine and straightforward "information gathering" exchange with the caller. Push polling slyly attempts to switch off our political message "defense filter" by convincing us the purpose of the call is to get our opinion on the topic. But, of course, that's not why they're calling. The greatest danger from the practice is its capacity to spread lies and disinformation about candidates or issues without the perpetrator having to take ownership of the lie. Consider some of the questions from last week's poll:
When negative political advertising runs on TV, as disgusting as it often is, campaign finance laws require disclosure of the source of the ad, and we can measure the disinformation with the credibility of the opposing candidate or camp. Push polling tries to deny us, as voters, the ability to connect the dots between the lie and those who benefit from its telling. It should have no place in Lafayette."
It's time for Duane Ackerman to make sure his company lives up to his ethical standards. Bellsouth already donates too much money to the sleaziest folk in politics, lining up alongside Verizon and SBC with literally millions of dollars.
(Reprinted from ISP Planet.)
Gratis' network of Web sites host advertising offers from a variety of highly rated companies such as Citibank, Blockbuster, AOL, Columbia House and BMG, among others. When a visitor to a Gratis site signs up for an offer from one these advertisers, Gratis is paid by that advertiser for delivering a customer lead. Using those revenues, Gratis pays for the items it gives away.
Gratis' high-quality giveaways are attracting record numbers of new users and, as a result, large businesses are acquiring a steady stream of new customers from the valuable demographic that comprises the Gratis user base. Last year, Gratis was named the 95th fastest growing company in the U.S. in Inc. Magazine's prestigious Inc. 500 ranking.
"In the last five years, Gratis has revolutionized the online customer acquisition sector," Gratis co-founder Peter Martin said. "Online giveaways used to revolve around low-value items such as t-shirts, caps and tote bags. As a result, the level of consumer interest was correspondingly low. We thought there was a better way - one that offered more value to both consumers and to our own customers, the online advertisers."
"Our vision was to increase dramatically the quality and value of free goods available - giving away Apple iPods, flat screen televisions and video game systems, instead of low-value items - and, by doing so, drive radically higher levels of traffic. The concept has proven to work well for our advertisers, who are looking to acquire high-quality new customers, and our users who enjoy getting something really cool for free," Martin said.
Addressing the natural skepticism that exists around "free" offers on the Internet, Gratis co-founder Rob Jewell said it is important to understand how Gratis' business model works. "Gratis succeeds when we attract people to try our advertisers' online offers," he said. "In order to do that, we decided to offer expensive, high-quality, sought-after items to our Web visitors - the things people really want, such as desktop PCs, designer handbags, and gaming systems."
"Our system is simple and straightforward," Jewell said. "For example, to get a free Apple iPod from us, simply go to freeipods.com and register. Try one online offer and refer five friends, each of whom need to try one online offer. When the fifth friend's offer is completed we send you your free iPod. There's nothing complicated about it. Right now, we're sending out between 400 and 600 free iPods every week."
Last year, the City Council in Baltimore faced a budget shortfall so bad that it considered laying off 186 city police officers, reducing some fire department operations and scaling back trash collection. Then it found an untapped honey pot: cellphones.
Starting in August, the city began collecting $3.50 a month from each of Baltimore's 238,000 mobile phone subscribers. The extra income has helped to strengthen the city's finances and is expected to help the city fix up schools and trim the property tax.
"I can't remember the last time we've had such an easy budget year," said Sheila Dixon, the president of the City Council. "The bulk of our taxes come from property tax, but when you can't diversify and the federal and state taxes are drying up, you need other income."
Baltimore is not alone. The city of Springfield, Ore., for example, recently enacted a 5 percent tax on cellphones and land lines, which would help finance a new jail. Residents and utilities opposed to the tax, which is yet to take effect, have forced a referendum to be held on Tuesday.
Dozens of other cities and states have already passed cellphone taxes. Many other states and municipalities, including some in Louisiana and Missouri, are debating similar measures as they compile their budgets for the next fiscal year.
Officials are particularly eager to tax cellphones because the amounts individuals pay each month are small enough to go virtually unnoticed, but in aggregate can be substantial. Cellphone subscribers nationwide paid an estimated $17.8 billion in federal, state and local taxes last year.
But mounting taxes have led wireless companies like Verizon Wireless and Sprint to form unlikely alliances with consumer advocates and tax reformers to fight new city fees. They argue that consumers are taxed twice in states and cities that also impose sales taxes, and that the extra burden is particularly hard on retirees and low-income subscribers and also reduces overall demand for mobile service.
The cellphone taxes, when added to existing federal excise and state sales taxes, as well as fees for 911 service, mean that $8.75, or 16.7 percent, of the average monthly cellphone bill of $52.50 now goes to government agencies - about twice as much as on many other services, according to CTIA-the Wireless Association, a wireless industry trade group. While cellphone subscribers in New York, Connecticut and New Jersey pay some of the highest tax rates in the country, the states do not levy a wireless-only sales tax.
The carriers say they do not oppose collecting taxes on behalf of governments, but they object to being subject to special taxes as tobacco and alcohol are.
"We have no problem with the revenue needs of the localities," said Steven Zipperstein, general counsel for Verizon Wireless. "But we have a big problem that a certain class of customers or services should be singled out for excessive taxation."
Cingular Wireless, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile filed a lawsuit in February in Maryland Tax Court against Baltimore and Montgomery County, which has its own wireless tax. They contend the cellphone fee is effectively a sales tax, which only the state has the right to impose.
They also say that cities have no authority to collect taxes on services consumed outside their borders, noting that many of the cellphone calls made in Baltimore go outside the city limits.
"Some portion of what they are taxing is outside their boundaries, so it's defective for that reason," said Kenneth H. Silverberg, a lawyer at Nixon Peabody, the firm representing the carriers.
Others have joined the move to repeal the fee. At least one Baltimore councilman wants to exempt senior citizens from the wireless tax. Progressive Maryland, a nonprofit group that promotes "pro-working-family legislation," said Maryland lawmakers should raise the corporate tax and scale back taxes on consumers.
"When you have a thriving corporate sector paying less and less tax, the taxes get foisted on working and middle-class families," said Tom Hucker, executive director of the group.
The National Black Caucus of State Legislators called on state and local governments last December to roll back taxes, including flat taxes, on wireless services because they "disproportionately burden low-income, low-volume cellular telephone subscribers."
But a Baltimore municipal spokeswoman said the city felt it was on firm ground. The telecommunication tax was "crafted and implemented with the expectation that it would stand up to a legal challenge," said the spokeswoman, Raquel Guillory.
The tussle over the right to levy taxes on wireless services comes as phone providers and federal regulators struggle with how technology is changing the meaning of a phone call. Some lawmakers argue that to encourage the spread of new technology, new services should not be taxed as heavily as traditional ones. Others, intent on cutting and streamlining local taxes, want to limit the power of states and cities to introduce their own special fees.
Yet city councils and state lawmakers with budget holes to plug argue that "a phone call is a phone call," regardless of how it is placed. With consumers increasingly using cellphones instead of land lines, local governments are eager to start taxing wireless services just as they have taxed traditional phone lines for years.
In Baltimore, the $3.50 tax on cellphones extends to land lines as well. Businesses operating multiple phone extensions also pay 35 cents a line. Under the previous tax structure, the city charged a 12 percent tax only on land lines.
By moving to a flat fee for all phones, the city expects to raise $26.1 million in the fiscal year ending June 30, double what it received under the old formula. Of that total, $8.81 million, or 34 percent, will probably come from cellphone users, money the city did not receive before.
To be sure, the expanded phone tax is only one reason the city's finances have improved. Baltimore also nearly doubled its tax to record deeds and it expanded fees on utilities. The property market has also been booming in the area.
The income generated by Baltimore's broader phone tax has become a model for other cash-short cities. Council members in Portland, Ore., are debating whether to include cellphones for the first time in the city's utility license fee on phones. Cities in Missouri as well as the state legislature are considering similar measures.
Wireless companies point to Pennsylvania as a state with lofty taxes on cellular services. In 2003, lawmakers there extended the 5 percent gross receipts tax on land lines to include mobile phones. That tax goes on top of a 6 percent statewide sales tax.
Some cities in the state, like Philadelphia, have general sales taxes, too. Cellphone subscribers also pay into a fund for an emergency response system for wireless users. And then there is the federal excise tax of 3 percent. In all, taxes make up 19.05 percent of the average monthly wireless bill in Pennsylvania, one of the highest levels in the country.
Some state and local lawmakers are already thinking beyond cellphones. One idea is to create a uniform use tax that covers all forms of telecommunications: land lines, mobile phones, Internet-based phones, high-speed data lines and programming provided by cable and satellite companies. By spreading the tax to services like satellite television, which are subject to very little city or county taxes, the fees on phone services could be lowered.
"We've had a tax system based on technology as a utility for almost 60 years," said Steven J. Rauschenberger, a state senator from Illinois and the president-elect of the National Conference of State Legislators. "But with the convergence of technology, we need to rethink the system."
ACC Business hosted its first-ever award luncheon at the Channel Partners Conference & Expo.
On March 15, the company recognized the top 2 percent of its sales agents for their 2004 productivity. The top 1 percent — eight master agents — won 2004 Platinum Cup Awards, while the remaining winners received 2004 Outstanding Sales Achievement Awards.
 Back row left to right : Michael Heath, JD Baker, Steve Gerhardt, Bill Mansfield, Bill Pino; Sitting: Brent Saxon; Front row left to right: Frank McGuire, Vince Bradley Curtis Roth, Joe Petretee, Sandra Butler Buchanon, Ben Ho  Adam Edwards of Telarus with ACC's Ben Ho |
“For years we’ve worked closely with agents to improve the value of our products and services to help them succeed,” said John Baker, president and CEO of ACC Business. This formula has been a real success, so we’re proud to be recognizing their hard work and celebrating our mutual success.”
The following master agents are 2004 ACC Business Platinum Award Winners and received an engraved champagne chiller, a bottle of Perrier Jouet with matching flutes, and a token monetary gift: Simplify Telcom, Infolink Communications, Intelisys Corp., Technology Brokerage Group, Worldnet Communications, MicroCorp, Telarus and US Telebrokers.
ACC Business also gave out its 2004 Sales Achievement Awards to 10 more top selling agents. Each of these winners received ACC Business award plaques, also engraved with their agency’s name: Northwest W.A.N., Telcel Communication, DM Enterprise Group, Network Management, Global First Communications, Gemini Communication, On Track Communi-cations, Utility Management Solutions, World Telecom Group and The Rockland Group.
Ben Ho, ACC Business national sales director, presented all of the awards, flanked by ACC Business’ Baker. Also representing AT&T at the event were Michael Heath, president of select accounts and indirect channels; Celine Azizkhan, channel chief; and Rob Dapkiewicz, marketing vice president of select markets.
“I was delighted to be able to recognize nearly 150 of our agents and, in particular, celebrate the success of our top 2 percent who performed spectacularly in 2004. We have a win-win relationship with these agents that we’re very respectful of,” said Ho.
ACC Business said more than 150 of its agents and channel partners took part in the luncheon.
By David Piscitello, President, Core Competence, Inc. (From WatchGuard LiveSecurity Updates)
Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) is still the most widely used Web browser. The majority of Web-based spyware infestations also target IE. While critics and experts can debate whether this is due to sloppy code and inherent flaws in IE, or abuse of a well-intentioned program customization called the Browser Helper Object (BHO), you have more important concerns. For security's sake, any network administrator must decide whether to deploy an alternative Web browser, or to minimize the organization's exposure by locking down IE and deploying spyware countermeasures.
Dump Internet Explorer?Frustrated with spyware and a seemingly endless stream of security patches, many users are choosing an alternative Web browser. Browsers such as Mozilla/Firefox, DeepNet Explorer, and Opera natively support many attractive features:
These browsers don't support BHOs and are thus immune to browser hurtful objects, the "spyware" BHOs that hijack home pages, favorites, and search engines. Various antispyware software vendors claim to detect and block an estimated tens of thousands of spyware variants responsible for hijacking, URL tracking, and intrusive advertising. BHOs and rogue toolbars that plug into IE account for approximately one thousand of these pests and parasites.
Alternative browsers claim to be more secure than IE. Firefox bases this claim on the success of the Mozilla project specifically, and open source policy in general (see "Release early, release often"). Opera was designed from the beginning with security in mind, and doesn't support ActiveX controls. The DeepNet Explorer renders HTML just like IE, but doesn't support BHOs. However, none has proven immune to bugs, so as an administrator, you must weigh the strengths and weaknesses of each contender as they affect your organization.
Consider other factors before you commit to converting your organization to a new browser:
The answers to these questions might force the conclusion, "Let's stick with IE." If so, then your next step is to deploy it as securely as possible.
Five steps to a more secure IE configurationDraw from the accumulated experience of others who combat spyware, and implement these measures to protect your IE users:
Maintain IE Patch Currency. As exploit paths and vulnerabilities are identified in IE, patch as early as possible to eliminate them. Investigate central patch management solutions. If you must leave patch management in the hands of your users, make certain they understand the consequences of neglecting this critical process. If your users are responsible for patching, conduct regular audits to ensure they are keeping up with patches.
Improve your (IE) Zone Defense. You can adjust settings for IE's security zone so that you maintain a secure and productive user experience for your organization. But doing so is not as simple as consumer anti-spyware pages (CyberCoyote.org, SpywareInfo.com) suggest. If your business applications are developed by .NET partners who do not sign components with Authenticode, or your users routinely visit business partner sites that use ActiveX components, your IE security configuration must allow access to these particular components. In such situations, make use of IE's Trusted Zones and include these sites as reputable and trustworthy.
Assess your organization's needs, and develop an IE security policy that meets the security-usability requirements of your organization. If you use Active Directory, use the Group Policy Object Editor to create an "IE configuration" GPO. Configure your IE policy under User Configuration => Windows Settings => Internet Explorer Maintenance => Security; then link the GPO to the appropriate organizational units.
Block Ad Server Domain Names. Several anti-spyware activists maintain lists of known adware server sites and domains. If you block a spyware agent from communicating with its ad servers once the agent lands on your network (assuming it manages to elude your other countermeasures), you negate the impact of that spyware. Add known spyware/adware servers to the Blocked Sites lists at your Firebox. Use a hosts file or DNS to resolve the adware hostnames to local host (127.0.0.1); or, use a registry script like IE-SPYAD to incorporate these into the IE Restricted Sites list. Here again, if you use Active Directory, you can include this countermeasure in a GPO.
Hamstring hijackers. Take advantage of the software developed to identify and block malicious BHOs. Be aware that some BHOs have legitimate purposes. Examples of legitimate and useful BHOs are privacy preference clients like AT&T Privacy Bird P3P Client, Citibank's Virtual Account Software, Yahoo! Companion, certain toolbars and Web accelerators. If you want to give your users some flexibility in their browser look-and-feel, run BHOlist on a sampling of the PCs in your organization. Identify any legitimate BHOs and toolbars used by your organization, and compose an Approved BHO List. Install anti-spyware software that provides browser hijack protection at each client. Configure blocked exceptions for all approved BHOs on your list. Free and donateware such as the tandem applications SpywareGuard and SpywareBlaster, Ad-Aware, or SpyBot Search&Destroy are widely acknowledged as legitimate, effective alternatives to commercial anti-spyware software for the budget-impaired.
Try a different cup of Java. Recent flaws exposed in Microsoft's Java Virtual Machine prompt some anti-spyware experts to suggest using Sun's VM instead. Before you choose to uninstall Microsoft's Java VM, be certain this decision meets the organization's long term objectives. If, for example, you are going to migrate from Java/J2EE to a .NET framework, and will eventually disable Java entirely, is this step necessary? Do any business applications needed by your organization require a specific version of JVM?
ConclusionInternet Explorer has its share of problems, and you may conclude your organization is better off with an alternative Web browser. But your organization doesn't have to be easy prey for spyware. With some planning, you can implement appropriate measures to minimize your IE-related spyware vulnerability profile. Switching browsers or locking IE down are both valid options. Doing nothing is not. ##
Further ReadingSpyware Risk: It's Time to "Get Smart"
Spyware Remediation: It's Not "Mission Impossible"
Dave's Spyware and Anti-Spyware Resources
The Internet Explorer Answer: "Have a Freaking Clue" (exclusive interview with Tim Mullen from BlackHat 2004)
If you would look at the shares of Verizon this morning, you would come to a conclusion - VZ is the biggest phone company in the US. Well, that is just not true. At the end of first quarter 2005, SBC is the largest baby bell company. Yes, that’s right - bigger than Verizon, which for some odd reason gets more props on Wall Street than SBC. “I am challenging anyone to justify the 25% premium enjoyed by VZ shares relative to SBC,” says Dan Berninger, senior analyst with Tier1 Research. Maybe because Verizon made more money this quarter than SBC? ($1.8 billion versus $885 million for SBC?)
Still Dan’s argument is quite valid. In an apple-to-apple comparison, Verizon’s 1Q-2005 revenue was $18.18 billion, while SBC came in at $18.34 billion. As an aside, the two companies have roughly the same number of local access lines -Verizon 52.2 million and SBC 52 million. Verizon’s proportional share of wireless customers, is 25 million or 55% of 45.45 million, while SBC’s 60 percent share of Cingular’s 50.4 million brings the company 30.2 million wireless customers. Verizon has 3.9 million DSL customers, SBC has 5.6 million. Verizon has 18 million long distance customers, while SBC has 22 million. High capacity data revenues: Verizon $2.1 billion versus SBC $2.8 billion.
Techdirt on Verizon Wireless’ killer quarter. More from Om Malik.
| # of Simultaneous Calls | Voice Traffic | T1 Bandwidth | Cable/DSL Bandwidth | Cable/DSL Bandwidth |
| Using G729 | Kbs | 1500 | 500 | 350 |
| 1 | 40 | 1460 | 460 | 310 |
| 2 | 80 | 1420 | 420 | 270 |
| 3 | 120 | 1380 | 380 | 230 |
| 4 | 160 | 1340 | 340 | 190 |
| 5 | 200 | 1300 | 300 | 150 |
| 6 | 240 | 1260 | 260 | 110 |
| 7 | 280 | 1220 | 220 | 70 |
| 8 | 320 | 1180 | 180 | 30 |
| 9 | 360 | 1140 | 140 | -10 |
| 10 | 400 | 1100 | 100 | -50 |
| 11 | 440 | 1060 | 60 | -90 |
| 12 | 480 | 1020 | 20 | -130 |
| 13 | 520 | 980 | -20 | -170 |
| 14 | 560 | 940 | -60 | -210 |
| 15 | 600 | 900 | -100 | -250 |
| 16 | 640 | 860 | -140 | -290 |
| 17 | 680 | 820 | -180 | -330 |
| 18 | 720 | 780 | -220 | -370 |
| 19 | 760 | 740 | -260 | -410 |
| 20 | 800 | 700 | -300 | -450 |
| 21 | 840 | 660 | -340 | -490 |
| 22 | 880 | 620 | -380 | -530 |
| 23 | 920 | 580 | -420 | -570 |
| 24 | 960 | 540 | -460 | -610 |
| # of Simultaneous Calls | Voice Traffic | T1 Bandwidth | Cable/DSL Bandwidth | Cable/DSL Bandwidth |
| Using G711 | Kbs | 1500 | 500 | 350 |
| 1 | 96 | 1404 | 404 | 254 |
| 2 | 192 | 1308 | 308 | 158 |
| 3 | 288 | 1212 | 212 | 62 |
| 4 | 384 | 1116 | 116 | -34 |
| 5 | 480 | 1020 | 20 | -130 |
| 6 | 576 | 924 | -76 | -226 |
| 7 | 672 | 828 | -172 | -322 |
| 8 | 768 | 732 | -268 | -418 |
| 9 | 864 | 636 | -364 | -514 |
| 10 | 960 | 540 | -460 | -610 |
| 11 | 1056 | 444 | -556 | -706 |
| 12 | 1152 | 348 | -652 | -802 |
| 13 | 1248 | 252 | -748 | -898 |
| 14 | 1344 | 156 | -844 | -994 |
| 15 | 1440 | 60 | -940 | -1090 |
| 16 | 1536 | -36 | -1036 | -1186 |
| 17 | 1632 | -132 | -1132 | -1282 |
| 18 | 1728 | -228 | -1228 | -1378 |
| 19 | 1824 | -324 | -1324 | -1474 |
| 20 | 1920 | -420 | -1420 | -1570 |
| 21 | 2016 | -516 | -1516 | -1666 |
| 22 | 2112 | -612 | -1612 | -1762 |
| 23 | 2208 | -708 | -1708 | -1858 |
| 24 | 2304 | -804 | -1804 | -1954 |
The phone company moves nearly all voice traffic as digital rather than analog signals. Your analog line gets converted to a digital signal by sampling it 8,000 times per second at 8-bit resolution (64,000 bits per second). Nearly all digital data now flows over fiber optic lines, and the phone company uses different designations to talk about the capacity of a fiber optic line.
If your office has a T1 line, it means that the phone company has brought a fiber optic line into your office (a T1 line might also come in on copper). A T1 line can carry 24 digitized voice channels, or it can carry data at a rate of 1.544 megabits per second. If the T1 line is being used for telephone conversations, it plugs into the office's phone system. If it is carrying data it plugs into the network's router.
A T1 line can carry about 192,000 bytes per second -- roughly 60 times more data than a normal residential modem. It is also extremely reliable -- much more reliable than an analog modem. Depending on what they are doing, a T1 line can generally handle quite a few people. For general browsing, hundreds of users are easily able to share a T1 line comfortably. If they are all downloading MP3 files or video files simultaneously it would be a problem, but that still isn't extremely common.
A T1 line might cost between $400 and $1,500 per month depending on who provides it and where it goes. The other end of the T1 line needs to be connected to an ISP, and the total cost is a combination of the fee the phone company charges and the fee the ISP charges.
A large company needs something more than a T1 line. The following table shows some of the common line designations:
ACTION ALERT
The Texas Legislature could make it illegal for towns to set up broadband networks. Texas House Bill 789 currently is being heard by the House Committee on Regulated Industries. One small provision buried in this 330-page bill outlaws municipal networks.
The big phone companies have been fighting to control who provides broadband. We must let the committee know that the ban on muni networks must be dropped. Broadband is too important to leave in the hands of a few special interests.
For more information on the effort to support municipal broadband, visit http://savemuniwireless.org/
Take action now to support increased choice for broadband. Please send your state representatives the following message:
Remove all restrictions on municipal broadband from HB 789. Texans want more broadband choices, not fewer. Every Texas community deserves the right to decide how best to build its critical infrastructure.
Here is what you can do.
Action in 30 Seconds: Notify your Representatives
Take action now. Consumers Union has provided a one-click web form that will send your message to your state representatives.
Visit http://cu.convio.net/savetexascommunityinternet
The form provides a boilerplate message. You may edit the form and write your own message. Please ask your representative:
Remove all restrictions on municipal broadband from HB 789. Texans want more broadband choices, not fewer. Every Texas community deserves the right to decide how best to build its critical infrastructure.
If you have time for nothing else, send that form.
If you have the time to contact your representative directly, by phone or by fax, that is most effective. You can find the contact information for your representative here: http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/fyi/fyi.htm
Contact Regulated Industries Chair and Committee Members
The House Committee on Regulated Industries is preparing a watered-down replacement of the anti-muni language. All indications show that the replacement will still offer the big phone companies a veto over municipal projects. Action is required now to let the committee know it should strike the muni restrictions completely.
If your state representative sits on the committee, please contact them and let them know you are a constituent who opposes limitations on municipal broadband.
Contact committee chair and bill author Rep. Phil King, and let him know that you oppose limitations on municipal broadband.
The representatives on this committee are:
| State Representative | Phone | Fax | District | Counties Represented |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rep. Phil King (chair) | 512-463-0738 | 512-463-1957 | 61 | Parker, Wise |
| Rep. Robert "Bob" Hunter (vice chair) | 512-463-0718 | 512-463-6244 | 71 | Nolan, Taylor |
| Rep. Sylvester Turner | 512-463-0554 | 512-463-8380 | 139 | Harris (central) |
| Rep. Todd Baxter | 512-463-0631 | 512-236-1065 | 48 | Travis (northwest) |
| Rep. Robby Cook | 512-463-0682 | 512-463-9955 | 17 | Bastrop, Brazos (part), Burleson, Colorado, Fayette, Lee |
| Rep. Joe Crabb | 512-463-0520 | 512-463-5896 | 127 | Harris (east) |
| Rep. Will Hartnett | 512-463-0576 | 512-463-7827 | 114 | Dallas (part) |
Let Us Know
If you send a letter or fax to your representatives, please send us a copy of your letter so we can track who has been contacted. You can send copies either by email to info@savemuniwireless.org or by fax to 815-301-8302. If you receive a response, please let us know.
Yesterday, a revised version of HB 789 was released. The section that outlaws community Internet (72KB PDF) has been changed, largely in response to objections like ours. The changes camouflage around the prohibitions, without addressing the real problem.
One change actually broadens the ban to cover even more services. The original ban primarily protected the large phone companies. The revision extends further protections to the large cable providers.
The bill adds some small exceptions. New provisions will allow free public hotspots under limited circumstances. The change would allow the city to light up a library, but not a downtown block.
Exceptions are added for a number of obvious services, such as permitting e-government services and allowing libraries to charge out-of-area visitors to use their facilities. The presence of these ridiculous exceptions validates our claim that the ban is harmful and overly broad. It also illustrates the folly of this approach. The bill fails to exempt on-line library catalogs, for instance, so presumably the Austin Public Library would need to shut down that service.
The changes open up just one provision for community Internet. Municipalities will be allowed to setup networks to support "economic development activities" providing that specific legislation authorizes the project.
We expect the committee will hold a hearing on this new language in the next few days. It is important that we all contact them before then and let them know we want the community Internet ban removed completely.
According to Redwood City, Calif.-based messaging filtering firm Postini, DHAs were launched by spammers at a crippling rate.
"February was the worst month ever for DHAs," said Andrew Lochart, the director of product marketing for Postini, in a statement. "In fact, the five worst days ever recorded by Postini were in February."
The average Postini customer, added Lochart, was attacked 224 times per day during the month, with each attack comprising an average of 166 invalid message delivery attempts.
"That total of 37,184 invalid delivery attempts per day could have crippled customer e-mail servers if left unchecked," Lochart said.
In a DHA, a spammer guesses e-mail addresses until he gets some right, then harvests those valid addresses to use in later spam campaigns.
During 2004, Postini's clients were attacked by an average of 150 DHAs per day. February's rate, while not the 300 percent increase of 2004's average over 2003's, was an impressive rise of 50 percent over 2004's monthly average.
"[DHAs] will become more severe, as spammers turn to harvesting because they're finding it harder to locate valid addresses in other ways," said Chris Smith, the marketing director at Postini in an earlier interview.
In other security news, Postini said that spam accounted for 88 percent of February's e-mail, a number unchanged from the previous month, and noted that the Netsky worm took infamous honors as the month's most prominent e-mailed malware, easily beating Bagle by a factor of 2 to 1.
Anti-virus vendors, however, disagreed with Postini's take. Sophos, for example, claimed that Zafi.d was the most commonly-seen virus during February, accounting for 31 percent of the malicious code spotted. Netsky.p, which has remained in the top 5 of most such lists since its debut a year ago, took second on Sophos' list at 22 percent.
Moscow-based Kaspersky Labs followed Sophos' lead by naming Zafi as the most prominent worm of the month (22 percent) with Netsky second (18 percent).
