Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!mcsun!unido!fauern!ira.uka.de!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!spool.mu.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!magnus.ircc.ohio-state.edu!csn!alumni.colorado.edu!wouk
From: wouk@alumni.colorado.edu (Arthur Wouk)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Subject: Re: Big Brother charging for modem use?
Message-ID: <1991Mar2.023716.13851@csn.org>
Date: 2 Mar 91 02:37:16 GMT
References: <7X9kw3w163w@bluemoon.uucp>
Sender: news@csn.org (news)
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Lines: 84
Nntp-Posting-Host: alumni.colorado.edu

In article <7X9kw3w163w@bluemoon.uucp> cmcurtin@bluemoon.uucp (Matthew Curtin) writes:
>Greetings!
>
>I've been hearing roumors about the FCC charging us EXTRA for using modems 
>(as opposed to just using voice).  How could the FCC regulate this, as it 
>seems to me that the phone companies alone would be responsible for this.
>
>If this is true, this is certainly just a scheme by some beaurocrat to 
>make an extra buck and hinder us from communicating with each other in 
>this manner.  What could be done to stop it?
>

i would like to comment on this matter based on my knowledge gained
from being in a company that was bought out by a telephone company
(GTE) over 30 years ago.  (i didn't stay around toolong after thast.)

the principle on which telephone service works is that of
'concentration'. it is too expensive to run a single line from each
terminal point ((telephone, ...)  to the switching center and hence pn
th the network. instead, local concentrators exist to serve a given
number of phones (say 10) on the basis that not more than one of them
will need service at any one time. actually this is an obvious
oversimplification, but it makes the point. these concentrators again
may be concentrated one or more times before reaching the switching
station. at the switching station you enter the world of trunk lines
with much capacity,  but again based on a predicted usage level.


the point of this is, the physical plant is based on a specific
predicted utilization level, based on a well established pattern of
utilization by different types of users: home, business, etc.

since business use is very heavy, it is harder to reduce the number of
lines used to provide a given level of service, so more physical lines
need to be run from the terminus on in through the concentraters. this
is very expensive, and busnesses pay more for phone use for that
reason.

home use is much lighter, and the degree of concentration possible is
greater. so the introcution of a modem into residential areas 
provides a very different type of load to the system than a person to
person phone call. i for instance, tend to log in for from 10 minutes
to two hours at a time. this degrades the service offered to others on
my concentrator, since i tie up one its outgoing lines very
significantly.

in a sense this is the sort of phenomenon which makes family people
tend to have a dedicated line for their computers. the same queing
problems for a single line lead to immense dissatisfaction in the
household, because of the degraded service to the non-modem user!

anyway, as you can see, if you introduce this perturbation to the
service demand, the phone company will have to make more capital
investment to provide the same level of service to the other users on
your concentrator. 

now, the FCC enters because it has jurisdiction of rate setting in
certain case, while the state utilities commission has similar duties
in other cases.  the point is that we modem users are free loading on
a system designed for the usual distribution of personal phone
calls. i would not be surprised if some ruling from some government
agency doesn't eventually force us to pay extra for the extra demands
which we make. in order for that to be done a rather complicated
analysis of the distibution of modem based uses had to be mnade. for
instance, if we use uucp from 2am to 3am for regular downloads, we
don't really pose an extra system load. if we try to run for several
hours on mother's day, for instance, we make things very difficult.
so it is hard to judge what the extra cost really is.

now: this all could change if a fiber optic line was used for service
all the way down to the household level, or even say to the first
concentrator level. the huge capacity of such lines would make the
whole discussion above irrelevant.  but the cost of running fiber
optics so far down the tree of the system might make ALL phone service
too expensive for most people. i really can't guess about that.

so don't blame the phone companies so much, and think about what we do
as partially freeloading on others. since i happen to be retired, most
of my usage occurs at a time when my neighbors are all away at work,
so i don't believe that i downgrade their service significantly. can
you say the same?
-- 
arthur wouk 
internet: wouk@cs.colorado.edu