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From: smb@ulysses.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.followup
Subject: Re: Modem Users Beware: BELL $$$
Message-ID: <652@ulysses.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 14-Oct-83 15:25:38 EDT
Article-I.D.: ulysses.652
Posted: Fri Oct 14 15:25:38 1983
Date-Received: Sat, 15-Oct-83 03:48:49 EDT
References: <5480@cornell.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill
Lines: 33

Modems are essentially parasites on the voice phone network.  That is,
the network was designed, engineered, and intended for adequate-quality
voice communication.  Modem design is the art of transforming bits into
whistles, squeaks, and buzzes that have characteristics compatible with
the existing network.  Given that, it also makes sense for the phone
company to build bandwidth-saving devices that operate on the assumption
that speech is what will be carried.

Now -- according to some statements from AT&T that I saw published long
before I joined this august establishment, about 85% of the local loops
are physically capable of carrying 56Kb/sec data -- *if* the terminating
equipment is intended for that purpose.  I suspect that they'll try to
make such services available.  But new services tend to be priced at somewhat
closer to cost than POTS (plain old telephone service) is, which means that
it won't be competitive unless modem users are paying their share.  I should
point out, of course, that "think time" is not idle time for the phone line
with a conventional modem; it's still sending out its normal carrier.
(Incidentally, local loops will not necessarily be dedicated forever.
Technology is at, or close to, the point where multiplexing on a trunk to
a neighborhood makes sense.  Modem can screw that up.)

I'm no fonder than anyone of paying more for phone service.  I had a separate
phone line for my terminal well before I joined Bell Labs, so I know what
it would have been like to pay more on a graduate student budget.  And the
tarriff in question, in Oklahoma, was filed in 1965, when it was reasonable
to make different assumptions about usage patterns.  But it doesn't seem
at all unreasonable to me to levy some surcharge for modem use.

		--Steve Bellovin

Disclaimer:  these opinions are mine, and in no way reflect any policies
or non-policies of ATT, ATT Bell Laboratories, NJ Bell, the FCC, or any
other sentient entities.