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Grex > Agora56 > #2: General Announcements - Winter 2005/06 | |
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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 253 responses total. |
tod
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response 104 of 253:
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Jan 31 18:36 UTC 2006 |
She stroked out like back in August. Was anybody really keeping tabs?
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rcurl
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response 105 of 253:
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Jan 31 19:28 UTC 2006 |
Probably, many people.
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furs
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response 106 of 253:
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Feb 1 02:17 UTC 2006 |
re 103: only if a tree falls.
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remmers
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response 107 of 253:
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Feb 2 12:01 UTC 2006 |
I wish to announce that as of January 26, 2006, Western Union has closed
its telegraph service. No more telegrams.
http://www.livescience.com/technology/060131_western_union.html
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nharmon
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response 108 of 253:
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Feb 2 12:59 UTC 2006 |
I wonder what Western Union's telegraph service consisted of on January
25th. Perhaps when you sent a telegram, the clerk took your message, and
then e-mailed it to another location, where they would print the message
and deliver.
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keesan
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response 109 of 253:
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Feb 2 15:27 UTC 2006 |
I thought they called and phoned the message to you.
In 1985 FedEX used to have a super-fast option in which they faxed material
to the local office then delivered it to you. They eliminated that. zip
mail?
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rcurl
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response 110 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:02 UTC 2006 |
What is available now for a person to send a written message
person-to-person within a couple of hours, when neither the sender or
recipient have any fax or computer access? Overnight FedEx isn't as fast
as was a telegram. Or is it just that the demand for that has become so
small that such a service is not sustainable?
There is a radio amateur message service that is still in operation, which
uses a format like telegrams, but public access to that is very difficult
except in emergency situations where amateurs have been enlisted to help.
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nharmon
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response 111 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:04 UTC 2006 |
Fax and computer access is hard not to have access to with public
libraries (computer access) and kinkos (fax access).
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jep
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response 112 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:06 UTC 2006 |
An article I saw said that Western Union delivered 20,000 telegrams at
$10 each last year. That's not much business for a company serving the
entire nation.
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rcurl
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response 113 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:44 UTC 2006 |
Re #11: tell us how two people living some distance apart, who do not have
computers or fax machines, can without prior arrangement get a written message
sent by one to the other within an hour or two? Public fax machines and
computers don't help in the delivery of the message.
It's jep's figures in #112 that explain the failure of telegraph service: most
people have better means, but this still leaves a few in the lurch. They will
just have to "get with the program" (literally and figuratively).
"Long distance" telephone service may become another victim. Since we now
have cell phones, and don't make international calls, we never use POTS
long-distance. Even POTS is under some threat. We dropped our second line
since we moved to cable internet. Our daughter doesn't have POTS at all,
relying solely on a cell phone.
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nharmon
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response 114 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:48 UTC 2006 |
How does telegraph work? You tell them the name you want to send to and
they magically know where it goes?
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gull
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response 115 of 253:
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Feb 2 16:57 UTC 2006 |
Re resp:113: Telephone service and Internet service are going to merge.
They already travel over the same circuits in many cases. With VoIP,
this is going to get carried right through to the end user. Cable TV
will take longer to merge, because of its huge bandwidth requirements,
but eventually all your information services are going to arrive on the
same pipe.
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keesan
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response 116 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:10 UTC 2006 |
In parts of the world where people don't all have telephones, telegraph
service is important. I got a few telegrams while living in Macedonia. The
dorm had one phone. The place where I rented a private room did not. Making
long distance calls required a long wait at the post office for the operator
to set it up. That has probably changed, but I doubt everyone has phone
service all over the world. Is there anyone in the US without phone service?
Telegrams were used as greeting cards, not for rapid communication, in the
US.
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marcvh
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response 117 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:13 UTC 2006 |
I would like to announce that there is a difference between a telegraph
and a telegram.
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nharmon
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response 118 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:18 UTC 2006 |
Thanks marc. #114 should be, 'How does a telegram know where to be
delivered?'
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mcnally
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response 119 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:19 UTC 2006 |
re #115: and that "eventually" is closer than many people might think.
For me it's already here and after several months of testing we're
starting to take installation orders from our customers.
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jep
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response 120 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:30 UTC 2006 |
I read a few years ago about a very small town in Louisiana which did
not have phone service up to that point, but had finally had it made
available. I don't know if they were the last place in America to have
phone service. They must have been, since there were articles in major
newspapers about it.
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rcurl
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response 121 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:36 UTC 2006 |
My recollection of telegrams is that they were delivered by phone if the
recipient had a phone, and were delivered by a person to an address
otherwise. In the latter case they came with the strips of paper on which
the message was printed cut and pasted to a delivery form. You can see all
this in old movies... 8^}
Re #115: I wonder how much of an impediment to that will be caused by the
fact that that "pipe" doesn't work in power failures, while POTS still
does? Maybe the cost or convenience advantages of the former will
overwhelm the reliability advantage of the latter: it won't be the first
time that convenience or cost overwhelmed reliability in something. Or,
perhaps cable could also provide power for at least the modem and
associated phone?
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albaugh
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response 122 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:40 UTC 2006 |
Mac IE Dead And Gone
CMP TechWeb 02/01/06
Copyright 2006 CMP Media Inc.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As promised, Microsoft stuck a fork in Internet Explorer for the Mac on
Tuesday, and called it done.
Late last year, the Redmond, Wash.-based developer told Mac users to look for
another browser because it was dropping support and discontinuing downloads
for IE.
On Tuesday, Microsoft posted a notice on its Mactopia Web site that Internet
Explorer for Mac no longer available for downloading.
Microsoft recommended that Mac owners still using IE should migrate to more
recent Web browsing technologies such as Apple's Safari.
That advice may have had some effect. Data from Amsterdam-based Web analytics
vendor OneStat released on Tuesday noted that that Safari use was slightly up,
both within the U.S. and globally. Use of Safari, the number three browser on
most metrics listings, has climbed by about a quarter of a percent in the U.S.
since November.
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tod
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response 123 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:44 UTC 2006 |
re #110
You can still send a message when you send cash via Western Union.
(MoneyGram is cheaper and more global, though.)
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rcurl
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response 124 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:55 UTC 2006 |
I use Firefox (but have Safari installed) on my Macs, but a lot of web sites
are written for only IE compatibility - and only for the most recent IE for
PCs. I have the last IE for Mac, and it doesn't work on all sites. Is this
Microsoft action an indirect attack on the Mac platform?
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twenex
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response 125 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:58 UTC 2006 |
No doubt.
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albaugh
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response 126 of 253:
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Feb 2 17:58 UTC 2006 |
Both, I'd say.
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mcnally
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response 127 of 253:
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Feb 2 18:37 UTC 2006 |
re #120: Depends on what you mean by "have phone service." Do you mean
*any* service at all (such as a shared community phone at a grocery store)
or do you mean residential phone service? Stehekin, WA, was debating the
latter as recently as August of last year:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002419687_stehekin04m.ht
ml
And I'd be willing to bet there are numerous small villages in Alaska that
don't have regular phone service, though they might have radio links for
emergencies.
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gull
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response 128 of 253:
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Feb 2 20:19 UTC 2006 |
Re resp:116: One interesting thing about developing countries that
don't have widely-deployed phone systems is they seem to be skipping
the whole wired phone idea altogether. They're jumping straight from
nothing to cell phones.
Re resp:119: That's very cool. If I were in your service area I'd be
tempted. Comcast just started punishing me for being a loyal customer,
so I'm a bit annoyed with them. (In other words, the six month
promotional "new customer" discount ended, causing my bill to jump by
$30/month.)
Re resp:120: Many commercial PBX systems have battery back-ups. I
imagine the same thing could be provided for residential customers
without too much extra cost.
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