Re: cellphones on planes / AT&T history

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: John Shoch <shoch () alloyventures com>
Date: March 25, 2007 2:39:08 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net, ip () v2 listbox com
Cc: "Mike O'Dell (E-mail)" <modell () nea com>, John Shoch  
<shoch () alloyventures com>
Subject: RE: [IP] cellphones on planes / AT&T history

Dave and Mike,

1.  On a personal basis I certainly share Mike's view that we don't  
need people sitting at our elbow on a plane yelling into cell  
phones.  [When confronted with a cell phone user at an adjacent table  
in a restaurant I often ask the inconsiderate person to step  
outside;  I really like the idea of trying this on a plane....]

I don't now if this will be controlled by FCC policy, airline policy,  
social pressure, or market pressures.  But years ago I liked Morris  
Air (a non-smoking airline) and regularly stayed in the "Non-Smokers  
Inn" in Dallas.
A NYT article from 22 years ago:  http://query.nytimes.com/gst/ 
fullpage.html?sec=travel&res=9E0DE0DB1038F931A3575AC0A962948260

2.  Thus, I have no desire to encourage cell phone use on planes.   
But I also have to remind everyone that, in answer to Mike's  
question, there was a famous "device which does for the mouth what  
earphones do for the ears."

Many people know of the famous Carterfone case, which was about an  
electrical device which connected to the phone -- AT&T tried to ban  
the device, but eventually lost, helping to open up the market for  
third-party phones.  But in 1956 (over 50 years ago, and 12 years  
before Carterfone) there was the Hush-A-Phone case:  sort of a small  
cone or mouthpiece attached to a phone to collect and contain a  
speaker's voice.

Info at:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hush-a-Phone_v._FCC
Pictures at:  http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp? 
NewsNum=301

It's an amusing story:  the Hush-A-Phone started in the 1920's as an  
attachment for a "candle-stick" style phone, and was sold for  
decades;  a later version was an attachment to handsets.  As  
recounted here http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi1222.htm#cite1,  
apparently an AT&T lawyer on his lunch-break saw one in a shop  
window, and decided to sue to stop this unauthorized attachment to a  
phone.  The FCC supported AT&T, but on appeal the case was  
overturned, and the FCC was ordered to allow these "foreign  
attachments."  Thus, an over-eager AT&T lawyer precipitated what many  
view as the first small crack in the AT&T monopoly.

The short decision can be found at:  http://www.cavebear.com/ialc/ 
hush-a-phone.htm.
An excerpt from the ruling:  "To say that a telephone subscriber may  
produce the result in question [**7] by cupping his hand and speaking  
into it, but may not do so by using a device which leaves his hand  
free to write or do whatever else he wishes, is neither just nor  
reasonable. The intervenors' tariffs, under the Commission's  
decision, are in unwarranted interference with the telephone  
subscriber's right reasonably to use his telephone in ways which are  
privately beneficial without being publicly detrimental."

John Shoch
Alloy Ventures

PS:  Another alternative is this Portable Phone Booth:  http:// 
sensoryimpact.com/2005/01/performance-sculpture#more-303


-----Original Message-----
From: David Farber [mailto:dave () farber net]
Sent: Sunday, March 25, 2007 2:53 AM
To: ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: [IP] cellphones on planes

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Mike O'Dell" <mo () ccr org>
Date: March 25, 2007 12:39:34 AM EDT
To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Subject: cellphones on planes

Dave,

Bob Frankston undermines his own point with an extrapolation into the
ridiculous.  It's not about technology or Luddism, it's about polite
behavior in a public space and reasonable concern over the expected
escalation of impoliteness that would result from turning an airliner
into a communal phone booth. The state of "Modern Air Travel" has
already made "Greyhound in the sky" a charitable description of the
experience - the addition of numerous people shouting at invisible
parties would make it seem all the more like The NY Port Authority
Bus Terminal, not merely a bus ride.

I'm sorry if Bob can't imagine being  out of touch for six hours but
he's a victim of his own escalating expectations. Just like FedEx
created institutionalized support for procrastination, the cellphone
has made "not-quite-in-time" planning the norm instead of the rare
exception.

Just because it's no longer considered
conspicuous consumption to have a cellphone, it doesn't follow that
the design of the universe includes the requirement that cellphones
work all the time, everywhere. There are lots of places (outside of
airliners) where cellphones simply don't work, and in some cases,
you put your life at risk believing they do.  (And what will
happen when people discover that airliner cellular systems have
finite capacity and people start getting call failures??)

Heiden's Law seems particularly applicable here:

        "When you want it bad, you get it bad, and
         most people want it in the worst way."
                                - Heidi Heiden

I tell you what - if someone can come up with a device which does
for the mouth what earphones do for the ears*, then I'll reconsider
my view on the notion of a divine right of continuous connectivity.

        -mo

* Earphones let you hear all you want without disturbing anyone else.
The required device would let you talk all you want, likewise.


-------------------------------------------
Archives: http://v2.listbox.com/member/archive/247/@now
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com


-------------------------------------------
Archives: http://v2.listbox.com/member/archive/247/@now
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com