AMEN BROTHER!!!!!

-----Original Message-----
From: "Jason Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <asterisk-biz@lists.digium.com>
Cc:
Date: Thu, 21 Apr 2005 01:12:42 -0400
Subject: [Asterisk-biz] FW: 911 Legislation

Hey. I want to give my customers 911 service. Truly I do. My customer’s safety is important to me. Before we go legislating lets make sure we are on a level playing field by:

Open access to the ALI databases to providers that can provide a reliable interface and stop sole-sourcing in to the ILECs.

Open access to central listing and stop sole-sourcing to the ILECs.

I went to OM2Tech, they first told me 250.00 to set up, then 250.00 min monthly, plus .25 per DID, that was a small price to pay. Then I open up shop, call them, ready to go, then they tell me it’s going to be a little more than double. No problem, I don’t care, I want to provide my customers with the service.

Now, they tell me, sorry, BellSouth WILL NOT ALLOW THIS. So I call Intrado (BellSouth’s contractor for the ALI) who tells me sure I can do it, 4500 DOLLARS SET UP, and 3500 DOLLARS MIN MONTHLY, .50 PER DID.

Now I ask you, what kind of crap is this? I called my representative, the Hon. Tom Feeney, whose assistants informed me sorry, they don’t have anything they can tell me.

If you are going to break the monopoly, BREAK THE DAMNED MONOPOLY. You cannot have Chairman Powell stand there and encourage us to innovate and create and then tell us you have to buy 911 service from the ILEC at a price none of us can afford without a major investment. That won’t even begin to break even for which in my case would be over a year at least to get 7000 subs, and that would be with a lot of luck. Realistically, my goal was 1500 subs residential this year and 50 biz subs.

Once again, I want to offer 911 to my customers. Give me the tools. Heck I would gladly eat 2 bucks a month to provide 911 service just as a matter of public safety…I was considering that I could do a cost of 4 bucks a month and eat two. But here we are, I guess I tell me customers that no, I don’t have 911 service. But why? Vonage and Packet 8 do? Do they really or is it Level 3’s 911 call center?

The big companies get away with this crap thanks to major vulture capital investment that allows them to hire armies of lawyers and lobbyists and ridiculous sums of advertising. You want innovation? Level the damned playing field. There is a need for people like me that actually answer the phone for my customers. There is a need for people like me that actually fix a customer problem immediately. There is a need for people like me who actually get the billing right and don’t BS the customer. If you legislate 911, fine, give everyone equal access to the ALI and listings. Otherwise, what have you really accomplished? Give the consumers a choice between the ILEC that loves to trample and screw their customers and the MegaVoip company that just doesn’t have to provide ANY level of service at all?

That is not promoting innovation, ideas, and competition. Of course, that’s not the job of the US Congress anymore. The job of the US Congress is to do exactly what the highest contributors and most influential lobbyists ask of them. Guess what gang…they could give a rats you-know-what about “competition”

</rant>

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