From: floyd@hayes.ims.alaska.edu (Floyd Davidson)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
Subject: Re: Modem tax back
Date: 25 Jul 92 12:39:47 GMT
Organization: not a bit

In article <2527@uswnvg.uswnvg.com> scott@uswnvg.com.UUCP (Scott Eckelman) writes:
>OK, I can hardly pass myself off as a disinterested bystander (US West = 
>regional phone company), but it seems that most people don't understand
>the economics of the telephone network.

I'm not sure either of us, you or I, understands the economics of
the network.  I am sure most people don't.

I'm not unbiased either...  My employer is Alascom, Inc., the
regulated long distance company in Alaska (the *other* regulated
long distance company in the US).

>The amount of equipment installed at an exchange is determined by
>applying statistical analysis to historic calling patterns of the
>various customer types which are connected.   Business lines are 
>expected to make more frequent and longer calls than residences;

Probably just a slip, but it should be shorter calls.  I don't mean
to pick nits here, the difference is important.

>residences generally make more calls in the evening than businesses, etc.
>Using queuing theory, the network engineers plug in the factors of
>call duration, frequency  of calls, and number of customers, and come
>up with the amount of equipment required to serve the anticipated
>load with a reasonable expectation that the customer won't have

The load anticipated here is important.  It is the peak load which
must be provisioned for, and that happens to be almost totally a
function of business users.

Now I'm not so sure about that with a line switch, but it
absolutely is true of a toll switcher.  The exceptions are certain
holidays such as Christmas and Mother's Day which generate loads
much higher than any normal business pattern.  Of course no telco
makes any attempt at provisioning to meet the peak load of those
days...

>to wait for or be denied service.  Tariffs are filed, and rates
>are set based on the cost to provide service and allowable profit.
>Many tariffs are flat-rate service:  you pay $20 per month and
>you can make all of the (local) calls you want.  
>
>Modems change the usage picture a lot.  When I use a modem, it's almost
>always for far longer than if I were using the phone to call a friend.

I can't swear to what happens with line switchers, but with a toll
switch, there just is no perceptable change in the usage picture.
Business uses of modems are essentially the same as business
patterns for voice calls:  many and short.  Non-business use
patterns are also the same:  lower numbers and longer calls
concentrated in the non-business hours well away from the traffic
peaks just before and after the lunch hour.

>If you have lots of customers using modems where they used to 
>use only the phone, the phone company has to purchase more of that
>expensive equipment to insure that _all_ customers continue to receive

I don't think so.  More like they provision to meet the peak
business traffic needs.  At times when the peak non-business
traffic exceeds the business traffic (stated holidays) a very
interesting thing happens that we all like to watch with interest
for any odd peculiarities:  service is degraded due to the
overload.

The results are very interesting, but nobody uses those patterns
for provisioning.

I do think that at some future date, when packetized digital
systems are good enough to be used on domestic trunks (currently
they might be used, but without compression) there is going to
be a significant difference in the effect of modem traffic on
provisioning of trunking between switching sites.  The modem
traffic cannot be compressed but the voice traffic can.  That
will be significant.  But as far as I know there is little or
no current use where it has any significance now.

Floyd
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban