The Greenville journal. [volume] (Greenville, Ohio) 1850-1918, 1908-08-13
A TELEPHONE CALL,
French Subscribers Protest
Against State Service.

Service.
From day to day the telephone crisis
grows worse. In spite of the promises
Of the administration, the subscribers
have experienced no notable improve
ment In the wretched telephone serv-
Ice. Nor does the future appear any
more promising than the present.
The Association of Telephone Sub
scribers has now been at work for
four years. and no one can accuse it
of having lacked in good will, pa
tience and disinterestedness. We have
studied the telephone question in place
Of an administration asleep in routine.
With the assistance of eminent spe-
ciallsts of France and foreign coun-
tries we have established a programme
Of reform.
This programme NJ. Berard promised
TO study. but he only eluded the ques-
ton and made the subscribers source
Of ridicule. His successor, NJ Simyan,
has studied the problem, having recog-
nized its utility and urgency. and
adopted it entirely in principle. I'm
fortunately the draft of law which he
presented is absolutely imperfect and
lnapplicable, due both to the wording
and to the opposition that the propc-
sition has already met in the chamber
and the systematic hostility of the adj
ministration.
Again, parliament by itself is power
less to reform the telephone service
and to put on foot a rational and CO.
herent project. for the administration
will not furnish the necessary informa-
tiOn.
We thus have a complete failure of
reform.
To be patient any longer in the pres
ence Of this lamentable failure of the
administration is impossible. An ener-
getic and radical remedy is necessary
for an anarchic situation. We do not
any longer care for promises which are
| never fulfilled and which after four
years of delay and waiting end In to-
tai ruin.
| Our telephone service continues from
bad to worse. Our instruments are
|
make us the laughingstock of the
civilized world.
AS a matter of fact, the state is alb
solutely powerless to exploit the tele-
phone, a most delicate business and
one of a peculiar nature.
The State Is Incapable From Finan-
caI Point of View.
To provide a telephone service Suf-
fcient for present needs and to assist
its future for Paris as well as the
provinces many hundreds Of millions
of francs will be required.
The financial requirements and
budget appropriations will not permit
the state to make such an effort.
Again, the proposition now before
the government calls for only $S,4OO,-
900 in six annual payments. One might
as we'll throw a drop of water into the
ocean.
The State Is Incapable From Tech
nicaI Point of View.
The state has proved its inetficiency
| to rapidly put on foot rational and
practical plan Of reform. The slow
ness and complication of administra-
tive routine, the inertia of the bureau
Gratis, do not permit of timely and
thorough adoption Of improvements
realized by science. BY the time it
has been decided to install a new sys-
tenn it Is already old and has been re-
placed by another.
The State Is Incapable on Account of
the Personnel.
The state can neither choose nor suit
ably direct the personnel charged with
this extremely delicate work required
for repairing the apparatus and giving
exchange connections.
The recruiting is made by recommen-
dation.
The personnel is disgusted at the
shameless favortism which crops out
at every point
Under such conditions we need not
be astoniShed if the work is incOm-
petent.
The State Is incompetent From a
Commercial Point of View.
The state has neither commercial
nor industrial aptitude. 1t is equally
ignorant of the cost price and the re-
turns of the telephone service. The
personnel, life employees, advance au-
tomatically and are not interested in
the development and efficiency of the
service.
Instead Of trying to increase its pat
bn nIn mi iStr
thing possible to drive away new sub
scribers.
What would we think of a merchant
who should be afraid of having too
many patrons?
These are the causes Of the failures
Of the administration. and there is but
one remedy:
The telephone can only be reorgan-
ized with the aid of private industry.
Up to the present we had not pro-
posed this solution. We still treasured
the illusion of the reform which the
government could make. We had 10y
ally tried to collaborate with it, to
calm the enraged subscribers Today,
after the last and striking avowal Of
inefficiency which the administration
has given, the measure Is Overflowing
Therefore the state needs the CO.
operation of private industry to solve
the telephone question.
Only private industry can raise
without difficulty the necessary capital
and within two or three years furnish
telephone service equivalent to pres
ent needs. Only private industry.
which has not its hands tied by a red
taped bureaucracy, can rapidly exc
cute programme of reform. Only