Re: Comparing 800 Number/TLD Shared Database

["andi payn" <payn@null.net>]

There seem to be at least three issues here, some of which does have an
analogy with the gTLD-MoU system.

First, Bellcore, who operate the shared number repository, had direct
financial ties to--in fact was owned by--the RBOCs. The RBOCs were among the
customers of the repository, which gave them significant advantages over the
other customers (who are not also owners). This is partly because they were
the initial players (well, collectively they were part of the single initial
player), and partly because many of the smaller competitors were too busy
fighting to keep ownership of their own tiny pieces of the pie than fighting
for an appropriate share in the newly-distributed pie.

Second, Bellcore operates as a monopoly, and as a for-profit company; only
the US Government's regulatory oversight has prevented them from continually
ripping off all of the rest of the players in the system.

Third, there were two types of clients involved--the local telephone service
companies, who until recently only read the database; long distance
telephone service companies, who both read and wrote the database; and pure
800-number providers and other specialty companies, who only wrote to the
database. Clearly, the regulation issues were more complicated than the
regulators initially suspected--since the vast majority of local telephone
service is carried by the RBOCs, who owned BellCore, it was in BellCore's
(indirect) interest to subsidize lookup costs by overcharging for storage
costs.

Fourth, there are various ill-defined assets whose value and ownership is
ill-defined. Bellcore was able to profit from managing the SMS800 system by
acting as if they owned something of value, and was then able to claim that
they owned nothing when they expected to be ordered to divest themselves of
the asset they'd been profiting from.

So how does this impact the DNS issue? Good question. Here's my best guess
as to the parallels for the issues above in terms of DNS, especially the
gTLD-MoU system (since that's what the poster was talking about).

Under the gTLD-MoU system, CORE, a non-profit corporation made up of
registrars, would o

>For all of you who are interested in the Shared Repository/Shared Database
>idea for DNS, I am reposting a Small Telephone Company's viewpoint of how
>well Bellcore's Shared 800 Number Repository works. And how much it
>fosters competition, or rather, doesn't.
>
>I hope that gTLD-MoU supporters will take serious note of this article,
>and seek to address issues of similarity between the two systems.
>
>I do not suggest by posting this that I think that 800 Numbers and DNS are
>roughly equivalent, or analogous or anything like that. I suggest that the
>shared 800 Number Database is similar in theory to a Shared TLD Database,
>and I urge extreme caution if we are to proceed with the formation of
>CORE.
>
>CORE will become a non-profit Swiss Association, this is well understood.
>It will, however, have a MONOPOLY over generic TLD space. This should be
>well understood!
>
>Keep in mind, as you read this article that both Bellcore and NSI are
>recent SAIC acquisitions (Bellcore is not approved yet). This does not
>bode well for any possibilities of the US Government extending NSI's
>contract, especially if it were to be the entitiy to create the Shared
>Database (instead of CORE creating it). There is no suggestion that this
>will occur, but in this time of great uncertainty, no one knows what will
>really happen.
>
>Keep in mind, as well, this article is from the perspective of the Small
>Telco, and I believe that the issues raised here are similar to one's that
>will be raised by the Small ISPs who are forced to deal with
>CORE/CORE-registrars for SLDs in shared name space.
>
>Beware.
>
>Robert T. Nelson
>President, INTERNOC(tm)
>the internetwork operating company, inc.
>+1.210.299.4662
>rnelson@internoc.com
>
>P.S. I have posted this profusely, pre-apologies for those of you who get
>sick of it...where's that procmail message-id filter, J.D.? ;-> Please
>trim Cc: where possible and appropriate on replies.
>
>
>====== Reprinted with Permission from Author ==========================
>
>This discussion is Beehive CEO's - monthly column as found on the last
>page of Americas Network magazine. It has been printing his letters for
>nearly 20 years. This column will remain posted till he writes the next
>one.
>
>This column is an update on the Beehive/Bellcore disagreement thats been
>boiling for the last three years.
>
>The e-mail thanked me for a grandiose refund of overcharges by Bellcore.
>
>You're welcome.
>
>Cash Cow
>========
>Bellcore and I have been squabbling over their rates and business promises
>for years. To put an end to it, last year Bellcore came in and took all
>10,000 of Beehive customer 800 numbers. Put us out of the 800 business.
>Those numbers are now - by Federal Court Order - frozen for use by
>anybody. Except for the 200 not disconnected at the moment the Federal
>Court Judge ordered Bellcore to "stop" taking the numbers.
>
>I got mad. The question is, has all the dirt we've dug up cost the BOC
>operating companies that cool $57.7 mil that they are now giving back from
>admitted overcharges? And how much goes from the BOC to BOC?
>
>WHAT EQUITY?
>============
>
>I've said for years that the BOC have been getting cheaper rates for use
>of the 800 signaling system than my little company pays. It goes like
>this: The BOCs own Bellcore. Bellcore designed and operates the SMS 800
>system. Everyone is forced to use it to route 800 calls to the network.
>Folks like Beehive who had an operating 800 system could no longer depend
>on our in house system(s) unless we paid tribute to Bellcore. And Bellcore
>charged big bucks to store numbers in their computers and smaller bucks to
>access the data. Profits returned to the owners of Bellcore were said to
>be in the order of seven million dollars per month
>
>If you own the monopoly store that makes profits such that even the owners
>pay retail, the owners are, in fact, getting the service cheaper --
>through profits -- than we non-owners. The former high school coach who
>runs the SMS data base "team" says he does what the BOC Board of Directors
>tells him to do: earn money.
>
>But, Congress, in the 1996 Telecommunications Act, said that such a cozy
>relationship as the SMS800 operation or number portability, cannot be
>operated by an interested party
>
>Yes! The BOC cash cow had to be got rid of.
>
>So a buyer was found. The SMS800 team began to distance themselves from
>the BOC's and Bellcore not only in anticipation of the sale, but also to
>reduce the publicity of my court filings about the secretive ways they
>operate, plus the huge profits being paid to their BOC owners.
>
>Before the deal could be consummated, the FCC said Bellcore had to return
>those excess charges. At least one Bell complained that nobody said the
>BOCs had to operate the system for free. Another said everyone booked the
>costs of creating the SMS800 deal as an expense at the time, so how could
>they justify any fees but operational costs? Interesting point.
>
>Bellcore said the FCC had to approve a waiver before Bellcore could return
>the money. (Yet the coach told me "no way he could settle with Beehive,"
>because "tariffs" prohibited change and a settlement would require FCC
>approval! (A matter of scale, I suppose.)
>
>In May, the FCC said Bellcore could give back some of the overcharges. In
>a letter to all Resborgs from "the SMS management team", Bellcore styled
>the return of $57.7 Million as a "variance". They also said the "team" was
>"delighted... and pleased" to refund the overcharges.
>
>Sure they were.
>
>Although the sale to SAIC is said to be a done deal, the lady is not to
>sing until this fall. As of June 12, Bellcore said it is nothing more than
>a "software" house and doesn't have anything to do with the SMS/800
>management team operation. "A software house?" So who owns the team? More
>than a few folk wonder if the sale includes fat license fees for the over
>200,000 lines of C+ software and its continued use to operate the SMS800
>system?
>
>Can software tippy toe in the tulips?
>=====================================
>
>Is there a connection that the same 800 programming/hardware methods be
>used for local number portability (LNP)? As suggested in this column last
>month in July 1, might it be better to adopt the Microsoft Internet
>proposal as cheaper and more suited to the future? One regulatory engineer
>opines that because now that the cow is out of the barn with BOC contracts
>already let, there is nothing that can be done to change the path taken by
>the BOCs in their "compliance" with FCC demands for LNP before the end of
>the 3rd quarter.
>
>Our industry is firmly clutching antiquity as we madly go over the
>precipice down to the future.
>
>Copyright 1997 by A. W. Brothers and Americas Network magazine. All rights
>reserved.
>
>=========================================
>
>Thanks again to Art Brothers for granting permission to reprint this on
>the Internet.
>
>
>