🚀 go-pugleaf

smr <me@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>On 5/29/2013 12:13 AM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>smr <me@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>>>On 5/28/2013 6:14 PM, Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>>>smr <me@shawnritchie.com> wrote:
>>>>>On 5/28/2013 4:05 PM, Cydrome Leader wrote:
>>>>>>Mark Anderson <mea@nospambradnylion.com> wrote:
>>>>>>>bje@ripco.com says...

>>>>>>>>Sprint seems to cater to the high-end, where unlimited everything
>>>>>>>>is more important than competitive pricing. Even their "family
>>>>>>>>plans" are hard to swallow.

>>>>>>>Pagepluscellular.com has unlimited pricing plans that seem reasonable
>>>>>>>and no contract.  I have been using them for almost 4 years now.  Since
>>>>>>>I hate talking on the telephone I keep to the pay as you go minutes and

>>>>>>I'm going to guess you have nobody to talk to in the first place.

>>>>>>I don't want to try to port my number which I like over to rats&rodents
>>>>>>cellullar.biz

>>>>>>Has anybody ported a cell number to google voice and then back again, if
>>>>>>this is even possible?

>>>>>>I do have a work phone, which sucks, but is free.

>>>>>Porting is law. You can port your number whichever and whenever the fuck
>>>>>many times you want to, assuming the accounts you're porting away from
>>>>>are in good standing.

>>>>>I have ported numbers to and fro Google Voice without issue.

>>>>Mandatory participation in porting is required in some instances, but
>>>>not others. Porting participation is definitely NOT mandatory with VoIP.
>>>>VoIP isn't even regulated by FCC in most instances, although it is
>>>>with cable.

>>>>Google Voice might indeed choose to drop out of porting without regulatory
>>>>consequence.

>>>Sort of; VoIP carriers _are_ now covered by the FCC regulations for LNP.
>>>The problem is that Google refuses to acknowledge that they are one as
>>>such. So you're correct that they could opt to not honor a port-out
>>>request, but I think it would be somewhat suicidal of them to do so.
>>>There are no examples of them refusing to do so "just because" to date.

>>Google Voice may not be a carrier at all. The numbers themselves are
>>from bandwidth.com, which is the CLEC, not Google Voice (from the
>>traffic routing lists).

>>I admit I'm not familiar with this. Which FCC order requires VoIP to
>>participate in LNP generally?

>FCC 07-188 and 09-41, from 2007 and 2009, respectively.

All right, I'll read it. Thank you.

>Google argues that they're not even an interconnected carrier, and, 
>depending on how you read the rules, they actually don't meet at least 
>two of the four criteria the FCC itself proposes for that definition. 
>That said, their underlying CLEC is absolutely under the FCC LNP regs 
>and it would be really, REALLY fuckin' dumb for either organization to 
>decide "Welp, we're not honoring port-outs anymore!".

I have no idea what makes bandwidth.com a CLEC either. As far as I know,
they aren't a Google subsidiary. They sure as hell own no switches. I believe
their business model is making available phone numbers in any rate center
(or as many as possible) that many VoIP would assign to their customers.
Despite their name, they undoubtably buy the bandwidth to the equipment
cabinent in the central office serving the rate center from Global Crossing
or one of the others, and don't provide it themselves. Their main business
seems to be virtual PBXs for medium-sized businesses and some large ones.

I guess operating a switch isn't a prerequisite for being a CLEC.

I'm also guessing that FCC wrote regulations lacking legal authority of
the Telecom Act, which sure as hell didn't anticipate VoIP.

Tell me any of my guesses are wrong.

Look, Mark: The topic drifted. Somehow I found it was possible to change
Subject to reflect topic drift AND stay on the some topic in followup
to shawn.