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To: limtex who wrote (51672)	11/24/1999 3:42:00 PM
From: SpudFarmer	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Sorry to butt in. This is just a wild guess, but, I doubt it has as much to do with the providers as it does the FBI and FCC. Any guesses?

To: limtex who wrote (51672)	11/24/1999 9:20:00 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 152472

*Saved again by the FBI* Spudfarmer must have the answer. Prepaid sales must be to identified individuals with names, addresses, photo ID so that the spooks can listen in to what they say. It is illegal in the USA to have a private conversation. That's to ensure it remains the land of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Some of the old-fashioned among us don't think that's freedom, but in '1984' and 'Alice In Wonderland' that idea would go down well. Does the FBI publish their scorecard of how many successful intercepts they've had where criminals have been convicted of property or personal attack crimes? I doubt it. They'd find the cost of what they do far exceeds the benefits. All of us who are not criminals want desperately for every criminal to be captured at lowest cost and incarcerated, [preferably forever]. The cost/benefit analysis would look ugly. In New Zealand, we wander into a shop, plunk down NZ$150 [US$75] and walk straight out with a phone. No ID needed. Just fill in the warranty stuff [the contract is with the person buying the phone]. For that US$75, you get US$50 free minutes an Alcatel [or some other models]. No requirement to use it for any period. You can chuck it in the rubbish as you walk out of the shop and owe them nothing. Minimum payments are US$5 per month to top-up the account. Minutes cost US25c per minute off-peak and weekends/holidays and they now have '3 day weekends' as a deal. During the day [7am to 7pm] it's US60c per minute. You take the phone home, dial the number, 729 or something, and do over the air activation which takes I guess 5 minutes. Pretty simple. Short messaging and all that stuff is free. Caller ID. Voice messages cost 10c a minute to collect. This is another way in which the USA lags behind the rest of us. The FBI would say it puts you streets ahead. But we haven't had any Oklahoma bombings, school yard murderings, Waco mass killings, or other stuff. We get the odd schizophrenic lose their mind and kill those around them. Also some gratuitous violence and murder from disaffected young males. It must cost a LOT of phone sales in the USA. Queues alone would put people off. There should be 6 packs of ThinPhones on sale, prepaid, so families could put them under the Xmas tree. If there were, sales would zoom like crazy. Calling party pays will help too. Until then, people will just have to scratch their heads, wondering why the USA uses cellphones less than Europeans despite a huge per capita income, and blame it on the free market with many standards. The problem is really the USA government monopoly. Mqurice