Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!dandelion.CI.COM!david
From: david@dandelion.CI.COM (David Watson)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: "Party" lines
Message-ID: <8805042117.AA21998@dandelion.CI.COM>
Date: 4 May 88 21:16:59 GMT
Sender: daemon@bloom-beacon.MIT.EDU
Organization: The Internet
Lines: 57
Approved: telecom@xx.lcs.mit.edu


Here in the Boston area, we have at least several 1-550- numbers which
interconnect their callers, including "teen", "party", and "fantasy"
lines.  The cost is 20 cents for the first minute; 10 cents per
minute thereafter.  I'm not interested in participating in the
controversy over the content available on some of these lines; this is
probably the wrong group for that discussion anyway.  I am, however,
curious about how they work, and would like to hear from someone who has
facts about the way they are implemented.

When your call to one of these services succeeds, you hear a recorded
message describing the rate structure and the purpose of the particular
line.  Then your call is assigned to one of a number of groups of about
eight callers whose conversations are arbitrated by some gain control
circuitry so that you generally hear only one person speak at once.
There is sometimes a human "moderator" whose function is to check in on
each conversation and bump any callers bothering the rest of the
"cluster".  A beep tone sounds every ten minutes.

What's the history of these services?  What is their official name?  Did
they suddenly spring into existence after the AT&T breakup?

What is the nature of the arrangement between the providers of these
services and the telephone companies?  What percentage of the generated
revenue do these businesses collect -- or are they phone-company
operated in the first place?

The number of eight-caller "clusters" seems to vary dynamically -- what
determines the number of clusters?

What technology is at the moderators' disposal?  Can they re-assign a
caller to a different cluster, for example?  Are they responsible for
enabling and disabling clusters?  How do they keep track of the number
of lines in use, and who is abusing them?  What is the ratio of
moderators to clusters?

Is it a common arrangement that the 550 exchange in every area code is
reserved for this type of service?

How many of these services are there in, for example, New York? Chicago?
Boston? How about rural areas?

Is there an equivalent type of service accessible nationwide?

Are there comprehensive lists of these services?

Will ISDN (if it ever becomes prevalent in the home) drastically alter these
capabilities, perhaps opening up new business opportunities?

I apologize if these questions have been covered here before, but a good
description of this class of phone service would be interesting.
Pointers to articles would also be welcome.

			Thanks,
			 -David Watson (david@dandelion.ci.com)
			  Cognition, Inc.
			  Billerica, MA