<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> < > < The United Phreaker's Incorporated Proudly Presents > < > < Phone Calling To The Future > < > < By: The Lost Avenger > < > < An Upi Production 1990 > < > <><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><> Reprinted In File Form On February 13, 1990 Orignally Publised In Toronto Star Monday February 12, 1990 =============================================================================== PHONE CALLING TO THE FUTURE By Bill Reno SPECIAL TO THE STAR LAS VEGAS - There is no limit to what the telephone can do for a business of any size. Those who do not learn to use the power of voice processing will not survive in tomorrow's marketplace. That was the message that emerged here last month from Infotext 90, a convention for the voice processing industry. Voice processing has grown from a start in 1983 to a billion dollar a year business involving thousands of enterprises. The industry produces computerized information, entertainment and customer services delivered over the world's most pervasive medium: The ordinary telephone. Callers in the U.S. can access a seemingly endless array of services, such as used car prices, legal advice, dating tips, sports scores, job openings and cat lore. Trivia games with cash prizes, fantasy baseball leagues and cross continent personals are some of the more popular phone entertainment offerings. Phone Lines Most of these services were developed by individual suppliers who have knowledge and entertainment concepts to sell and can be reached on pay per call phone lines. Callers are billed the cost of the services by the phone companies, which keep part of the revenue for use of the line and pay the rest to the information provider. Caller pay lines have special number prefixes, the most common being 976, which cover a single area code, and 900, which can be accessed by callers from anywhere in the U.S., except Alaska and Hawaii. Callers to these numbers are all billed the same rate, regardless of the distance of the transmission. A New York based 900 service giving up to the second commodity prices, for example, will cost callers from Manhattan to Seattle precisely the same amount per minute. About 100 services are available on 976 phone lines from Bell Canada in Ontario and Quebec. The majority of the lines are the often controversal adult fantasy lines, which are on the wane in the U.S. because of market saturation. The 900 service is not yet available in Canada, except for automated polling or call count lines, which are actually routed into the U.S. over the AT&T network. Bell plans the introduction of full 900 service in Ontario some time in 1991. Essential links in the delivery system are the telephone service bureaus - agencies which thousands of phone lines from the carriers. The lines are then connected to specialized voice processing computers and re-rented to the information providers, who promote their services to their target audiences, typically through radio and television advertising. Fortunes have been made almost overnight by information providers know in the industry as infopreneurs, who understand what information or entertainment callers will pay for and how best to package and promote it. One dramatic example of sucess in this new industry is Arthur Toll, a former airline executive who founder Gateway Telecommunications in 1987 with two answering machines costing $70 each. Last year his company, which now includes a service bureau, advertising agency, equipment manufactor and media production house, had gross billings of $39 million (U.S.) and is currently the largest provider of 900 services in the U.S. Voice Processing While the voice information industry was launched by individual infopreneurs like Toll, established businesses sre rapidly, and profitably, incorporating voice processing into marketing and customer service programs. Already in wide use is the dealer location service, where callers enter their postal code into their touchtone phone to hear a short advertisment along with the address and phone number of the nearest dealer. Also becoming popular are phone entry contests and product sample request lines. The caller is normally asked to answer a few basic market research questions, which the business uses to build present and potential customer databases. A case study presented at the convention demonstrated how Revlon used a $100,000 (U.S.) phone sweepstakes to stimulate calls to an automated advertising and market research 900 number. Phone Bills Since the callers paid $2 on their phone bills to enter the contest, most of the costs of the program were covered by the entrants themselves. Among the several Canadians attending the convention was Mandle Cheung, president of Computer Talk Technology in Richmond Hill, a major designer and manufacturer of voice processing systems in this country. Cheung was impressed by the inventiveness of Americans in creating new applications, but felt there was nothing to learn from then on the technology side. "Everything the Americans are doing with developing the hardware and software itself, we do as well, in some cases better," Cheung said. "We feel we have more appreciation for how small and medium sized businesses can exploit this exciting new technology." 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