In Precarious Battle tells how labour broking was defeated in the South African Post Office (SAPO). Labour broking has become synonymous with worker exploitation. By 2011, a third of SAPO’s workforce was employed through labour brokers. These ‘casuals’ worked alongside permanent employees, some for over a decade, but for a quarter of the salary.

David Dickinson shares the story of how labour broking provided cheap and compliant labour, and how the use of labour brokers in SAPO divided the workplace and the workforce. He charts the attempts of casuals to organise within the law and how their efforts were defeated at every turn. He describes the increasing ferocity of the wildcat strikes that followed and explains how eventually 294 casuals, the Mabarete, fought their own battle and ended labour broking.

This book reflects on how labour broking created misery for those trapped in precarious employment, how the Constitution failed casual workers and how the South African industrial relations system is unravelling.

EU Telecommunications Law provides a comprehensive overview of the current European regulatory framework as it applies to telecommunications and examines the challenges facing regulators in this sector. Key chapters focus on the selection of appropriate regulatory models that serve to encourage effective investment in next-generation networks and ensure their successful deployment. Andrej Savin provides an up to date overview of all the relevant sources, guiding the reader through these disparate materials in a simple and systematized way. In particular, the book provides analysis of the 2016 proposal for a European Electronic Communications Code (EECC). Using the 2009 Regulatory Framework on electronic communications as a basis the author analyses each of the 2009 framework?s five main directives, comparing them with the changes proposed in the EECC. Providing a comprehensive introduction to the main areas of EU telecoms regulation, this book will be of great value to telecoms and IT lawyers. It will also appeal to academics carrying out research in IT law or competition law as it relates to IT and telecoms.

EU Telecommunications Law provides a comprehensive overview of the current European regulatory framework as it applies to telecommunications and examines the challenges facing regulators in this sector. Key chapters focus on the selection of appropriate regulatory models that serve to encourage effective investment in next-generation networks and ensure their successful deployment. Andrej Savin provides an up to date overview of all the relevant sources, guiding the reader through these disparate materials in a simple and systematized way. In particular, the book provides analysis of the 2016 proposal for a European Electronic Communications Code (EECC). Using the 2009 Regulatory Framework on electronic communications as a basis the author analyses each of the 2009 framework?s five main directives, comparing them with the changes proposed in the EECC. Providing a comprehensive introduction to the main areas of EU telecoms regulation, this book will be of great value to telecoms and IT lawyers. It will also appeal to academics carrying out research in IT law or competition law as it relates to IT and telecoms.

During the early modern period the public postal systems became central pillars of the emerging public sphere. Despite the importance of the post in the transformation of communication, commerce and culture, little has been known about the functioning of the post or how it affected the lives of its users and their societies. In Postal culture in Europe, 1500-1800, Jay Caplan provides the first historical and cultural analysis of the practical conditions of letter-exchange at the dawn of the modern age. Caplan opens his analysis by exploring the economic, political, social and existential interests that were invested in the postal service, and traces the history of the three main European postal systems of the era, the Thurn and Taxis, the French Royal Post and the British Post Office. He then explores how the post worked, from the folding and sealing of letters to their collection, sorting, and transportation. Beyond providing service to the general public, these systems also furnished early modern states with substantial revenue and effective surveillance tools in the form of the Black Cabinets or Black Chambers. Caplan explains how postal services highlighted the tension between state power and the emerging concept of the free individual, with rights to private communication outside the public sphere. Postal systems therefore affected how letter writers and readers conceived and expressed themselves as individuals, which the author demonstrates through an examination of the correspondence of Voltaire and Rousseau, not merely as texts but as communicative acts. Ultimately, Jay Caplan provides readers with both a comprehensive overview of the changes wrought by the newly-public postal system - from the sounds that one heard to the perception of time and distance - and a thought provoking account of the expectations and desires that have led to our culture of instant communication.

"Ninety-nine percent of Filipinos are waiting for a telephone and the other one percent for a dial tone." - Lee Kuan Yew, November 1992. A decade after the above quote, far reaching reforms in the telecommunications sector has dramatically changed the situation in both the Philippines and Malaysia. By looking at the institutions and actors that drove these changes, this book examines state capacity, market reform, and rent-seeking in the two countries. In doing so, the study challenges conventional depictions of the Malaysian and Philippine states. It contends that despite the weakness of the Philippine state, reform occurred through a coalition that out-manoeuvred vested interests. In Malaysia, although considered a strong state, patronage and rent-seeking played key roles in policy adoption and implementation. The study also demonstrates how the nature of groups supporting reform shapes policy implementation and its outcomes. Finally, while liberalisation removes monopoly rent, this book shows that it can also create other types of rents.

Because the wireless industry is less capital intensive than others sectors in the telecommunications marketplace, it is expected to enjoy continued profitability. With survival at stake, telecommunications companies must ready themselves for battle to win access and operations rights in the wireless communications spectrum. This book maps out the strategies required to fight this battle by explaining how a telecommunications company should structure its entry and operations in the spectrum.

Western and Central Europe contains both strong established and new, emerging markets for US and European mobile communications companies. This book is a comprehensive analysis of the current status and future integration prospects in these markets, with clear, in-depth explanations of standards, regulations and technology. Markets are identified and compared, showing where future growth will happen and when.

Broadband technology is ushering the telecom industry through a unique period of change with profound business implications for suppliers and users. This single source describes the four major broadband technologies that are shaping telecommunications networks: frame relay; optical fiber (including SONET); distributed queue dual bus (DQDB); and asynchronous transfer mode (ATM).

Combines four approaches to the subject: the reporting of newsworthy developments, the analysis of these developments, the synthesis of decisions and events occurring over widely dispersed areas, and the author's judgment and opinion about the significance of these events. Chapters discuss the indus

This book examines and compares policy making in telecommunications in Britain and France over the last three decades. The book examines questions related to liberalization, regulation and the role of the nation state in an increasingly international economy.

This work describes all aspects of service provision, from the definition of customer need to the day-to-day techniques of managing customer satisfaction. It includes guidelines for negotiating a service level agreement, methods for understanding the customer's requirements, and the identification of key issues associated with help-desks and customer assistance centres. The book is intended for IT and telecommunications managers, service suppliers, system architects, designers and help-desk staff in businesses using networks and communications services to achieve high level services.

This superb introduction examines all aspects of implementation from concept to reality, and spells out the pros, cons, and effects of EDI in your organization. The cost of EDI hardware, software, training, transmission, and maintenance are broken down and clearly explained to prevent problems and maximize benefits. Checklists and procedural guidelines are also offered to ease your EDI transition -- so that you're never left with a system you can't put online quickly and efficiently.

Offers synthesized information on the rapidly evolving technology of digital cellular radio, including historical development, current status, and future trends of the mobile telephone field.

As the Internet revolution continues to unfold and transform telecommunications, pressure is building for faster, less expensive, and more widely accessible broadband service. Such a development would facilitate improved and less expensive traditional applications such as voice telephony and web browsing. It would also enable new and useful applications such as Internet-based television, videoconferencing, and software distribution. Broadband has great potential to improve efficiency and productivity, even to improve national security in some cases. Broadband service and affordability, however, have consistently lagged well behind demand and progress in information technology, with damaging results. The Internet revolution remains incomplete and threatens to stagnate if the situation continues. In The Broadband Problem, economist and technology entrepreneur Charles H. Ferguson explains the causes and ramifications of this damaging bottleneck, and he offers suggestions on improving the current state of affairs. He asserts that current telecommunications law and policy have not provided sufficient levels of new entry, competition, and innovation in the local telecom market. The continuing dominance of ILECs (incumbent local exchange carriers) in that market impedes the healthy, and much-needed, development of an efficient broadband market. The result of these policy and market failures is inadequate technological progress, innovation, and productivity in advanced Internet services and telecommunication services generally. The broadband problem is holding us back, and thus must be addressed and solved. With this important volume, Charles Ferguson has contributed mightily to that mission.

This book provides a comparative study of the telecommunication reform process in three Central American countries - Costa Rica, Guatemala and Honduras - focusing on the roles of the local private sector and international financial institutions. By addressing the following questions, the book aims to understand the potential for the emergence of an autonomous and inclusive regulatory state: * What has been the main driving force behind the wave of privatizations in Latin America? * What has been the role of the international financial institutions (IFIs)? * What kind of state emerges after privatization and regulatory reform? * Why does privatization remain so unpopular? The author discusses the historical role of telecommunications in state power, the sources of proposed, failed and implemented reforms, and the political processes determining their destiny. Benedicte Bull concludes that the reform processes in the three countries show significant variation. This is accounted for - not by the different relationship to the IFIs, but by the different relationships between the state and the private sector. The impact of this on the reform process is also the key to understanding the state's capacity for post-reform regulation and the unpopularity of privatization. Academics and students with an interest in Latin American studies, international political economy, comparative politics and development studies will find this book of great appeal.

Telecommunications Regulation examines the background to regulation and the work of the regulator. It discusses typical regulatory rules and the legal and administrative framework for regulation, and looks at regulatory strategies, market structures and approaches to price control. The book includes a number of case studies which show how regulators engage with such topical issues as interconnection and loop unbundling, and also features technical coverage of both numbering and number portability. Finally, it looks at new products and services such as virtual network operators, intelligent networks, radio spectrum and next generation networks, and considers the impact these might have on the future of regulation. A comprehensive, in-depth guide to the subject, this book will be a valuable resource for engineers and managers in the industry, as well as lawyers and economists needing an insight into current telecommunications regulation.

The comprehensive postal test-prep guide that delivers through rain, sleet, and snow

Now that the U.S. Postal Service has replaced its obsolete 470 test with the updated and more difficult 473 and 473C hiring exams, you need this book more than ever if you want to qualify for employment. It's packed with timed, skill-building drills to help you answer questions faster and more accurately.

Hardbound. Telematics in Education provides readers with an exciting examination of the use of computer based communication technologies within education. Discussion ranges from whether new forms of teaching and learning involving telematics can replace existing methods, to how far collaborative learning can take place through telematics.The authors consider the possible implications for psychological and organisational issues in education and how an increased use of telematics could radically alter the relationship between education and society.

Delivers a conceptual overview of call centres - the products that support them, the designs that make them work and the ongoing management that is required for their successful operation.

Hardbound. The convergence of telecommunications, mass media and computer technologies has brought spectacular developments of ubiquitous intelligent interconnected systems. In the course of these evolutionary changes, debate and policy has swung again towards privatization, deregulation and increased reliance upon competition. Nevertheless, the underlying and powerful role of new information continues to bring so much restructuring and organizational change, that a reassessment of ideas about competition in this dynamic context, is essential. The aim of this volume is to provide an update of research and policy debates in this important field. An international perspective is provided with contributions from academic, business and governmental communities. The volume will be invaluable to researchers in telecommunications and information activities; decision-makers in industry, government and regulatory fields; consultants; and information service provide