We are a group of retrotechnologists devoted to older telecoms, and we are seeking to form a properly structured non-profit organization for the purpose of building and operating a local-scale, community-driven GSM/2G cellular phone network in San Diego county, starting with the town of Ramona. Additionally, we are also fighting for full preservation of copper-based POTS (analog land line) and ISDN services, including full preservation of the local 5ESS switch in Ramona, and making contingency plans to rescue that legacy equipment and operate it ourselves in the event that CPUC allows AT&T to withdraw.
If you are someone who would like to advance from lamentation to action, we invite you to join our planning meetings! Are you infuriated that T-Mobile artificially blocks new (non-grandfathered) customers from accessing their still-functional legacy 2G network? Or if you are lucky to be one of those grandfathered 2G customers, are you frustrated that the quality of the service has degraded to an atrocious level? If so, you are in the right place: come to our meeting, and start transforming our vision for a new community-based GSM/2G network into reality.
In addition to GSM, we also warmly welcome discussions about analog land lines (POTS), ISDN and TDM transport - basically all legacy circuit-switched telecom technologies centered around transport of toll-quality narrowband voice are welcome here. If AT&T get their way and withdraw from providing POTS and related services, we must NOT allow them to throw their 5ESS switch in the trash - instead we MUST rescue that equipment and operate it ourselves, becoming the new land line phone operator in Ramona to take the place vacated by AT&T. All necessary contingency planning needs to begin now - so please join our meetings.
About your organizer: this effort is led by a freelance professional telecommunications engineer with decades of experience in both wireline and wireless telecoms, particularly in "retro" telecom technologies that are unloved by today's corporate overlords.
