Update News for September 2024

Here is a quick run-down on what you will find in this bulletin:

• • The Coming End of Copper Telephone Lines

  • Compulife Sticking With Old School

  • CrowdStrike outage

  • Building Toward Duplicate Web Based Product

  • Our Current Programming Plans for 2024

These topics will be dealt with in more detail throughout this bulletin.

The Coming End of Copper Telephone LinesDo you still have a copper based land line telephone? I do but I know for certain that many people are giving them up.

I can speak to this with some authority as my part time hobby, which I devote a LOT of time to, is political telephone campaigning. During this past year I have called and spoken to thousands of people on matters of political importance. I do so by conducting 4 questions surveys to learn what they believe. By the nature of the questions it also serves to inform them on what I believe are key matters.

I have found that using the telephone is a VERY important way to personally campaign, just as using the telephone was a very important way for me to prospect for life insurance sales when I began selling life insurance in 1979. The skill that I developed doing that has helped me as I use the telephone in political volunteer work.

As you know most people HATE making phone calls to strangers. I remember lots of agents when I sold insurance had “callitis”. They could sit doing nothing, staring at the phone, afraid to pick it up. The fear of rejection was paralyzing their ability to make the next (or first) call. It’s a kind of stage fright. I know that many life insurance agents would rather spend large amounts of money to buy leads than do their own prospecting. But I always wondered why you would pay for fruit in a store when you could just go out and pick your own freely?

Anyway, when I am calling voters, using lists of voters provided by the Republican National Committee (there is another source called i360; in some campaigns I have used both), I have two types of phone numbers provided in the lists: cell phones and land lines. As I call both types of phones there are MANY more BAD land lines (disconnected lines) than there are cell phones. Why are those land line phone numbers bad? That’s simple, because people have dropped their land line. They used to have that phone number, but they no longer have it. Further, the number has NOT been given to someone else because there is a surplus of unused, land line phone numbers. How do I know that? Because in making my phone calls, using my VOIP phone system, I have had to buy dozens of phone numbers and keep them stockpiled. Why, because if you make enough outbound calls to strangers, you eventually get your phone number flagged as spam. The only solution when that happens is to switch to another number. But what happens to your number that was marked spam. I have found that if you allow it to lay fallow for a period of time (not use it) it will eventually lose its spam flag. The spam flag is NOT permanent. By the way, if you have any questions about any of this, feel free to give me a call (888) 798-3488.

So why this mass exodus from copper land lines? It’s very simple. Here in Kentucky the cost of a land line is about $70 per month. Why would you pay for a land line when you already have a cell phone? $70 per month is $800 dollars per year and that’s a lot of money to anyone. A lot of people are giving up their land lines in favor of using their cell phone for ALL their calls; good luck when the battery runs out. I recommend more than one charging option. You can buy “lots” (meaning a group) of charging cables on ebay for very little money. And if you own a lot, you don’t have to play the popular home game “Has anyone seen my charging cable?”.

Having said that, both of Compulife’s toll free lines are copper based. Why? Because I don’t trust the internet or computer technology. Most people have grown to trust both and as a result their lives have become dependent on both to work all the time (and they don’t).

Here’s a quick review of Compulife’s copper lines. The toll free number (800-798-3488) is copper and it reaches Jeremiah at his office (the main U.S. office is in his home). At my office, which is at my home about 30 minutes away, there is still one copper land line that remains and that is the toll free line to my office (888-798-3488).

Our second lines, which we primarily use to call out on, are actually VOIP computer based service provided by Nextiva (there are many different providers). I am VERY impressed with Nextiva’s product, service and software (particularly their software).

The U.S. company’s fax line comes from Jeremiah’s internet service which is through the cable TV company. At this point there is no fiber optic at his home in the country. Jeremiah’s backup internet connection, when the cable service goes down, is Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite dish. That system works surprisingly well even though Starlink has thousands more satellites that they say they need and plan to launch.

My primary internet service is through a fiber optic provider and my secondary internet service is through the same cable TV provider. And yes, I have to periodically switch between the services because one of the services fails. Jeremiah has also lost his primary internet service and when that happens he puts the satellite dish out in the yard, pulls the cable to the house, and he’s back up and running. Usually when he loses internet it’s because there is a power failure but fortunately his home has a propane driven backup home generator (it auto starts when the lights go out) so he can still function when he loses electricity. The problem is the cable TV provider is down without electricity, and that’s when Starlink shines because it runs off the backup power and talks to the internet through the Starlink satellites.

That’s one huge advantage of copper lines, they continue to work when the power goes out. The copper land line system operates on very low voltage, low power consumption and has its own backup system for the power it needs when the lights go out. In fact in the good old days, when there was telephone service where there was no electricity, the systems could be run on large, non-rechargeable battery packs. I remember as a kid being able to buy those batteries as surplus as telephone companies moved away from that power source. Even so, the land line systems have great backup systems and continue to work even when the electricity goes out.

The phone lines we have from the cable company costs ONLY an additional $20 per month over the cost of the internet service. When I took our home phone off copper it saved us about $50 per month. I was also able to transfer the old land line phone number to the internet phone provider, so we still have the same land line number that we have had for decades. It was easy to hook the cable provider’s phone service connection on the modem to the home phone system which made it a simple change. If we were to try to move one of our copper land lines to a web based phone alternative, we will have to deal with the transfer of the toll free number and that makes me VERY nervous as we have had those numbers for almost 3 decades (our Canadian toll free number for almost 4 decades). If it happens, it will be my toll free that is moved first, but I am inclined to avoid that day. If it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.

With so many other people around me dumping their copper land lines, why not save $50 per month and dump my copper land line in favor of an internet service? Good question, but I already gave you the main answer. I do NOT trust the internet and I don’t trust computers. I don’t think you should either but you probably do NOT depend on those services as much as we do and so for you, loss of communication service amounts to an annoyance where for us it is a VITAL part of our ability to do business and serve our customers.

Compulife Sticking With Old SchoolOne of the two things that prompted me to write this part of the bulletin was a phone call I got from our telephone provider who advised us that we could get a great “deal” by switching to their new fiber optic service and use their internet phone system instead of our copper line. I said thanks but no thanks because I still wanted the copper land line and I already had fiber optic from another provider.

The sales person said that eventually the phone company would drop providing the service (SAD) and that when that happened we would have to switch. I pointed out that if we lost the copper service because they quit providing it, that they would lose our business because we had two other internet providers who were already offering phone services and we could just add the phone to one of those services and the copper provider would lose my $70 per month. And I don’t see how they can pull the copper service from Jeremiah, when they have yet to pull fiber optic to his neighborhood.

And just to underline the point that they are planning to end copper service, a few months ago I had a problem and loss of service with the copper provider and I needed them to come out and repair it. The repair guy told me the same story and said the company was doing nothing to keep up the copper infrastructure, only repairing it as they needed to. I told him the same story that I am telling you and I advised him that if the day came when they could no longer provide the copper service our business would simply go elsewhere.

So why my dogged determination to keep that copper line? One word: electricity. Have you noticed that when the electricity goes out you lose all internet and computer based communications? Despite this, the copper land line telephone still works. But doesn’t that service use electricity? Yes it does but it is VERY low voltage, low consumption electricity and that age old service, which has had to endure a LOT of power outages over the many decades in the last century, has a very strong backup system and can continue to operate when the power goes out. In fact at one time, before there was widespread electricity in rural areas, all the old phone systems in the rural areas ran on batteries. I remember as a kid having battery packs that were telephone surplus. They came from phone companies that had replaced the “battery only” systems with electrical services that used rechargeable battery backups.

Feel free to call me an old fashioned, paranoid 70 year old, but I continue to be deeply concerned about having lots of backup methods of communication to ensure that our small software company keeps on delivering our services, both electronic and human, no matter what communication technology fails. We are very committed to continue to make our customers happy that they use Compulife.

On a further side note, it is also why when you call Compulife for technical support, you are not speaking with someone who is hard to understand because of their strong foreign accent and the fact that English is their second language. These are all common things that many companies are doing to save money but these are NOT the things that we are doing or plan to do here at Compulife.

CrowdStrike OutageThe second thing that prompted this discussion, and it was the main thing that prompted the discussion, was the CrowdStrike Outage. In case you missed it, that was a HUGE story.

During July CrowdStrike caused widespread internet failures for many businesses. Did you notice?; many unfortunately did. If you happened to be flying on that day, you didn’t get to fly, you were grounded. Funny how an internet outage can ground your airplane, isn’t it?

The interruption in service, blamed on a flaw in security software that was distributed by the company, was so massive and widespread and affected so many services that the whole debacle now has its very own Wikipedia page. I would encourage you to have a read.

The article underlines how fragile our technological society has become, and how dependent we are on everything working. I have said it many times, but I will repeat it again. It’s not “if” computers are going to fail it’s “when”. The only solution for failure of technology is BACKUP and backup means having a “copy” or “duplicate” system that you can fall back on. For large companies that is almost impossible, and so when something like the CrowdStrike failure occurs they simply shut down.

Providing you have a computer that is independent from the internet, you can still function, you just may not be able to communicate with the internet. You can keep on working.

In the case of CrowdStrike, the failure was internet based, and shut down services for many Windows based, internet applications. The article correctly says:

“Most personal Windows PCs were unaffected, as CrowdStrike’s software is primarily used by organizations. The CrowdStrike software did not provide a way for subscribers to delay the installation of its content files. Computers running macOS and Linux were unaffected, as the problematic content file was only for Windows, but similar problems had affected Linux distributions of CrowdStrike software in April 2024.

More and more individuals are depending on more on more of their basic computer technology services that are web based, meaning that instead of having a computer program on their local PC (like the Compulife’s PC version of our computer program) they are actually running software that they are able to use through an internet connection. Personally, I avoid having to do that whenever I can but most are happily going with the technology trend.

Building Toward Duplicate Web Based ProductOne example of this is Microsoft Office versus Office 365. Office is the suite of Microsoft products that include the “Word” word processing program, and the “Excel” spreadsheet program. These are application I use virtually every day.

Office 365 is the version of the Office software that you can run through the internet. This does not require installation of the Office software on your computer, you simply access the software on their Internet with your browser. From my point of view, thanks but no thanks. Do I really want to rely upon a word processor or spreadsheet program that is going to fail if I can’t get on the internet? Really? Oh, but it’s so much better we are told. If the software is updated, you don’t have to reinstall. You don’t have to worry about security because all of that is taken care of for you. And trust us, you have nothing to worry about. During CrowdStrike outage, that service was down also

It’s a free country and if you want to depend on the internet to use your computer, knock yourself out. And more and more people are quite happy to do that which is why Compulife’s goal and objective, in the coming years, is to have our own web based Compulife Mobile edition evolve and expand to do everything that the PC version of the software does now, so that whether you are running on the web or on your PC, you can do everything the same.

But, from my point of view, if I can do something locally on my own computer, and avoid having to use and rely upon the web, that is what I will do. Adding the web simply adds another layer of computer technology that can fail, and also adds a level of security risk that I can avoid.

Our Current Programming Plans for 2024The following is the current order for new work that we will be doing in 2024:

• • Introduction of New PC Version: CQS.EXE

• • Overhaul Of Current Product Data Files

• Introduction of Compulife Mobile* Plus (with Pick 12)

Anyone with questions about any of these upcoming projects can call Bob Barney to discuss:

Please don’t email me essay questions, just call. If I’m not in, email me your phone number, I’ll call you.

These planned objectives will easily consume our programming time during the balance of this year and throughout 2024. The good news is that once the product data files have been converted, and we have introduced the new CQS.EXE, and upgraded our internet engine to use the new data files, Compulife will be turning its full attention to our web based, Compulife Mobile software. The long term goal is to have a web based product that does everything our PC based software does.