“Unless the FCC sharpens its outreach, thousands of people who are deaf may be left without functionally equivalent phone service…”

The above quote is the opening line from a great article on last Friday’s workshop on the registration deadline for making relay calls. I believe the title “Outreach Woes Persist as TRS Transition to 10-Digit Numbers Looms” is apt.

I got permission to share with you a copy of the article. You can download the article here.

Readers will remember my recent post on this issue which was put up just before the workshop. You can also download the document that we distributed at the workshop.

The FCC is hosting a workshop this morning to “find ways to get consumers to register before the November 12 deadline.”

You can read the FCC announcement of the workshop here.

In preparing for the workshop, Purple has identified the most critical issues regarding the Ten-Digit process. You can download a copy of our document here.

We are most concerned about the low number of registered users for text relay users–and the fact that they will be cut off from access to relay services after the deadline. Our document also include information on the various efforts we have taken to help people understand the importance of registering for a local ten digit number especially if they use text relay. We hope the FCC will do more to address this critical issue.

Today I will be doing an experiment–I will try to tweet live updates from the workshop. If you already have a Twitter account, you can follow me at @kelbybrick. If you don’t, you can track me at www.twitter.com/kelbybrick.

As always, we would love feedback from you–whether it is on the FCC workshop, our document or my live updates.

Click here to download Purple’s Petition asking for clarification

Click here to download Tony Coehlo’s letter

Click here to download consumer organizations’ letter

Click here to download Purple’s Ex Parte (summary of meetings with FCC)