Long Beach Show

There will be a large show taking place at the Long Beach Convention Center in downtown Long Beach, California. The show dates are Thursday September 11 though Sunday September 14. There will be several hundred dealers, among them a number of phonecard dealers, including Steve Eyer, Ginnie Katchur, Carson City King, and USA Cards. In past shows, there have been other dealers set up as well. While this show can be classified as a coin show, it does have a lot to offer phonecard collectors. USA Cards always produces a show commemorative issue, the last show card had Marilyn Monroe. A few phonecard collectors and dealers will be getting together for dinner after the Thursday show (7:00 pm) so if you are in the area, stop by the show, and join us for dinner. You can e-mail me for details on that.

PCM Report Stops Publishing?

From a posted message on CompuServe’s Telecard Forum:

"We at PCM Report Magazine want to Thank all of you for the past 2 1/2 years of support. However, at this time we have decided to stop publication on a monthly basis and possibly do a quarterly magazine.

Effectively next week we will actively update the PCM WEB SITE on a timely basis and create a whole new section called New and Newsworthy Cards which we will show the card and if we know what dealer is handling the card, we will also list them.

The Price List will be updated and published on the Web Site.

Thank You again for all your support."

Sid Bashover, PCM Report.

Score Board in Stock Trouble

SCORE BOARD said it received a temporary exception from Nasdaq's lisiting criteria allowing its common stock to remain trading through October 15 under the new ticker symbol "BSBLC." The marketer of sports and entertainments products failed to meet Nasdaq's net tangible assets requirement today, but received a temporay exception, which expires October 15, subject to its meeting certain conditions. The company said it believed it can meet these conditions and remain listed on Nasdaq.

Smart Cards in the News

SEATTLE, Sept. 3 /PRNewswire/ -- The Global Chipcard Alliance (GCA), announced that member organizations U S WEST Communications, GTE (NYSE:GTE) and Bell Canada joined forces to provide total customer service for their North American smart card customers. This agreement covers the North American continent, making it the broadest smart card interoperability initiative in the world to date.

The U S WEST Telecard, GTE Smart Card and the Canadian Bell QuickChange / LaPuce Card are stored value cards designed for consumers who prefer the convenience, ease and security of using a smart card for their payphone calls.

Smart cards, available in different stored-value denominations contain an advanced integrated circuit chip. The chip gives the card its ability to electronically deduct the cost of each call and then show the remaining value on the phone display, thus making the card ``smart.''

``This agreement represents a new era for the smart card industry and for the Global Chipcard Alliance,'' said David Anastasi, vice president and general manager U S WEST Public Services; as well as the Global Chipcard Alliance president and a member of the board. ``Our decision to expand our agreement with GTE and work with Bell Canada in this venture revolves around benefiting consumers through the development of the smart card industry. One of the goals of this agreement is to make our US WEST Telecard even more flexible as we move towards an environment of international prepaid consumer spending and other smart card applications.''

The U S WEST, GTE and Bell Canada interoperability agreement will affect all Millennium(TM) payphones located in US WEST, GTE and Bell Canada's serving areas, by mid 1998. U S WEST has deployed approximately 20,000 Millennium(TM) payphones region-wide. U S WEST locations include Washington, Colorado, Oregon, Arizona and Minnesota. Bell Canada currently has 70,000 Millennium(TM) payphones installed, in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. GTE currently has number of Millennium payphones through out the United States, including: Hawaii, California, Florida, Texas, Washington and Oregon.

Prepaid Internet Phonecards

HOUSTON, Sept. 3 /PRNewswire/ -- For those computerized travelers resolving to lower their remote Internet and long distance telephone charges, the new Charter WebLink(TM) pre-paid Internet phone card may be the perfect ticket.

With hotel surcharges of $3 and $4 per minute and up for long distance telephone services, Stephen L. Schilling, Chief Operating Officer of Charter Communications, says the way to save dollars and spend more quality time on the Internet is with the new pre-paid Charter WebLink(TM) Internet phone card ($5 to $100 cards, Internet 19 cents P/M, long distance 25 cents P/M, call 1-800-200-8757). See http://www.c-com.net

"We offer a dual-purpose pre-paid telephone calling card that delivers true savings to all travelers, and particularly international travelers, who find it difficult and costly to access the Internet in the US," says Schilling.

As a busy traveler, private investor Roy Rimmer of Houston said, "Whether I'm in New York, Atlanta or Los Angeles, I simply program an 800 number into my laptop, and I have immediate access to the Internet and my e-mail. Its quick, economical and very convenient."

The card was created as a value added service for Internet Service Provider customers, and using it as a regular pre-paid long distance telephone card has appealed to the same customers.

As an active Internet user, Mike Thompson, a stock broker in Houston says, "Daily e-mail and long distance calls are an essential part of my business activities. This card takes care of both, while I take care of my clients."

"This is a remote Internet access product that saves valuable time and money, and is easily replenished with a single phone call," Schilling said.

The pre-paid Charter WebLink(TM) Internet phone card, providing cost- efficient remote connection to the Internet, and worldwide long distance telephone calls, available in $5 to $100 cards. Internet 19 cents P/M, long distance 25 cents P/M. Call 1-800-200-8757. See http://www.c-com.net

Sprint Spree Bonus

Selected $10 and $20 Sprint Spree generic phonecards come with a bonus - a 10 minute NFL player phonecard. There are 12 cards in the set. I purchased three cards, and got three Steve Young cards!

Dilbert at 7-11

I was buying something at a local 7-Eleven here in Orlando and I noticed that they are selling Dilbert phone cards. They have 25 unit and 50 unit cards. The cost is 16.99 for the 50 unit cards, and there are 4 designs.

From: Keith Moore

NFL / General Mills Cereal

I just purchased 15 oz. packages of Cheerios with a picture of a football on the lower right hand corner saying, " You could win instantly! FREE 30 minutes long distance with NFL/Sprint Collector's Edition Calling Card." Details are on the side of the package.

There are four phone cards: Drew Bledsoe, Don Marino, Brett Favre & Steve Young. If you do not win there is a "sorry . . ." printed on the upper inside of the package. (I didn't win one. :-( ) Free phone calls expire on 10/31/98. You can also mail for a free game piece and the odds of winning the 113,000 phonecards are approx. 1 in 301.

From: Jan Cooper

Nobody Beats the Wiz

There are two phonecards offer I saw at local Nobody Bits the Wiz store

1. A 5 min card in side a 3-pack Konica film (84 expo).
2. A 10 min card included in the SOUNDESIGN Emergency 4-in-1 kit. The kit contains a radio, a flashlight, some batteries and a phonecard.

From: Lei Zhang

Fuji Camera

A free10 minute phone card from PromoTel is attached to some packages of Fuji one-time-use cameras. Look for a bright pink oval sticker that says "free 10 minute phone card!" on the front of the outdoor camera (about $8.00) and indoor camera (about $12.00). The card itself is visible from the back of the box. The plastic card pictures the Fujifilm plane (blimp ?) flying in the air. PIN is exposed. Time expires 8/31/98.

From: The Phonecard Shopper

Collector-Link Contest

What famous international sporting event did the first AT&T phone card commemorate? If you can answer this question, visit: http://www.collector-link.com/cards/contest.shtml to enter and try to win a free Collector-Link phonecard. Complete rules are available on-line.

New Walgreen’s Card

One thing you didn't mention in that e-mail was Walgreens has a new card for the rebate club. It's a Revlon card, you have to purchase $20.00 worth of Revlon products, (my daughter bought 3 things and it came to $22.00) and you get a 30 minute card. It's red and has a picture of Cindy Crawford (I think, all those models look alike to me!) Anyway, if you couldn't tell we are really into corporate cards. We were real surprised, the same day she got the cards, I got the new Moneycard Collector magazine with the card pictured on the cover.

From: Toni Pie

Until Next Week,

Alan

Distribution

Phonecards On-Line is written and distributed by Alan Cohen. It is a weekly newsletter devoted to phonecards - Current news, viewpoints, and reviews of new issues. It is distributed free of charge, and available two ways.

1) On-Line on the World Wide Web. The address is: http://www.cardmall.com - All back issues are archived at the web site!

2) Direct e-mail. Send a message to: phoneline@cardmall.com

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