The center must dispatch ships to service the buoys, whose mooring lines often get tangled in fishing lines or are severed by collisions with boats.

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Politicians wanting to send bulk campaign text messages have to wait at least 48 hours before dispatch in order for their mobile service operators to vet the content and reject anything they believe could be inciting.

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Data from resident reports can be used to generate notifications, create work orders, and dispatch responders, depending on the type of service requested.

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To see where all this could go, think about another failed Motorola-designed communications network, a phone-taxi dispatch hybrid with clunky phones, poor call quality and lousy customer service.

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Merloni can connect machines to a service centre via a phone line, making possible off-site billing, testing and the dispatch of an engineer who knows what needs fixing in advance.

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