Dying Telephone Technologies? (connect, system, channel, channels)

[KevK]

The Past- dying or dead:
1. Payphones. With 215 million cell phones in the USA alone basically everybody over age 10 has one. Nobody needs a payphone except people in jail.
2. Landlines. With most families having a phone for each member, who needs it?
3. Toll long distance. Will soon go the way of the Edsel. Nobody is going to pay for something the cell phone provides for free and with the technology today, it cost no more money to switch a call across the country vs across the street.
4. The area code. Yes it will still be around but it will amount to what will be a 10 digit number and will lose any meanning to geography as more and more people move and elect to keep their numbers.
5. Independent VOIP providers. Questionable future with cable and telcos offering service bundled with other things like DSL and broadband. Why would I pay Vonage $35 a month for something I can get with my cable for $25?
6. The White Pages. Not paid for with ads like the Yellow Pages. Will eventually be replaced by CD ROM disk.
7. Pay by the minute cell phone bills. Eventually they will all be "all you can eat" for $50 or so. Being pushed by Cricket, Metro and now Boost Mobile. Look for TMobile to go that way next to get an edge on the 2 big boys.
8. Rotary dial phones. They were common when I was a kid. My teenagers have never seen one so I got one and showed it to them. They were amazed!

[exhdo1]

Originally Posted by KevK

The Past- dying or dead:
1. Payphones. With 215 million cell phones in the USA alone basically everybody over age 10 has one. Nobody needs a payphone except people in jail.
2. Landlines. With most families having a phone for each member, who needs it?
3. Toll long distance. Will soon go the way of the Edsel. Nobody is going to pay for something the cell phone provides for free and with the technology today, it cost no more money to switch a call across the country vs across the street.
4. The area code. Yes it will still be around but it will amount to what will be a 10 digit number and will lose any meanning to geography as more and more people move and elect to keep their numbers.
5. Independent VOIP providers. Questionable future with cable and telcos offering service bundled with other things like DSL and broadband. Why would I pay Vonage $35 a month for something I can get with my cable for $25?
6. The White Pages. Not paid for with ads like the Yellow Pages. Will eventually be replaced by CD ROM disk.
7. Pay by the minute cell phone bills. Eventually they will all be "all you can eat" for $50 or so. Being pushed by Cricket, Metro and now Boost Mobile. Look for TMobile to go that way next to get an edge on the 2 big boys.
8. Rotary dial phones. They were common when I was a kid. My teenagers have never seen one so I got one and showed it to them. They were amazed!

Was just watching the morning news. The report was that people in the U.S. will pay more for cell phone usage than for wired phones for the first time.

[MissShona]

Originally Posted by KevK

The Past- dying or dead:

8. Rotary dial phones. They were common when I was a kid. My teenagers have never seen one so I got one and showed it to them. They were amazed!

We had a rotary phone when I was growing up (and I'm 'only' 28)! We also had only 1 color television (a floor model in the living room) and black and white TVs in the other rooms. I remember in 1984 (so I was 5) when my mother got a used color TV -- put it in her bedroom and got ( ) cable. Seeing HBO and MTV for the first time was life-changing! Oh, but the house consisted of me, my mother and her parents (my Grandparents).

Now I'm back with my Grandparents (they're helping me out until I can walk again) and it's nice to see that they've moved up a 'bit'. They have digital cable and wireless internet. Up until 10 years ago, they were renting their phone from the phone company! Now have a cordless phone...but only use it if they absolutely have to! It amazes me that they prefer the receiver-on-a-string type...but I guess old habits die hard.

[BrianH]

I cant see landlines dieing off in my time. Cell phone networks can still get maxed out like they did in Ireland during 2k when everybody used the phone at the same time.

[dynimagelv]

We have already disconnected our landline......

My first memory of telephones was a Standup black phone with no dial....you picked it up and said HELLO!!!! CENTRAL!!!!!ARE YOU THERE?

oh and b.t.w......didn't have ANY TV then...in the entire town [small one in Eastern Colorado.]

[KevK]

Originally Posted by MissShona

We had a rotary phone when I was growing up (and I'm 'only' 28)! We also had only 1 color television (a floor model in the living room) and black and white TVs in the other rooms. I remember in 1984 (so I was 5) when my mother got a used color TV -- put it in her bedroom and got ( ) cable. Seeing HBO and MTV for the first time was life-changing! Oh, but the house consisted of me, my mother and her parents (my Grandparents).

Now I'm back with my Grandparents (they're helping me out until I can walk again) and it's nice to see that they've moved up a 'bit'. They have digital cable and wireless internet. Up until 10 years ago, they were renting their phone from the phone company! Now have a cordless phone...but only use it if they absolutely have to! It amazes me that they prefer the receiver-on-a-string type...but I guess old habits die hard.

I am earlier than you. We had one rotary dial phone in the kitchen because SW Bell charged more for extension phones. However a unique opportunity came along that my older sibling took advantage of. One summer people started to move out of dozens of homes 2 blocks over that were condemed for a freeway. Him and a friend got about a dozen phones out of the empty open houses and we soon had "illegal" extensions in every room! We also only had one TV set which was a black and white Curtis Mathis and it only got 3 channels and all of them went off at midnight. Cable did not show up until I was 19.

[rcsteiner]

Originally Posted by KevK

The Past- dying or dead:
2. Landlines. With most families having a phone for each member, who needs it?

We do. We live in a steeply-sided valley, and even though we're in the Atlanta metro the cell phone reception is not reliable around our house due to a lack of towers within line of sight.

[KevK]

Originally Posted by BrianH

I cant see landlines dieing off in my time. Cell phone networks can still get maxed out like they did in Ireland during 2k when everybody used the phone at the same time.

Landlines are the same way. The PSTN (phone network) is not designed to carry 100% of possible traffic. Nowhere near it. If everybody tries to use the phone at once, the network will crash as it did in Chicago when a radio station there had a contest to give away 2 new cars to the 101st and 102nd callers some years ago (which is why the Bell system now uses choke lines for radio stations and, in some places, Ticketmaster).

[KevK]

Originally Posted by rcsteiner

We do. We live in a steeply-sided valley, and even though we're in the Atlanta metro the cell phone reception is not reliable around our house due to a lack of towers within line of sight.

Eventually they are going to fill the spot. Tmobile used to suck around my house (Lithia Springs area) but now it is rock solid.

[ArizonaBear]

I cut my land line about 8 months ago and use cable for my Internet.

More and more people (and not just age 30 on down) have just cell phones these days.