The notion of the family phone as a shared family resource is as passe as Ma Bell.
The notion of the family phone as a shared family resource is as passe as Ma Bell.
History will clearly show that out-of-control telemarketers killed the home landline phone. They’re the reason why I got rid of mine years ago.
I haven’t had a land line in close to 10 years now. My home security system calls my cell and there is no land line for a burglar to cut. That’s what happend to a couple of neighbors with security sytems a few months back. Some punk cut the land lines and did a smash and grab on two houses.
I love my land line, cell phones don’t work well here in the sticks.....plus I always have light when the electricity goes off.
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.777
One caveat - if you have medical issues or other reasons that require the ability to summon aid under almost any circumstance, the landline phone is still the most reliable. Even with a UPS for the cable modem (or whatever) and VoIP box, you have limited connectivity - IF your internet stays up. Many cell sites don’t have back-up power and the telcos are fighting a proposed FCC rule that would require only a 4 hour backup power capability. Plus in emergencies the cell sites may be overloaded to boot.
I figure VoIP with cellular backup is good enough for me, but YMMV, just do your homework - it’s not strictly a financial consideration. The landline telephone system has evolved for over 100 years to provide service under adverse conditions, as long as the wires are intact.
Why would anyone want to pay a bill for multiple cell phones over a landline phone for the family is beyond me.
True story. I have a Verizon tower a couple of hundred yards away from my home. Can’t get reception. Everywhere else is fine.
I’m about ready to dump my Verizon land line and FIOS.
They are gouging me with high prices...me no like dat no mo!
Will be great to see Verizon suffer for land line losses.
One nice thing about a land line is that you can’t misplace it. Another is that you can’t drop it inter the terlit. Uh...a friend told me about that...
Now if I could only get my parents to embrace the cell phone. They have cells but they turn them off when they are home, forget to turn them back on when they leave and while they're at home with their cells turned off, they have no call waiting on their home phones. I guess they're just set in their ways.
Haven’t dumped the land line, but we’ve changed to the cheapest available plan.
We make our long distance calls by cell phone on the weekends (when they’re free)
We (the wife and I) each have a cell, and we HAD a home land line (unpublished for more than a decade).
We dropped the land line and added a new cell line with the same number for not much additional extra to our existing cell bill.
Now, for the important part: The hew (home) cell line is connected to an Xlink Cell Bt Gateway. The gateway connects to the cell via Bluetooth, then our home phone is plugged into the XLink and our existing cordless phones (one on each of three levels) work just as before. And we are saving money.
It's a great system.
We dropped our land line about four years ago.
And phone polls will continue to sample a poor slice of contemporary citizens.
We will keep our land line here in Northern Virginia.
When the last hurricane came through all the cell phones were out for about a week while the hard line phone never quit working.
I also make sure we have one regular, hard wired phone so that when the cordless ones go out with the power we still have communications capability.
Progress: you used to pay 12 bucks a month telephone bill for the entire for the family, now you’re paying, what, $200?
Progress: the quality was such that you could hear a pin dropped on the other end, now every other word is unintelligible.