Outdated Technologies: Landline Telephones

Tsutarja

Tsutarja

  • Team Aqua (GT 2024)
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    #4: Landline Telephones​

    Special thanks to Otter Mii-kun for suggesting this technology!

    Before the invention of cellular telephones, there were landline telephones. The name is pretty self-explanatory, but for those who don't know: it's the regular kind of phone that's connected to a line and is typically not portable. Most landline phones have a cable connected to the handset as well, alongside answering machines, caller ID, and can even work without any sort of electricity!

    So some questions of thought:

    • Do you still have a landline phone in use?
    • How often do you use a landline phone?
    • For those who've abandoned landline phones, how long ago did you do so?
    • What were your reasons for abandoning landline phones? Anything other than "oh I have a cell phone now, so I don't need a telephone at the same time"?
    ​
    If you have any ideas for future discussions for Outdated Technologies, send me a message!​
     
    The only time I use landline phones these days is during work. Otherwise, my family and I ditched them several years ago. All of us are often away from our house, so cell phones are much more convenient and we save some money by not paying landline bills every month (though I think the bill's not that much compare to our cell phone bills now).

    Back when we had landline phones, my mom would often talk to her side of the family a lot, but when we stopped the landline phones they call to her cell phone instead, heh.
     
    We still use landline phones at our home to call someone on other floor or spefic location and it still being used today for all other call or to receive call from a company elsewhere or when parents gone and too check things from phone.
     
    The last time I used a landline phone is when i was interning at a company.. I used it frequently as a child though but that was when The Ring was a thing and I kept scaring anyone with a landline.. We ended up getting a huge bill because of that.. I Never touched a landline phone after.
     
    We still have a landline phone at my home, and it is the primary way of reaching someone in the house. The landline is really convenient exactly because of that reason. It rings in the home, where it is presumably never a major nuisance to pick up the phone. It's kind of a way to contact the house instead of contacting a certain person. We use it frequently, and I can only imagine it being inconvenient to have to pull up a mobile phone from a pocket whenever someone calls.
     
    I've actually been tempted to pick up a landline phone for my apartment here, because I'm able to (pretty sure this place has its own number) and it would be nice to have a backup in case the cell phones can't be reached, but then there's the thing of...well, we do have cell phones, and I don't even use those much anyway so I can't justify buying another phone to use! Why buy another phone when there's already two cell phones around here? Although I know I tend to keep forgetting to charge my phone, so hmm. There is that. But anyway.

    Pretty much, it's been at least five years since I've used a landline phone, at least on purpose. I'm not counting any times I might have been handed one to talk to somebody. I don't see myself buying one anytime soon, and the only time I would be using one is if I'm over at someone's house who does have one, and I wouldn't normally be touching that phone at all since it's not mine and that would just be weird.
     
    We have one on every floor in the house, everyone uses them more than their mobile phones, I don't use them but I do want to get one of the old Rotary Phones!
     
    My family still has a landline phone, and it's the main phone for the entire family. None of us are permanently attached to our cell phones, so if anyone needs to contact us, the best way to do so is with the landline. Also, our landline has an answering machine attached to it, so we use that to screen calls so we can avoid talking to people as much as we can.

    When two out of the three people living in the house have telephonephobia, we take plenty of measures to avoid the phone as much as we can.
     
    My family still frequently uses a landline- that's the main phone, that one that isn't going to change or become unavailable at any point. That's the phone that our relatives call, and the phone that appears on our billing information.

    Mostly everyone has a cellphone, but more the most part, they're on prepaid plans with pay as you go billing. I'm the odd one out, since I use a monthly prepaid plan that provides me with ample mobile data (which is more of my reason for owning a cellphone), so I can easily troubleshoot any of the servers running throughout the house.
     
    There are two of them in my home right now. They are exceptionally reliable compared to our mobile phone coverage here.

    I wouldn't want to imagine a world where landlines didn't exist, not while mobile network coverage still has signal quality and coverage gaps.

    Speaking of landlines, I think DSL tech is a nice way of making use of existing phone lines to send high-speed data. It might be no fibre optic, but DSL isn't too shabby after a certain point.
     
    My mom and I still use landline phones 99% of the time. My mom wants to keep her phone line as long as possible-though I don't know how much longer that's gonna last, since AT&T and Verizon (the latter of which served our area with phone service until they sold their service areas in Michigan and 13 other states to Frontier in 2010) are pushing state legislatures, including in Michigan, to pass bills to allow carriers to drop service entirely and leave customers out in the cold if they don't have wireless. (I do worry, though, that the federal government itself might mandate a nationwide phase-out of traditional phone service, like they did with analog broadcast television.)
    Besides, where we are, wireless service isn't all that reliable-many people have to be outside just to make cell phone calls. Out in the country is even worse, never mind that we're almost living out in the country anyway as it is.
    One other thing-all the phones in our house are corded, which means we can call out and receive calls when the power is out. Once that happens, I go right to the phone, pick up the handset, and dial DTE Energy's customer service line.
    Besides, my mom and I are so behind the times it's not even funny. Most people around our parts have cable telephone service (such as Charter or Comcast) if they continue using traditional home phones, rather than ILECs such as GTE/Verizon/Frontier or Ma Bell/Ameritech/SBC/AT&T. Some have even switched to VOIP-based services such as MagicJack and Vonage, but that's another topic entirely.
    We've had the same home phone number since we were still served by GTE (before they merged with Bell Atlantic to form Verizon), and since our area code was still 313 (changing to 810 at the end of 1993), though I'm not sure if that can last much longer, since we keep getting scam calls (nearly everything is exempt from the Do Not Call law nowadays, including people trying to sell home security systems and back braces).
    Sure, smartphones may be so wonderful, but with all the steps you have to take just to make a call (such as swipe the screen, tap and tap to get to the dialpad), I prefer the simplicity of just picking up a handset and dialing right away when the dial tone comes on.

    /EnoughOfMePraisingBackwardness
     
    We still use our landline for receiving international calls from relatives and occasionally to dial 0800 numbers to companies, so Id say we use our landline often. It has it's specific uses so I don't think it'll be replaced by mobile phones, unless it's cheaper to do both.
     
    We stopped using our landline years ago I'm not even sure. Sometimes while I was in high school? Before we stopped using it completely for about at least a half-year the only calls we were getting on the landlines were telemarketers and whomever would also call that we could care less about. Any important calls we got on our cellphones. So eventually we just unplugged it and stopped using it.
     
    We still have a landline phone for the fact that as long as our internet is on, it'll be on. My mom likes to keep it around for if there is a time that we don't have our cell service. I don't use it much only when someone calls since they do tend to call your home phone before they call your mobile. Otherwise I don't use it.
     
    Yep, they're still very much 'a thing,' in my house, to the point that, in addition to a cordless phone downstairs, there's a landline phone upstairs on the same line. Thankfully we've moved past the really archaic rotary phones in this house, and I still rather like the landline phone upstairs. It's grey with the keypad being located in the actual handset itself, which in turn sits in the cradle.

    And it is still well used today. On average we easily get 2+ calls a day, usually from family. In my mom's house she has sorta dropped the use of landlines, though, mostly due to too many bills.
     
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