Atlantic article: Telephone Culture is Disappearing

[DawnStorm]

Article here: https://www.theatlantic.com/technolo...g-ring/561545/

The main reason is because the amount of scam/spam callers. Well duh! There are other reasons as well, but that's the biggie. There is only one person I know that lives out of state and that's DH's cousin. But I have his number stored, and he texts anyway. I have more blocked numbers than I do contacts.

[Die Capacitrix]

If I happen to be at home when the landline rings, I do answer it. I don't know why, since it is the local newsrag, or someone who wants to tell me Windows isn't working.

I had to change my number at work because I received so many wrong phone calls due to a telephone mess after merging two systems.

And last week I received two phone calls at work. The second one was someone else from the same company that misdialed earlier.

Next step: No phone at work. At least I'll have a bit more space on my desk.

[Beachlife!]

I got rid of my land line years ago. The last few years I had it the only phone calls I received were from sales people and Exs. That might explain why to this day, my first reaction when my mobile phone rings is to swear. That's also how I react to the door fell for what its worth.

[Sue]

I still have a few elderly relatives who have a regular phone and don't have any of the features we all think of as standard. If you call them, and that is the only way to reach them, the phone will ring endlessly if they are not home - no voicemail. It's nice (if mean) that you also have plausible deniability "Oh I did try and call you back several times but I guess you weren't home". That's not a convenient lie that you can use anymore for most people. Hmm, not that this is a good thing I guess.

[dfresh]

My company moved last September and put in a very expensive new phone system, where every employee had their own number, it was easy to patch phones to your cell, and the phones were semi-integrated to our computer system. It is so complicated that they have had several hours of training on it.
It also keeps track of all the calls you have gotten, so I can see that since the new phone system went in I have gotten about 20 calls at work, of which maybe 3 mattered. I have made about 20. That works out to maybe 1 call in or out per week. Meanwhile, I send probably 10 emails a day, get several times that many, and get or send probably 2-4 texts a day for work.

[RichardM]

Originally Posted by Beachlife!

the door fell

Wow, they must have been knocking hard on the door.

[BoKu]

About a year and a half ago, the startup I worked for moved into a new building owned by the big company that bought us. My new cubicle came with a desk phone, which I put straight into the filing cabinet (but still plugged in). It has never rang, and I have never placed a call with it. I check it every month or so to see if it still works.