I work in IT, in the mortgage industry. If our systems are down, my boss loses an immense amount of money per minute of downtime. For me, part of the job is being not only reachable, but able to act at very short notice.
Not saying everyone with the cellphone welded to their ear is in the same boat, but the business world has changed such that at least some of the folks walking around with the "electronic leash" really don't have a choice in the matter anymore.
Dave Hinz
Ya know, if I remember the stories correctly, that is exactly what old folks said about "regular" phones when they were just coming into everyday use in most homes. "Hell, if someone wants to talk to me they can ride their horse out to the farm and talk to me. Don't need no damn contraption lettin' people bother me in my own home. Besides, that 'lectricity stuff will probably fry your brain." :)
Funny, isn't it that the people who comment on how they appreciate the ability to reach the important people they reach out to - that those people answer their phones, are the very people who have so much to say about the technologies which enable this contact.
Hmm, funny really. For me, a cell phone really helps me keep my privacy in many ways. I have an unlisted cell phone number with caller-ID blocking. I use caller ID on my phone (yes, I am a hypocrite). Very, very few people have my cell phone number. Once in a while I might give it to a delivery service, but if they ever called me twice they will get a whole load of crap. My home number has no voice mail and often goes unanswered.
This way I only get calls from people I want them from and only answer them at my convenience. If I don't want to be interrupted I put it on silent or turn it off. For me, this allows me to be out a great deal (particularly long outdoor photo sessions) and still remain in contact with the people I want to, yet ignore the rest of the world when I wish.
This has made my life richer without becoming a hermit.
Don't be so quick to judge how we use our phones.
CW responds:
Yes. Keep in touch for what? How much is going to change here in the 3 days I'll be out next week that will be of major importance to me? The need for constantly being patted on the back, or constantly patting someone on the back, is something of an illness, IMHO, related strongly to the sickness of being unable to sit still and think without some kind of background noise filling the air.
Charlie Self "In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office." Ambrose Bierce
Mike Marlow responds:
Funny isn't it that every person I was writing of has been answering phones that way since the '50s, to my knowledge. Damned few of them had cellular technology back then. The ONLY technology needed for a person to answer his own phone is a landline and an ego that is under control.
Charlie Self "In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office." Ambrose Bierce
Paul Kierstead responds:
For you, it sounds viable. I really get a kick out of the caller ID crap. When we moved to WV, the oldest kid had caller ID and her kids have strict instructions not to pick up if the number is unrecognized. We had to resort to email to get through on the damned phone line. The same thing happened when the daughter landed in NY from a trip to Italy, and was going to be way late getting to Greensboro to be picked up. No one at her house would answer the phone because it came from an airport pay booth.
But I also don't recall noting that everyone should do as I do. I noticed long ago whether I was knocking out pages on the machine or shooting photos, there was NEVER a call that came in that couldn't wait a few hours for return. That goes back to the mid-or late '60s, so I'm perfectly willing to continue to force people to wait a couple hours to hear from me. Horrible, I know, but that's life.
Charlie Self "In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office." Ambrose Bierce
I try to keep in mind the philosophy of a friend of mine, when it comes to rushing to answer the phone: "If it's important, they'll call back. If it isn't important, who cares???"
-- Regards, Doug Miller (alphageek-at-milmac-dot-com)
For a copy of my TrollFilter for NewsProxy/Nfilter, send email to autoresponder at filterinfo-at-milmac-dot-com You must use your REAL email address to get a response.
a couple of months back I turned off my house phone. now I only have a cel phone. if I don't want to recieve calls, I just turn it off. it takes messages....
Yep, but less the cop-size battery, which was necessary for analog models, its successors (STS 5000 in my case) can still seem heavy. Strange isn't it? It's an 800MHz radio, in our case, and lasts about as long as a cell phone with a spare battery....
The difference in battery life was more due to output power than anything. 5 watts for the ht. 500 or so milliwatts for the cell phone (radio).
On 15 May 2004 20:56:02 GMT, snipped-for-privacy@aol.comnotforme (Charlie Self) brought forth from the murky depths:
A Freakin' Men, sir. I'm with the hurler.
I cannot understand the obsession people have with phones, especially since the cell phone technology is still in the dark ages. I'd like to hear on one single person who has -never- had their phone go out of range OR their battery die OR had a bad connection OR they couldn't hear/understand what the guy on the other end was saying. I'd be willing to bet that everyone who has used a cell phone more than twice has experienced at least one of those happenings at least once.
My Hawaii client called me today using her cell phone and we spent over an hour online. I had to ask her to repeat things a dozen times and she asked me 4 or 5 times.
Feh! Pay all that money so people have more places from whence to harrass you at all hours? Right. Pass!
----------------------------------------------------------------- When I die, I'm leaving my body to science fiction. --Steven Wright ----------------------------
I was a contract programmer, consultant, chief and flunky in process control systems. You haven't seen panic till a whole factory quits running - or starts smoking and bubbling :-).
I turned down an employee job at one customer because I would have had to take turns wearing a pager (pre-cellphone days). I asked if I got paid my monthly salary, pro-rated of course, for the times I wore the pager. You can imagine the response.
If you're on call all the time, you're not an employee. You're a slave.
And way back in the beginning they were the early adopters who jumped on the technologies of the times to support their business and their private lives. You'd be surprised how many times a call to a local business number actually goes through to a cell phone today or to a home phone or to some other location besides the office location. All I'm saying is that it's funny how you and others seem to enjoy the ability to reach someone when you call them and actually applaud that they take your calls, yet as this newer technology is taking off, you have a lot of negative stuff to say about it, while the very technology you seem to think is acceptable was once equally new, considered equally invasive, equally vain, etc. Egos that are under control don't try to dictate to the world around them just what is proper and acceptable based on their own fears, preferences and taste.
Maybe, maybe not.
Some of us who have on call provisions rotate the duty. I get it a week at a time, once a month, or so. I am paid if called or not. The better I manage my day to day operation, the less calls I get. I encourage my direct reports to make decisions, take responsibility and do their own job. Usually, I don't get a single call. When I do, someone needs an escalated decision. All of the information I need to provide a decision, or an alternate contact, is in a PDA.
Without these devices, I'd be stuck at home by a phone. With the wireless devices, I'm where I want, when I want. This makes the device a freedom device, with extra pay as gravy. If I don't want the pay, I have peers who gladly volunteer to take my duty time.
Technology can either work for you or against you, it's a personal decision.
Barry
My son owns a business that supplies medical devices and oxygen to people at home. There must be someone on call all the time. I used to take weekends for him at times. I got paid, calls or not.
Pager and portable phone gave me freedom, not slavery. Some weekends there are no calls, but I could go as I pleased within the confines of a third of the state.. It also allows for contact so I did not return home only to find a second call required I be near the fist one, 30 miles away.
Do I still need a cell phone? No, but is sure is nice to have. Like the time my wife ended up in a hospital for six days when we were returning from vacation. It is a security thing also. I don't sit and chat on it at a ballgame or in a restaurant, etc. It is a tool to be used properly. Ed snipped-for-privacy@snet.net
The difference is the distance to the tower. Digital technology almost makes a mockery of the inverse square rule.
Au contraire. At least here the cells are supplied with backup power, and are an integral part of our disaster preparedness plans. Wires, poles and trees don't affect 'em.
You want a hoot, try to explain to irate neighbors how they should have a line-powered phone available, not just cordless....
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