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FCC Considering 10-Digit Dialing [UPDATED]
Ambiguo writes: "An article in today's LA Times is reporting today that tomorrow the FCC will begin considering switching to 10 digit phone numbers, starting as early as next month. There's a lot of opposition to it, especially since there was a large backlash when LA tried this a little while ago, but some say it's a stepping stone to the eventual 11 or 12 digit phone number of the future." Update: 12/06 4:33 PM by michael: The FCC is not going to switch us all to 10-digit numbers. Yet.
Long Distance Charges!
;-)
While it might be more organizationally sound for say, all cellphones in service by SomeTelco Inc use a given area code (SomeTelco "owns" the 999 area code and uses it for the cellphones it sells). Thats all fine and good, but if my girlfriend from down the street wants to call me on my cell, she'd have to make a long distance call.
Or, conversely, I live in a rural area, and the metro part of the state is in a different area code, thus its long distance. If I have a cell phone that uses the same area code as the metro area, I can call the metro for free (minus airtime). At least in the metro area I am speaking of, they were going to split the area code anyway, just because of all the new phone numbers (urban sprawl), and the cellphone thing just sorta cinched it.
In other words, due to population density, they split the metro area code into thirds. The area that the new area codes cover is a little bigger than the old one (before the split). Yes its a big pain in the ass. I think there are now 5 or 6 area codes for our state, and it used to be 3 (north, central, and south). Made it pretty easy to guess what a certain town's area code was if you weren't sure. Now its all screwed up. Course considering almost everyone I know has AT LEAST one cellphone, a home phone, and a data line (internet dialup), thats 3 phone numbers for every household, as opposed to the old general rule of 1, MAYBE 2.
I think the phones aughtta use a different system, since locale has almost no bearing on an individual's phone number: Make it like (backwards) DNS. I want my phone numbers to be EASY to figure out. I dunno maybe in the form of surname.firstname.(home || data || cell) or some damned thing.
But now that I think about it, its a pretty moot point... there is a reason that major telcos are laying fiber lines left and right, and its NOT for plain old telephone use. I think the telcos have something up thier sleeves (commercial phone service via internet). Think about it. Telcos make more money from its phone customers than shit like leased backbones or dialup access. For some reason I can see the telephone becoming an internet appliance anyway. With IPv6, this is probably possible. In which case, all incoming communication to my house would be routed to country.state.county.town.street.number.*
Personally I think this would be cool as hell, once we get fiber at the curb
What could possibly hurt the security of the American people more than giving our own government the ability to hide its
Not a third area code, but rather a third AND fourth area code. 416 gets 647 and 905 gets 289. See addthecode.com
I'll have something intelligent to add one of these days...
The places I've worked, it wouldn't matter if you dialed the number directly... every desk had every incoming line on the phone. Either way, you had to go through the receptionist. Plus, there were more extensions than incoming lines, so you couldn't dial a desk directly, anyway.
BTW... voice mail is here to stay. Deal with it. Not because it's more efficient on allocated numbers or for customers, but because you can get rid of some employees.
The whores get mad when the sluts give it away for free.
Toronto could sink into the Great Lakes for all I care, and I wouldn't even cry for a second.
(Go ahead, moderators, mod me down...that's how much I hate Toronto...)
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What you say!!
...(in australia) everyone's phone number is eight digits, with two digit area codes. nice and simple, with room enough for a hundred million people in each area, plenty big enough for the forseeable future.
> Telemarketers would NEVER get off your back unless you were changing it periodically anyway.
I don't understand why so many people have a problem with the blasted telemarketers. I never pick up the phone, unless it's someone I know. And the occasional time when I do answer, I just hang up on them after 5 seconds. STOP letting them waste YOUR time.
> No matter what you do, you're doomed to be interrupted.
Why do you have to drop everything and answer the phone when it rings? If it's that important, the person will leave a message on the answering machine.
Let the answering machine take it, and if it's urgent, you can allways pick up. My family and friends use this system, and we never have a problem.
Cheers
All numbers should be your SSN (or some other number) followed by a letter from a to z. When you move, change jobs, etc., you call the phone company/post office and have them point your SSN+x number to the correct place.
And you thought identity theft was a nightmare now...just wait until something like this is implemented.
---
"Fdisk format reinstall, doo dah doo dah,
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Currently, offices/businesses that multiple lines in have a phone number (BTN, billed telephone number) for each and every line. Only one of those numbers is really needed, as the first one rolls over to each folowing number when that line is busy. If the local carriers would assign only ONE number to a multiline phone connection that's gonna be set up as a rollover system anyway, many numbers could be recovered. (Of course, they'd be used up in the homes where one line has multiple numbers.)
The additional advantage to this is that the outgoing caller ID data on any of the lines would be the same number, the known telephone number of the company. (Where I work, people are always calling back our higher numbered lines, and sometimes running into busy signals because of it... even when I leave our primary number on their answering machine.)
The whores get mad when the sluts give it away for free.
The majority of places I'm aware of which had variable length numbers are moving towards fixed length numbers. The value of knowing if a number has the correct number of digits is greater than the value of variable lenght codes.
Here in San Diego, if it's in your area code, you don't have to dial a 1, ever (unless of course if you behind a PBX that requiresit). Also, they have carved up the county with so many area codes that there are a lot of local calls that I have to dial 1+3digitAreacode+7digitnumber. I have to dial 11 digits most of the time anyway, it would actually be easier for me to just know I have to dial 10 digits every time. It would also add consitancy to dialling for people travelling, like the person from Nebraska that said they dial 1+7digitnumber to dial LD within the area code, that's not typical, at least in my state. In the future, we will all probably have some sort of universal lifetime number anyway, that shuold solve the problem. I know AT&T was trying awhile ago with their 700 area code. Does this still exist?
Brewmaster64
Why do we need more phone numbers for ISPs? I don't use a modem for my net connection.
Everybody needs to quit their damn whining.
If I tell you my damn phone number is 999-555-1212, then write all those damn digits down on a damn piece of paper and when you need to talk to me, type all the damn digits into the damn phone. How is that any harder than dialing 7 damn digits?
And for people who are whining about the damn machines that need to be changed to handle 10 digits: it will be easier because currently, some damn places have 10 damn digit dialing and others have 7 damn digit dialing. If they all had 10 damn digit dialing, your machines would be easier to program.
Note to people outside the USA: Yes, we damn Americans really are so damn stupid that we can't handle dialing a few extra damn numbers. But at least we don't have damn warm bawls.
In fact, yes. But on the other hand nothing prevents you from purchasing a landline phone with a memory. You can also get a phone that shows and remebers callers phone number (and calling time etc). Heck, you can probably get even SMS messages for your normal phone. Just check your local dealer. In the end, if you think that phone like that is too expensive then dialing long numbers is not a problem - if it were you woulnd't think phone like that is expensive [read: you don't like dialing but it's not disgausting enough to justify buying a new phone]. I for myself hate dialing and I own cellurar phone only.
And then some idiot comes with an idea to use phone numbers as email addresses...
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Spelling and grammar mistakes left as an exercise for the reader.
I always considered the american system of fixed length for the area code (3 digits) and phone number (7 digits) extremely stupid.
In other countries, e.g. in most european ones, you have variable length area codes and phone numbers, allowing for a kind of "huffman coding": A big city gets 8 or 9 digit telephone numbers and uses a 2 digit area code, to keep the overall number as short as possible. Smaller towns use 4 or 5 digit telephone numbers and 3 or 4 digit area codes, and medium sized cities can use 3 digit area codes with 5 to 8 digit numbers.
A look at the german numbering plan, for example, shows other advances:
You use the '0' as the long distance access code, and the '00' as international access code. E.g. 0-40-54325432 to call from berlin to hamburg, or 00-1-415-7654321 to call to san francisco. This way you waste only one digit and not 2 for access codes.
You can group area codes locally. E.g. Berlin has the '30' area code, smaller cities and towns nearby have '331' (Potsdam) or '3322' (Falkensee) or '33439' (Blumberg). Cities in the south of germany have areacodes starting with '7', '8' or '9' (Bavaria and Baden Wuertemberg) or '6' (greater Frankfurt area), others start with '2' (Ruhrarea) or '4' (Hamburg, Bremen, Schleswig-Holstein). This way you have at least a rough idea where in the country you're calling to.
You should adopt that system here, and there will be no more whining about 2, 3 or even 4 completely different area codes for the same city.
Think about it,
Christian.
> Better yet: One number, period.
Yes, you could think of the spare 2 digits as a "port"
> The nature of the call is detected and handled accordingly.
Yes, I don't see why we couldn't have a packet sent first identifying the device type & connection.
Take a look at ISDN. With ISDN you get service identification and multiple numbers. Theoretically you can assign the same number to your phone and your fax machine, set your fax to answer "fax calls" and the phone to ring on "voice calls". Everyone who has ever tried that reverts to assigning one number to the fax and a different number to the phone, because in real life, service identifiers don't work. It's a legacy problem: Analogue fax devices don't identify themselves as fax machines before the call is answered. To the ISDN system, they look just like a human caller. Thus they end up trying to synchronize with your ear...
BTW: Germany uses 4 digit area codes (preceded by 0 to leave your local area) and 5 to 7 digit phone numbers (new numbers are all 7 digits long).
The problems with the NANP are due to overallocation in large cities. Any CLEC who wishes to compete in a rate centre needs an entire prefix. They get 500 customers, and that means 9500 numbers wasted. In the typical large american city, with many rate centres, and many CLECs, this means that the area code become exhaused.
Many locations have started conservation measures, either consolidation of rate centres, or allocation of sub prefix blocks to CLECs.
If you add an area code (because you're running out of numbers in the existing area codes) then you have to re-draw boundaries, etc.
This leads to two problems. First, the areas become smaller and smaller making it more difficult to figure out which one you are in and wether the destination you are calling is also in your (now relatively tiny) area. Second, with more areas, it's more likely you'll be calling out of it anyway so you'll still need to do more frequent 10-digit dialing.
Thus, it seems like it becomes easier for the phone company to say, this new ``area'' code isn't confined to a small area but covers anywhere in this larger area. You now must dial 10-digits everywhere in this larger area.
I live in the UK. My both my home phone lines and mobiles have 11 digit phone numbers. When I call someone, I select their name from the list on my phone and press the "call" button. I couldn't care less how many digits are in the number since the only time I see it is when entering it into the phone book.
What I'd really like to see is phones (obviously digital cellular phones or VoIP (voice over IP) phones) having the ability to automagically change their internal phone book numbers when the telco they're connected through is aware of changes in phone numbers (like the one in this article). That way nobody would care at all when they change since they wouldn't have to update all their phone book entries.
Follow me
New York is the only area to do this. The FCC issued a ruling against it shortly afterwards.
The military phone system uses them to assign priorities to calls. The are used for 'PRIORITY', 'IMMEDIATE', 'FLASH' and 'FLASH OVERRIDE'. If none of them is pressed, then it's a 'ROUTINE' call. In the event of the system becoming saturated, calls are dropped in order of priority, so all ROUTINE's first, then up the chain until the system is no longer saturated. There is lots on the web which you can find if you use the priorities, here is one
Maybe I should clarify a little. When I said we've been using the areacode I mean 1+3digitAreacode+7digitnumber for everything that is long distance. We still use 7 digits for local calls.
Or for geographically small area codes, for example New York has 13 area codes.
540 doesn't, at least here in beautiful Blacksburg...
Go Hokies!
So how do I know if you're in LA or New York? Just by looking at the number I could be charged long distance or short distance!
Well, thanks for that.......it may not be official, but IMO 0207 is the area code for Central London, the same as 0208 is the area code for Greater London.
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Moderator's essentials
In the UK we've had 10 and 11 digit phone numbers for ages.
Works like this:
(XXXXX) XXX XXX or,
(XXXX) XXXX XXX
The part in parentheses is the local area code, the rest is the actual phone number. If your number was 01234 567890 then anyone else in the 01234 area can call you without prefixing the 01234. I thought the US system worked like this anyhoo - 123-456-7890, meaning anyone in the 123 area can call without the 123 prefix? No?
Oftel, the UK's telephone company watchdog, has recently put into place new numbering schemes over here - mainly to deal with the explosion in mobile phone usage here. Like reserving the 07XXX prefix for mobile phones, the 09XXX prefix for premium rate lines, the 084XX prefix for internet access etc.
Just deal with the changes, American friends!
In London, people/businesses have had four number changes in the last 10 years - 01 123456 became 071 123456 which then became 0171 123456 and then finally 020 7123456!
--
jambo
system.admin.without.a.clue
-- js.
You'd have a whole lot more numbers, even with the current numbering plan if the USA had it's own numbering plan. Rather than something covering Canada, USA and other odd bits and pieces.
The current +1 "country" code has all sorts of complications, especially where different rates are charged to different countries within it.
You would call me at 410-455-xxxx (heck, you can look up my number online if you really want to) regardless of whether you were next door or across the country - never 455-xxxx (which you can't do anymore anyway), never 1-410-455-xxxx. The switch could look at 410 and know whether it's local or not; no need for the 1- prefix. So it frees up a lot of new numbers, at the price of no longer being clear to the caller if the call is long distance or not.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | http://www.infamous.net/
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You cannot wash away blood with blood
I don't think this is very relevant to the UK.
_ONE_ friggin number, that stays the same no matter where I move, and 2 spare digits on the end, so a cell, fax, pager, computer, all share a common number.
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-00 = phone
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-01 = cell
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-02 = fax
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-03 = pager
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-04 = computer
Depending on how this is implimented it's either DISA (dial the existing 11 digits, get some sort of tone/prompt and dial the next X) or German style DDI (just dial the number given, but needs the whole planet to be able to cope with variable length numbers.)
No doubt there are NANP terms for these, probably used nowhere else, too.
N is the *same* in both positions. Perhaps I wasn't clear enough, but NANPA refers to it as 1-8NN too. (Where N is the same number in both digit positions, i.e. 888, 877, 866.).
Photos of bits of the past hiding in the present: afiler.com
Before we get really ambitious with something like a common number for all your devices, let's get local number portability. If local numbers were portable there would be *no shortage* of telephone numbers.
With the conseqence of a telephone network which needs huge routing tables..
10 digit numbers with no 1 or 0 to start the area code or the exchange is 8^2(10^8) = 6.4 billion phone numbers. With a population of ~275 million that's more than 20 phone numbers for every man, woman, child, and little baby in the country.
Actually it's several countries, also unless the entire routing table was replicated world wide then there would be complications.
Currently the originator can at least have a guess at where a number is (based on the first 3 digits) thus could use a different link depending on if the call is going to Hawaii or New York...
The whole problem is that there are some exchanges with tons of unused numbers and others that are full. Each area code has 8 million numbers. If we got local number portability, all 8 million would be used.
Problem is that 7 digit number space is too small for urban areas, but often too large for sparsly populated areas. Both the USA and Canada have a wide variety of population densities.
Any kind of solution which is simple for people would require some radical actions.
This made sense some years ago when we had very high prices for long distance phone calls, you could have three types of numbers which were somewhat lower than the normal price. The called party paid the remainder. You had one type which had a tariff somewhat similar to long distance (slightly lower), one with a tariff for medium distance calls and one with a tariff for local calls (yes, we actually have to pay for local phone calls). And there are two types which costs the calling party a fixed amount for the whole call.
Nowadays the prices of phone calls dropped dramatically, the price of a long distance call beeing near (or even _below_) a local call, so these numbers lost there original use.
You can even get situations such that such a "split cost" number is actually more expensive to call than any ordinary geographic number. e.g. such numbers being excluded from a discount scheme.
Better clear it up just in case:
:)
0207 is NOT an area code in the UK. 020 is the London area code, and Central London phone numbers now start with "7". Outer London numbers begin with "8", but soon other numbers will also be common in the new London exchanges.
The long period needed to educate the public about stuff like this is the reason why it took SIX years to complete the changes -- it's all really part of one master plan, but the public were deemed to be too stupid to cope with it all in one dose. Hence the intermediary stages.
London was always meant to be unified; 0171, 0181 were temporary measures to scrape some space in the old overcrowded numeric space.
How the US hopes to continue crushing people into a 10 digit space I do not know, maybe they're hoping IP telephony will destroy "phone numbers" before they run out of them...
My phone number is +44 7974 246511. If you don't have a "+" symbol on your phone, get a better phone
But what happens if I don't want a fax or a pager, but I want 3 voice lines? Or several fax machines, but nothing else? This would be a nice system, except it would need to be tailored for each situation, and then you're back where you started.
If people will not need to distinguish between them then they can all be on separate lines with the same number.
What I REALLY want to see, though, is area codes based on services. They charge different rates for residential and business service Could it be that hard to differentiate on the area code, using a simple overlay? It would also help them make sure no businesses are gypping them out on a residential rate (would you want to call a business that was run from a residential phone number? - of course forwarders from the bus area code could be sold at cheap rates, ringing on the same line). Oh, that leads me to telemarketers - make it illegal to call a residential/mobile area code number for marketing purposes. What kind of excuse can they give? (phone spam burns me)
Have another one for mobile devices. Okay, each metro area has three area codes. Seems like it would be enough. It's what we have in Houston, and right now it's just a mishmash - business, residential and mobile sharing 713 and 281, mobiles only on 832. Restructuring would probably help things a lot in long-term effeciency.
But when do people listen to me?
funny munging
One problem is that with 7-digit dialing you know that if a call goes through then it's a local call. With 10-digit dialing it's harder to tell whether you're being charged by the minute or not. Easy to get burned if, for example, you assume that the number your ISP gave you is local just because it's in your area code, only to get a nasty surprise with your long distance bill at the end of the month.
The latter appears to be a uniquely NANP happening. In most parts of the world the local number is simply a short convenience. The number of digits dialed dosn't affect the charging.
i.e. if the US followed the rest of the planet then you could dial a local number as 1-ABC-DEF-GHIJ, ABC=DEF-GHIJ or DEF-GHIJ and it would both work and have no difference in charging.
Why are we in such a crisis? I know people have more phone numbers for computers, pagers, faxes, cell phones, etc, but is it really THAT extreme?
The minor reason is that the USA dosn't have all of the +1 number space the major reason is that a 7 digit "local number" is too small for many urban areas, but also too large for sparsly populated areas. But 3-3-4 (or 3-7) format is hardcoded in too many places to easily change.
> Better yet: One number, period.
Yes, you could think of the spare 2 digits as a "port"
> The nature of the call is detected and handled accordingly.
Yes, I don't see why we couldn't have a packet sent first identifying the device type & connection.
i.e. I fax someone. The fax sends a digital identification, saying it would like a fax connection. Or I connect via TCP/IP to the same number, and the first packet signifies a IP connection. I phone, the first packet signals an voice connection. etc.
I guess it's a just a matter of time before everything converges into one data stream.
But this is a relatively new thing even for us. Until a year ago, Southwestern Bell simply avoided assigning the same exchanges (those ten-thousand number blocks the article refers to) on both sides of the line, at least within the metro area. Just a few years ago, they divided the 913 (Kansas) AC, splitting off the larger part as 785, and 816 (Missouri) to create 660 in the rural areas. In doing so, they freed up over half the exchanges in each area code, but still claim that forcing us to use 10 digits is necessary.
I understand that 10-digit dialling is a must for New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and a few other areas that just have too many phone lines to fit. Lots of companies test market their new products in KC because we're a good cross-section of America. And I think our Dial 10 change a year ago was precisely a test of customer reaction to the system. We didn't react as violently as the poor schmucks in Californication that dial a 1 for all calls, even local ones!
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SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
There's your Bull. I can't wait for the cutover to catch up to all the phone switches so it's all 10 digit enabled.
John
John
Most people use auto-dial anyways..
jonkatz@slashdot.org
There is also the concept of permissive dialing. Even though it's NOT REQUIRED to dial the area code, I've long looked forward to being able to put in the whole telephone number (e.g. 1-212-345-6789) in my laptop's list of ISP's telephone numbers, and let the telco sort things out.
This is something in which is probably the norm outside of North America. Since long before laptops were even invented. Even hardware which belongs in a museum can manage this, so far as modern computer controlled kit is concerned its probably a standard feature.
The logic being "if I dial these digits it will always work. If I happen to know I'm in the same area I can dial this shorter set of digits"
Indeed it looks almost as though the USA made a design decision to make humans help machines.
BT/Oftel in the UK has changed the length of the telephone number 3 times in my recent memory, added and split area codes. London is onto its 3rd set of area codes in recent history. Actually make that 4 because where I grew up we had short std code dialing and that went away as some point as well.
The short "local codes" always were an alternative option. "Permisive dialing" (as the American's call it) was part of the system from the start. Even though allowing it could cause certain exchanges to "trombone", remember that all the routing was originally hardwired through relays. (Part of the point of the short codes is that they worked as explicit routing instructions.)
It's not that big of a deal...you get used to it, especially with speed dial.
In the greater (lesser?) Phoenix, AZ area we have 10-digit dialing, which won out over the "overlay" plan for the A/C split that US West first proposed. What's dumb is the inconsistency in the need to dial 1+. For calls to the "special" area codes in our area, you cannot dial 1+ but for calls elsewhere, you must dial 1+. Really dumb. Thank goodness the cellphone providers take care of this so you can program your cellphone with 1+ for everywhere.
I guess it's a just a matter of time before everything converges into one data stream.
Aahh... the promised land!
John
(that's {985209B0-CBCC-11d4-991D-00A0C029468C} to you...)
John
What's interesting is that Northern VA and Maryland currently have 10 digit dialing, but here in the District of Columbia its still 7 digit. I remember in the distant past when DC and Northern VA (703) had separate area codes, but did not have overlapping prefixes so you didn't have to dial 202 if you were dialing to a DC number from 703. When they changed that and forced people to dial 202 to call numbers in DC everyone had a hissy fit. Then everyone forgot about it and went on with their lives :)
Most area codes in the NE US are close together and cover a small geographic area anyway, so I don't see it as such a big deal.
As far as IPV6/symbolic phone numbers go, didn't we just have a discussing on that recently? Sounds like a bad idea...how do you type "jane_doe@123.main.st.anytown.usa" on your cell phone while you're driving? I know that's a little silly, but still, I think that we have a better time remember a short sequence (i.e. 10 digits!) of numbers than somebody's URL.
Putting the sig back into +1, Insightful since 1995!
> thats why they have such good cell phone
> networks because the land lines networks are
> outdated shit. Have you ever tried to get a
> long distance line in Germany? It's a nightmere,
> easier to tell the people you want to talk
> to to call you if the are in the US, ATT may
> be the evil empire but at least they are
> good at what they do.
You are kidding, right? When was the last time you did a long distance call in gemany? 1969? Since about 5 years now they have finished changing all PBX to digital, even in the smallest villages. You can get ISDN lines for about $15/month, less than what you have to pay for 2 analog lines, and a lot of people have ISDN in their homes. No more touch tone or other analog crap.
There is, of course, alot of bad stuff as well
When 1+ dialling came into effect, they had a jingle on the TV and radio, at least around these parts:
So, the only restriction is on local exchanges and area codes. Here in Kansas City, there can't be any 913-816-xxxx numbers or 816-913-xxxx numbers, but Southwestern Bell is absolutely free to use those exchanges in, say, Paola, KS and St. Joseph, MO, with no trouble at all. We also couldn't use 913-913-xxxx or 816-816-xxxx here locally, because it is permittedfor us to dial our own area code for a local call. But there's still no reason why those can't be used away from the state line.For those truly massive metros that require multiple area codes, it would be necessary that none of the area code numbers be used as exchanges in any of them. But there are 792 (8 * 99, because an exchange can't end in 11) theoretically possible exchanges for each area code, so even if scores of them are declared ineligible, we're talking about well over seven million potential numbers per area code. Allowing for some underuse in various exchanges, let's make it an even five million.
We've got 640 (8 * 80, excluding xyy patterns) possible geographic area codes, even allowing for massive expansion of non-geographic codes. Since each state, province, and district requires one area code, even if there are much less than five million phones, we ought to knock that number down to 600.
By my math, that gives us 3 billion geographically-allocated numbers in North America right now, and we're nowhere near needing that many.
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SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Great... Now I have a bigger chance of misdialing the number with my fat fingers. Damn you telco!!!!
-Psyanide-
The driver behind this has been that when the phone numbers were first assigned most people didn't have a phone line but plans were put into place for a phone line in every home. So whilst we were in a situation where most homes had one line we were OK for numbers however now the norm is approaching
Actually the problem is exactly the same as with the NANP. Plenty of numbers but in the wrong place. Indeed the UK plan is ever worst in some ways, since the original design was worked out around each STD code covering a specific amount of geographical area.
The NANP was more flexiable in this respect, but considerably more complex in terms of charging.
They've been doing 10-digit dialing in Maryland for years now. It sucked at first, but now I don't even think about typing the area code for locals calls,it just happens.
Ok.. first time I've posted on here for AGES.. but you're wrong.
The code is 020. The number is the next 8 digits. YES, Central London numbers start with a 7, Outer London numbers start with an 8, but the local part of the number IS 8 DIGITS.
In the future there'll be 020 6xxx xxxx numbers etc as demand increases.
While the FCC is at it why don't they dump POTS (Plain ordinary Telephone System) and mandate digital service to go along with mandatory 10 digit dialing.
POTS is 100+ years old (1880s?), ISDN was introduced 25+ years ago, and VoIP although new, is based on standards developed for video conferening over ISDN. It is time for the telcos and the FCC to check the calendar and see what century we are in (okay, okay, wait 26 days and then check it).
They should also mandate barcode readers (in the handset) so that you can simply scan in the number off of a business card or advertisement. Just in case someone hasn't patented the idea, I consider publishing something on Slashdot to consitute prior art.
The economic spin offs of requiring digital phone service to the home should far outway the costs. Let the hacking begin!
They should just allow us to use the other 4 DTMF tones (A, B, C and D). That would increase the number of combinations greatly. Not many people know about this, but EVERY tone generating device is capable of generating these additional 4 tones--all that is required is 4 more buttons...
Cool! Amazing Toys.
Not splitting up the STD codes by provider. There is no reason at all that C&W need to have 0500 for free calls, while BT had 0800. This would have halfed the requirements for special area codes.
Worst are the premium rate codes, which really IMHO should have gone into a special numbering space, undialable from outside the UK. i.e. numbers starting with 1.
It was March 2000 that the 10 digit dialing was enforced. It was optional in January, and announce (stupid Ma Bell message in my VMB) in Nov. or Dec.
This said, for a while, I was able to dial 7-digit after March, but only rarely. And there was no rhyme or reason to it, sometimes a 7 would work, other times not -- even the same number.
By April every call I made required 10 digit.
I live in Houston, Tx and I used to live in Dallas. I've been dialing 10 digits for 5 years now. So what you dial 3 extra numbers. You can easly tell if it's long distance if you put the 1 before the # ie... 1-123-456-7890.
The problem stems way back to the dawn of the phone company. Since there is no "enter" key on a telephone, the length of a phone number must be either fixed or predictable.
The solution chosen was quite a simple one, and I'm amazed that more people have never noticed it. It is thus: The second digit of all area codes is either a zero or a one. Thus, if the second digit dialed in is a zero or a one, the phone switch will wait for 10 digits as opposed to just seven.
This was the original plan which was simple for the hardware 50 years ago to understand. IIRC the NANP never actually fully followed this in the first place.
It is important to note that this does not mean that there is a shortage of phone numbers. Well, there is a shortage, but it is a ficticious one, created by the way in which phone numbers are allocated. Phone numbers are allocated in blocks of 1000 consecutive numbers which all go to the same local switch.
10,000 line blocks of numbers (or more specifically 10,000 line "local switches") go right back to the original idea for automated telephone systems. It's utterly obsolete WRT any equiptment which has been available for decades.
Look. What D/FW did is not the same as this change that's being proposed. 10 digit dialing is NOT just forcing everyone to type the 1 and then their full area code and phone number. 10 digit dialing is a fundamental change in the way the North American phone system works. North American users have some preconceptions of how billing will take place when they see a "1" (or absence of one) in a number. This will no longer work. Believe it or not (I used to work for Lucent), the phone companies have been upgrading their software and hardware for almost 10 years now to make this possible. A single phone number, you can take it with you anywhere in the world. No such thing as "area codes" at all... period. That IS going to happen. But the consumer advocates have [some valid] concerns. Scam artists will have a hayday during the transition period, etc etc.
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It would be easier if area codes were more logically assigned.
When the NANP was originally created there was a lot of logic to it. Just that since then bits and pieces have been added on all over the place.
Take your example of a city with 10 random area codes (fictitious I believe since I don't know of any city with that many. Maybe LA...). Having to remember 1 of 10 area codes is essentially the same as remembering a single extra digit, not 3 extra digits.
The point is how would you then change the US over to 8 digit local dialing. One possible way would be to add a digit onto the end of the 7 digit number and have a completly new set of area codes, problem would be finding a way to do these in a way which does not conflict with the existing numbering. This is something which would have been easier when the second digit of the area code was 0 or 1...
Yes, there is that rule. That never struck me as particularly the reason that telephone numbers were allocated as seven digits.
It's historical, very historical. The original idea being a 3 letter abreviation and a 4 digit number.
I'm a bit torn on this one.
...uh, something else. (No idea what, but I'm guessing they're "special rate" like 50/min or something, like our 09*.* range.)
With the UK numbering system we have variable length area codes (!) and subsequently variable length local codes (to make them up to 11 digits).
As Lord Pixel said, London is currently the only one with a three-digit area code (020). The four-number codes are easy enough to identify if you know the pattern (01x1, eg 0151 for Liverpool, 0161 for Manchester etc). The rest are 5-digits.
I've personally taken to writing numbers "(xxx) yyyy yyyy" where (xxx) is the area code, but this doesn't work. (It should. All the 019xx codes, for example, should be grouped together to form one local area, but that would make a call from Warwickshire (01926 - more or less in the south) to Newcastle (0191 - way up north, near the Scottish border) a local call. Can't see that happening.)
Our system, however, does seem to have finally sorted itself out; numbers beginning with 00 indicate an international call, 01 or 02 indicates a national call, 03 thru 06 are reserved for expansion (ooh, look, forward planning), 07 are solely for mobiles, pages and the like, 08 are freecall and special rate, and 09 are premium rate (adult chatlines, 60p/min calls etc). (Admittedly, these aren't all up and running yet, as they're being implemented in a step-by-step crossover method to prevent numbers from just suddenly not working, but it's a start.)
(To see these in better detail, take a look here.)
I can't be sure if the USA phone structure is similarly divided into mobile numbers, premium rate, land lines etc so I won't make some ill-informed hypothesis on the topic. (Hey, stop laughing at the back.) From what I gather, however, the American system dictates that numbers beginning with 0 are toll free, and numbers beginning with 1 are
Personally, I have to admit I prefer having the numbers all split up like the UK system; at least when I see "01" or "02" at the start of a number, I know it's a land line.
Even if the two or three digits following it are a bit of a lottery.
No boom today. Boom tomorrow. Always boom tomorrow. BOOM!
All current 3 digit area codes could be converted to 4 digit by appending a 1.. then 2-9 would be used for additional area codes.
Except that it would probably make more sense to have bigger "local numbers" than more area codes. With lots of area codes you run into the problem with the area either being some subset of a meaningful area or several area codes covering the same area. i.e. a 3-8 split makes more sense than a 4-7 split.
I imagine the problem was older switching equipment not being upgraded as quickly as needed.
John
John
Actually its 10, I was asleep.
You dial xxx-xxx-xxxx
You HAVE to dial all 10, its not that big a deal. I have access (local calling) to way over a few million people in the Atlanta area, its pretty nice
Jeremy
Don't you think they could just make different sets of plates, eg. commercial and residental..etc. Different color plates... You know like subnetting an IP range.
I traded in my angst and all I got was this lousy ennui.
PEOPLE THAT USE CELL PHONES WHILE DRIVING SHOULD BURN IN HELL!!!
Seriously, I like the idea of converting all the phone numbers to IP addresses. If this can't be done, just do it for the new digital wireless phones. Those will just become more and more common.
You could dial a person by punching the IP of their phone, or have a way of fingering the phone company they're with. I suppose it would be good to use speed dial on these things, so that people you call often still use only one number.
Or here's another idea - stretch ICQ to include phones! It's practically designed for it!
I dunno, this obviously would take some thought and I'm just spouting ideas that surface.
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Vidi, Vici, Veni
If they're business calls most phones and cell phones nowdays can be programmed to dial whatever area code you want. Unless you enter one manually it does it for you...so you're back down to doing seven. Okey-Dokey?
I traded in my angst and all I got was this lousy ennui.
Well, it seems to me that they are going to have to upgrade/replace those anyway, when the measly 200 new area codes (from the 10-digit dialing idea) are exhausted after six months to a year, (seeing as weve gone through almost all the 800 new ones in less than six years, and the growth is better than linear) and they/we have to go to 11 digit dialing. So twelve months down the road, we all have to dial 11 digits all the time when it could be done now and we would only have to dial 8 digits for local calls for a good stretch longer. (Without annoying new area codes!)
I wonder where they will end up to adding the 11th digit anyway. Probably area codes. That wont be more annoying for people.
(Incidentally, I wonder if you can also tell me why they tend to keep exchanges in the same town close together numerically, but seem to put area codes in the same state as numerically far away as possible.)
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Can anyone think of any reason the telcos didn't take this approach? The whole point of this is to eliminate area codes altogether. The slashdot reaction is a perfect example of how radical this change is going to be. The public can just not comprehend number portability yet. This sort of reenforces the concern of consumer advocates. If a techie community like /. has such difficulty in global number portability, can you imagine the chaos it will cause in with the general public?
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Bad argument! Things are bad, so let's make them worse? Bzzzzt!
It is unnaceptable that calls can be charged without your knowledge. Would you eat in a place that did not tell you how much your meal cost until you finished eating? "Oh, but you have to make that call anyway" you might say. No, I do not and I'll make up my mind.
What's to keep a system like this from rotating numbers from charge to non charge? At 12 it's cheap or part of your service at 1PM it's expensive. Suppose your ISP's number becomes a charge call? Suppose you want to dial a coumputer across town? How do you know that your hour long data exchange is not going to cost you? Such stuff agrivated me when I lived in south Florida where it was difficult to tell.
London was always meant to be unified; 0171, 0181 were temporary measures to scrape some space in the old overcrowded numeric space.
Actually the London split was a huge mistake...
The system doesn't quite work like it used to, but the first 3 numbers is the exchange, which used to relate directly to a building somehwere nearby where all the physical phone lines for all the numbers with that exchange connected.
Actually to a very large pile of relays. This was the best part of a century ago. The buildings may still exist but now contain much smaller pieces of hardware, the basic unit of which is a concentrator which connects around 100 lines to a either a 1.5M (NA) or 2M(rest of the world) digital link. These will scale pretty much indefinitly.
It was a starting place. I assume that some of those technologies will get more and more multiplexed and multifunctional so that less numbers will be necessary. I especially envision faxes becoming rarer and hopefully modems. Besides, by adding a digit you can make 2 numbers per person into 20 numbers per person. Which should be more than enough.
I do not have a signature
Speaking of the election, there is growing friction between small towns and big cities. Gore was clearly favored in high population areas and Bush in rural areas. I think Slashdotters need to be reminded that not everybody has the same high-tech amenities. I used to live in a town (population 18,000) with no local dial-up ISP's. I hate to think how long it'll be until they get cable modems and DSL.
By the way, I've spent half my life as a "city boy" and half as a "country boy", so I don't use either term in a truly derogatory way. Just sticking up for the under-represented country boys in this case.
AlpineR
Hope you are right about it getting better.
Also, I still think there is a place for circuit switched technology in phone networks...
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Make wireless phones use IPs? Um, if IP addresses were so easy to remember, we would be using them in place of name. For example, we'd all go to http://64.28.67.48/ instead of http://slashdot.org/ to read /.
And what happens when (if) we move to IPv6? Do you really want to have to dial numbers that long?
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"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
For dialing nationally, to a different area code, everyone already must dial 1-NPA-EXC-xxxx where NPA is the area code, and EXC is the exchange number (now an outdated idea in some areas) plus the 4-digit local number. For calls within the same NPA (area code), one could just dial EXC-xxxx. Calls outside the area code are dialed NPA-EXC-xxxx for a local (toll free) call or 1-NPA-EXC-xxxx for a toll call.
Here in Minnesota, I can dial xxx-xxxx for a number in central Minneapolis, 651-xxx-xxxx for St. Paul, 763-xxx-xxx for the northwest suburbs, 952-xxx-xxx for the southwst suburbs all as a local call. For a long-distance call, like to my parents in the northwest part of the state, I dial a 1-218-xxx-xxxx.
If we had area codes starting with 1 (which could only be done with 10 digits) it would look something like 151-xxx-xxxx which would start with a 1, like a long distance call, but would be local. Which is where the confusion (understandably) comes up.
Oh, and North American phone numbers are of fixed-length, so we can't simply make numbers longer without a fundamental change in the system. (Like other countries which may have numbers that are area code + either 7 or 8 digits long) Which would be just as difficult as changing systems to allow area codes that start with a 1 or 0.
Photos of bits of the past hiding in the present: afiler.com
------ Work is so much easier when you don't
With my penis.
The system doesn't quite work like it used to, but the first 3 numbers is the exchange, which used to relate directly to a building somehwere nearby where all the physical phone lines for all the numbers with that exchange connected. So, each that's why many people in the same area will have similar numbers. They've changed it though (obviuosly), so this isn't the case everywhere.
"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it."
Time is fun when you're having flies.
-Kermit the Frog
If that was the case no one would remember IP addresses, and it seems like most people have no problem in that department.
OK, I posted too fast. Seems they are doing this for pretty much my reasoning. Just transpose my argument for when they jack us up to 12
The ivory tower has never had to reach so h
It seems the real issue is long distance. In Texas we pay a lot more to call to the city next door than a city across the country, or, sometimes, even across the world. This is a scam. The benefit of 10 digit dialing, which we may or may not see, is the end of long distance. There is little economic reason to separate long distance and local calls. In Texas, the reason is orrupt state(yes Bush) and local government that allows the likes of SBC and Time Warner to bilk customers in exchange for gratuities to state and local officials.
If the FCC forces 10 digit dialing, and MCI or Sprint get it into their head that they can get a constant 50 or 60 dollars a month from people who wish to buy a block of time, we may in fact see real innovation in our phone usage.
1) the last thing i wanna see is your ugly mug when i'm talkin' to ya. ;)
2) i'm POSITIVE we can come up with better ways to spend our bandwidth than sending video and voice streaming data of your ugly mug (previously mentioned) over the internet.
3) videophones would make it alot harder to lie to your boss when you're calling in sick.
4) the pr0n lines would love videophones, eh?
just a few thoughts.
eudas
Blessed is he who expects the worst, for he shall not be disappointed.
Who says we can't have DNS over wireless? And most people use electronic phone books and speed dialing. IP's would be the extreme background number, and we would have shortcuts to avoid typing in all the numbers...
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Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Let's say you are a small phone company. All of your customers have phone numbers like this: 527-XXXX. Even if you only have a thousand customers, no one else is assigned the rest of those 527 numbers.
You can find out more information from the The North American Numbering Council
Verizon has been warning customers in eastern Massachusetts that they will be going to 10 digit numbers in the spring. Currently it is optional to dial 10 digits, although 7 will still work. In the spring (I don't remember when) we will HAVE to dial 10 digits. All of this stems from the area codes that they are adding overlayed with the existing ones. This will cause any given area to have two area codes that will mandate 10 digit dialing.
Actually, most individuals can only store a limited number of digits in short term memory. So, if someone shouted that their telephone number was 4252603763, would you be able to memorize that information without the aid of pencil/paper/palm?
Twelve digit dialing is 382929392939.
time to invest in the company that makes the yellow sticky notes...
eudas
Blessed is he who expects the worst, for he shall not be disappointed.
That's an Urban legand. When we switched from five to seven digits, people said the same thing.
Most, if not all telephone switches in the US today support ten digit dialing. Go ahead, try it. Dial:
1-<your-area-code>-<some-friend-in-your-a rea-code>
A 10-digit number should be acceptable provided that each new section is a shared area code that can be remembered separately.
If it is simply a long string of evidently random digits, won't the bells run up against the theoretical "average" digit memorization length of 10? If you present a string of digits to a random test subject and ask them to recite those digits, most will falter after the tenth.
For people who change their home addresses and thus their phone numbers frequently, an 11-12 digit number might result is lots of recollection failures. One thing the telco's have not experienced yet is user support for people who have forgotten their home phone numbers!
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
Since people in Atlanta are TOO FUCKING STUPID to remember 10 digits I suppose.
Just to clarify my above post: I realize that if you dial the area code for a local call, it doesn't charge you. My point is that with the new system you might think you're making a local call when it's actually toll.
"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it."
Time is fun when you're having flies.
-Kermit the Frog
Read it.. its written by/for the LA area, which I can assure you does NOT have 10 digit dialing...
This is yet another example of people assuming everything applies to them. Guess what, IT DOESN'T. This article, despite your huge ego, was apparently not written for you. Don't assume that it sucks because it doesn't apply, just realize that it doesn't apply and move on.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
I live in the Washington, DC area, and we have ten-digit dialing for all local calls. While it's always possible to use 11-digit dialing (1+NXX+xxx-xxxx) for all calls, the ability to dial a call without the leading '1' means that that the call is some variety of local call. The conversion to universal 10-digit dialing (and allowing phone number starting with '1') will make it very difficult to determine the class of a particular call without a lookup of some sort.
Way back in '92, the Greater Toronto Area (416) split into 416 and 905 geographically, so anyone outside of Metro had to change their numbers to 905 area codes.
Well, not even a decade later, numbers have run out again. Both 416 *and* 905 have started to run out, so each is getting a new area code. 416 will be adding 647 and 905 will be adding 249. This time around though, there will be no geographical split, so all calls be be 10-digit required.
Alot of people are pissed off about this, but everyone agrees it's alot better than having to change your actual area code.
Me? I don't mind, I've all ready got all my numbers in my cell switched to 10 digits anyways since I travel between 905 and 416 regularly.
I just think it's odd that I've have four local calling codes now, and my neighbours might have a different area code than me. But then again, people went through the same back in the '60s when Bell switched from four digits to seven.
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
However, i don't see why it was necessary - as far as i can tell, it would have been better in every way just to expand area codes to four digits.
- It would solve the 212 / 646 problem - in Manhattan, there's an overlay of 212 and 646. Businesses -hate- getting stuck with a 646 number, because 212 is supposedly more prestigous. But all they would have had to do is take ever number of the form 212-XXX-YYYY and change it to 2120-XXX-YYYY, and give 2121 through 2129 numbers to all new subscribers.
- People could keep seven digit dialing.
- I haven't done the math, but i'm pretty sure that four-digit ACs allow for more phone numbers than the current system, even if we had stuck with the "area codes have a 0 or 1 in the middle, and the first three digits of phone numbers will never look like an area code" system.
- It would be easier to memorize area codes, and be able to look at a phone number and know where it is. If i see a 617 number, i know it's a Massachutsetts. With 4 digit ACs, i would see a 617x number and know it's Mass. But when i see some overlaid area code that doesn't at all resemble 617, i'm not going to have any idea where it's from.
Can anyone think of any reason the telcos didn't take this approach?(BTW, cheap plug, since i'm pretty confident this will get moderated up: Check out the project linked to by my sig. It's pretty phat.)
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Mod up a post Rob doesn't like and you'll never mod again
If you read the article, you will see that California was complaining about the fact that only half of the numbers were being used while phone companies requested new area codes. The reason for this should be obvious, but isn't.
When someone stops using a phone number, phone companies wait a significant amount of time before reassigning it. This is done to prevent people from dialing a new customer thinking they are the old one by accident. Statistics are often kept on how often a discontinued line is dialed. Once this rate falls below a certain mark, the number is flagged for reuse.
In addition, phone companies really do not like assigning similar numbers unless a company requests an exchange to themselves. If I was 555-1212 and you were 555-1213, the chances of your friends dialing me and vice versa goes up dramatically.
So which would you prefer? Dialing 10 digits, dialing new area codes for the town next door, or having phone numbers reused so quickly that you dial your friend's old number by accident only to find a stranger? When people misdial someone quite often, phone companies often allow the victim to switch their phone number *again* for free. This can be a pretty nasty loop.
I have an email address for my phone - emails get converted into SMS messages. The email address for phones here is generally `phonenum@provider.whatever`, so pretty guessable.
You could always use BigFoot or some other redirector, but bigfoot is being a bit crap at the moment with delays, perhaps everyone is doing this! Still, with an emailable phone, you can avoid the 10p per SMS charge that is so popular here (UK) by just emailing from Rocketmail.
In the suburbs of Philadelphia where I lived until I went off to college, people are already required to dial all 10 digits of a phone number. The area codes 484 and 610 are overlayed. How this works is that someone across the street from you can have a different area code from you. I am not sure why they decided on this but they did.
One other thing is that, I have heard a good number of people asking for cell phones, pagers, etc. to have their own area code. Well I am not sure how true this is, but I heard the argument that when that happens, the local telcos will lose a certain amount in leverage in gaining revenues from cell phone companies. This is the case because the cell phone companies would more easily go through a competitive local exchange carrier (clec), and by pass the old Bell networks. So That is why you might see some foot dragging in getting that to be the case.
I live in the D.C. area, in Northern Virginia, a ten minute drive into the city. We only started even having to use area codes for local numbers about two months ago. Ten-digit dialing hasn't been standard here for three years, not by a long shot. Even when we started having to use area codes for local calls, two months ago, people started complaining. Now, I wasn't one of those people, and I understand the need for modernized phone number systems. However, I can understand how people, especially older people and the less educated, can see such changes as an added burden.
That being said, it's a necessary step for future expandability. For now, at least. But, I bet that eventually, within the next 20 years at the accelarating pace of technology, telephone numbers and most telephone lines themselves will be passe. Cable and fiber and wireless are the future--telephone lines are just such puny creatures with such small bandwidth--and I honestly think that most calls will be routed through cyberspace in the future. Why have to remember a 10 digit phone number, when you can pick up a receiver and say: "John Laws, hampden-Sydney, Virginia," the first time, and then just pick up the receiver and say "John Laws" any time after the first? It's coming within the next two decades, three at the most.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, *The Annals*
This is news? I've lived in Atlanta and Baltimore, both on 10-digit dialing for quite some time now.
What the FCC needs to adopt is an IPv6 addressing scheme. That way every toaster in our home can have a phone numb... oh, wait, that's something else.
-Chris
...More Powerful than Otto Preminger...
because once fax machines get replaced by email, pagers get merged with cellphones, and houses don't get phone numbers for second lines that are outgoing only (ie: modem's) or just replaced by DSL, then we are going to have plenty of phone numbers left...
Think about it, nine digits is 1 billion different phone numbers.. population us=270mil
thanks.
Really? This is not the case on my cell phone, I dial local calls with 7 digits.
Shut up, be happy. The conveniences you demanded are now mandatory. -- Jello Biafra
Personally, I can only remember 6. This means that if I want to go from my computer (where I have the telephone number for someone) to my phone (in another room), I need to write down the number or I will forget it.
Strangely, I can remember some IP addresses (though actually, only about six). In that case, though, I'm remembering groups of 2-or-3 digits. Makes you wonder why I can't remember phone numbers as groups-of-3 followed by groups-of-4. Memory is a strange thing.
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
So when will they be coming out with hexidecimal touchtone phones?
"Family Steakhouse: phone DEADBEEF for reservations."
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
What I saw was 0224-21279 for a local call... Or, a particularly nice one, 031-0568091
These are from Telecom Italia, by the way. The numbers are infinitely different depending on the service you use as well. (Mobile, stationary, digitally switched, etc..)
It took about two months to learn the system, during which, I carried around a scrap of paper in my wallet with some assists on it. Didn't take long at all to learn.
However, you can take a look at first, WHY the FCC is thinking of this (They're running out of phone numbers) and correlate it to IP addresses.
While the current IP string is fine for most networks, setting up a network with dedicated IP addresses is getting more and more difficult. This is primarily due to what I call first octet squatters. Given the number of independent networks around the world, it's quite feasible to give each locale a Third Octet string (instead of the usual second) This would allow for approximately 64000 network connections in a local area.
Folks, No local network I've EVER heard of had 64K comps hooked up to it. That's plenty of address space. For the most part, privatized networks have realized this, and have gone to splitting the same octet between themselves and an associate.
Unfortunately, there are quite a few number hogs out there, and regardless of the amount of computers that could feasibly be connected (with only three primary Octets allocated you get around 49 MILLION, 500 THOUSAND independent IP allocations)with the third octet string instead of the second.
So called "Plank owners" of the internet need to wake up and smell the coffee. Secularizing the second, or first octet string is effectively the same as driving a bus sideways across a 6 lane freeway at 5 mph. Major startup ISP companies that got their go in the late 80's and are now pretty much defunct (Compuserve) are guilty of this as well.
Many people don't see this as a problem. They tend to think like I did, (until I saw it for myself)which was "with 4.294967296 BILLION IP addresses, we'll never run out of space."
The phone companies thought the same way.
krystal_blade
It will be easy to motivate our fellow man; there is hardly anything people treasure more than not being annihilated.
Here (in the UK) the first 2 digits are use to clasify the type of phone, for example:
- 01, 02 geographical
- 07 - mobile
- 08 - free
- 09 - premium
amongst the others. There is no need to give mobile phones a geographical code, since they are mobile by nature.To continue the example I'm in edinburgh where the numbers are like:
where 0131 is the area code and lll specifies a locality and nnn the rest of the number. Different areas have different amounts of numbers after their area code to deal with demand. The area code itself isn't always 4 digits:You can find a lot of info about this on the net.
I think you missed the point that people are complaining about (not that I blame you...I KNEW what the problem was (from my dad, who works in the industry), and I had to read the article three times to find it).
This would be 10 digit dialing to everyone, everywhere in the USA, all the time. You would NEVER have to dial 1 for a toll call; all calls 10 digits, all the time (0, 911, 311, 411, 611 excepted of course). So, some "consumer advocates" are concerned that people would be too stupid to figure out whether they are making a toll call when they don't have to dial a 1 (even though most people don't know what the leading 1 really means anyway).
Not having to assign special meaning to the leading 1 means that another 100 area codes open up, and the system not having to figure out whether you will be dialing 10 or 7 digits means that you can add exchanges starting with 0 and 1, for another 2x10^6 numbers per area code. Plus, the system becomes much LESS confusing for the users, as it will always be the same procedure for making a call, and you will never have your phone number (area code) changed out from under you again.
Having lived in Los Angeles county, all of my 28 years, I'll gladly take anything that will keep us from splitting area codes. The local phone companies, Pacific Bell and GTE, have done an extremly poor job of managing these changes. Within a 50 mile radius we've gone from 2 area codes to 11 or 12. To make matters worse many cities have more than one, so you can't guess. LA alone has 5.
It's actually 7 'chunks'. So following that rule, yes, "five-five-five-one-two-one-two" for many would reach the capacity of their short-term memory, but "five-five-five-twelve-twelve" would not. Obviously, this varies from person to person.
I've been living in D.C. for a few years where we have 10-digit dialing. It's easy because it's based on geography (202 is D.C., 703 is Virginia, etc.), but I can see it being problematic when you have more than one area code in a given geographic region. I couldn't think in terms of "Virginia 555-1212", so it becomes more items to remember, and therefore more difficult.
[I find it quite dry, but for anyone who's in to this sort of thing, you can find the article that established this '7 chunk' limit at here.]
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The other thing, and this isn't a psychological theory but just something I've noticed, is that I really don't remember certain area codes as sequences of numbers anymore. For example, where I'm from in michigan, the area code is 616. No one from there tells me their area code, I just know it. And I don't put any effort into remembering it. It's getting to be like that with my new area code (520) as well. I imagine it's something akin to a Chinese speaker remembering a certain pictograph; the area code only takes up one "chunk" of memory. And if we were this familiar with, say, the area code AND the LATA, then all we'd really have to remember as a sequence would be somebody's last 4 numbers.
it's more :
you call the 7 digits and get somebody you didn't expect...
Los Angeles is a backwater place where the population is less than the crowd at the local football stadium ? Read the article before posting nonsense.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
psxndc
The emacs religion: to be saved, control excess.
But outraged consumer advocates and state regulators say adopting 10-digit dialing is unnecessary and would create confusion about the distinction between a local and long-distance call.
I can see a point here, but only kind of. Traditionally, when you dial a number with a "1" at the front, you are going to get charged. Without the "1" it is free. All of that is out the window with this change.
BUT! I'm in Verizon's monopoly and routinely dial a 7 digit number (no "1"'s anywhere) and get charged. Granted, I was pissed the first time, but now I'm used to it. In fact, nowadays, I completely ignore whether it is long distance or not. Partly because the charges are peanuts and I now have an income, but mostly because I now usually use my mobile which doesn't differentiate between a free or toll call.
Since over a year ago Philadelphia switched over to a 10 digit system, what this means is I have to dial 10 digits no matter what. So, 215-xxx-xxxx even though it's the phone next door. If I get a new line put in, it might be 610-xxx-xxxx even though it's in the same house with 215. It's not bad at all really, after the initial switch over. I just hope that they budget numbers a little better, rather than sticking them in huge blocks like they used to.
People who are too damned lazy to hit 3 more buttons should be shot. It took a little getting used to when they switched to it in my area (Philadelphia) back in January, but it did not take long at all before it became second nature. I hate whiners!
~Philly
If that was the case no one would remember IP addresses, and it seems like most people have no problem in that department.
Huh? If people could easily remm=ember IP addresses, we wouldn't need DNS.
While many network geeks may be able to remember IPs, they are hardly representative fo the population as a whole.
I know the IPs I know because they're all on the same network and start with the same 6 digits, so all i really have to "remember" is the last 6. If I had to truly memorize all 12 for every system I wouldn't have a chance...
---------------------------------------------
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
Here in Toronto, we're all going to 10-digit dialling all the time anyway on Jan. 8, 2001. Me, I'm breathing a sigh of relief, since now I won't have to remember if that (905) number needs or doesn't need the (1+)AC dialled from my (416) phone. Also, all the other calls I ever make from home are long-distance, anyway, so I don't care. But Bell Canada loves me, this I know, for my phone bill tells me so...
I'm not a geek, I'm just a clever script.
Here's the address for the "big switchover"
http://www.addthecode.com/
Does it make you happy you're so strange?
They revamped our area codes at the same time, and they are a single digit -- that's right: ten area codes for the whole continent! My area code, 08, (all long distance numbers begin with '0') covers more than half the continent, area-wise. I'm not so sure about the wisdom of this area code scheme, but the 8-digit local numbers are pretty nifty.
Oh, and mobile phones have their own area code, 04. You Americans should do this; it is packed with much subtle goodness.
'Course, what we really need is DNS for telephones.
I was living in Denver when it switched to 10 digit dialing. To tell the truth, it was a pain in the arse. 8 mos later, I was still occasionally forgetting area codes from the numbers (force of habit, and the fact that a lot of written/printed numbers hadn't been updated to include the area code.) To make things worse, the really crappy local phone company, US West, allowed the phone ring up to 5 times before a message cut in to tell you of your mistake. I don't know why they couldn't do it faster, it was really irritating.
Ok, I'm going to stop this before it degenerates into "Boy, those stupid lusers. What's the big deal about 10 digits?"
It's simple, really. Studies in short term memory have shown that only 7-9 things can effectively fit there. It is no coincidence that phone numbers are 7 digits in length. For local calls, this makes perfect sense. For long distance, the other three numbers are memorized as a separate three digits. So you remember a three digit number, and a seven digit number. Both within the realm of human capacity. If we switch to 10+ digit phone numbers as a norm, things won't be so easy.
There are memory mneumonics that can be used to compress 10+ numbers down to something easier to remember, but unless we want to start teaching psychological memory techniques in our high schools, most people will not know them.
I, for one, don't want to have to sit and stare at every phone number I ever see, reciting it until it's successfully transferred into long-term memory. Phone books would also be a pain. Imagine looking something up, remembering the numbers only to reach for the phone and only remember *most* of the phone number you were about to dial. Gee, that's just so useful.
Adding more numbers *will not* solve the problem. We just need to spread them out in a more efficient manner. We already have 7 digits, that's 100 million numbers per area code. Even with only 10 area codes, that's 1 billion phone numbers. Personally, I don't understand why we're having so much trouble.
--
Shaun Thomas: INN Programmer
Read: Rabbit Rue - Free serial nove
For most adults that need to talk to more people than can be pre-programmed into their phone, this is a royal pain in the ass. I make up to 200 business calls in a day, and this will increase my key strokes - well, you're supposed to be numerate, you work it out. And don't forget to add the extra time involved either.
The biggest problem is the mind-blowingly stupid way the US phone companies insist on having cell phone numbers in the same block as the local copper lines!!! Duh, what's the point in this? Look at NY. They have a seperate code for cells, and it works just great. And that's how most other countries of the world do it too. That's exactly how the rest of the country should handle it.
The point here is that dialing 10 digits for a local call is both stupid and unnecessary. Get it together and have seperate codes only for location and cell phones. 7 digit local dialling inside those locations should stay.
Portland, OR has been doing it now for almost a year. Once you get used to it it's no big deal.. not like adding an area code and changing everyone's numbers. 10 digit dialing is just about adding the area code to the front and I'd take that over new area codes every week any day.
Personally, I find it quite annoying when travelling to dial a 7-digit local number only to find that I needed to dial the area code too, or to dial the area code and be told by a recording that it wasn't necessary. Moving to mandatory 10-digit numbers is a good thing - there needs to be some consistency.
Someone earlier made a comment about people having one phone number that moves with them. . . I think that this is an important step towards that. I know that the technology is in place for this, but there seems to be some other obstacles barring the way.
(2) At 7 digits, CA license plates are about as cramped as they can get without becoming unreadable.
So what's next?
Two lines of 4 characters each?
Half the number on the rear plate and the other half on the front plate (no more tossing the front plate here!).
When all possible 7 digit plates are in use, require one car destroyed for each new one licensed? This will lead to waiting lists and high used car sale prices, and black market plate sales.
Split CA into two states (North and South CA) to double (roughly) the number of available plates.
10 digit dialing isn't required where I am (San Francisco Bay Area) but since I use my cell phone and my work phone, I dial all numbers as 11 digits (1-area code-then the number) because especialy on my cell, I don't know the default area code (is it the one that is on my phone (415?) or the area code that I am in (925?)? So, no matter if I am dialing a 415, 925, or 650, or whatever, I just dial 11 digits, and all of my phone numbers in the phone book feature are stored that way. Even at work, when I have to dial the numbers manualy, I just dial 11 digits by habit. (As I remember, if you dial a local number (555-1212) as 11 digits (1-415-555-1212) it's considered the same for the billing options.)
Atlanta has THREE area codes and any calls made in those area codes require a 10 digit number. So if you want to call your buddy across the street he might have a different area code!
crazy world we live in huh?
Silly slashdot, sigs are for kids!
Umm... That's the 11 or 12 digit numbers. The 10 digit ones are just you having to type the area code on to all exisiting numbers, as well as new ones.
The old number (with area code) (234) 555-1212 would be dialed 2345551212, even if you were in the 234 area code before.
Only 20 years ago I lived in an area where 4-digit dialing was enough. Now we face 10 digits just to call a neighbor. Times change...
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
It used to be that dialing the area code caused it to be a long distance number - you'd get billed for it. Nowadays, though, you generally have to dial 1 first anyway. Here in the Atlanta area it's been 10 digits for several years, and I haven't had a problem. Most people even abreviate it - 7 for 770 and 4 for 404.
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Stupid sexy Flanders.
By adding the # and * characters into the currently allowed dialable digits you would get 4,159,780,352 (12^9 - 10^9) new numbers to work with.
That should increase the supply for long time. Though this could be a problem for rotary/pulse phone users, the new numbers could be reserved numbers dialled by computers and fax machines for quite a few years.
Also, the current shortage will level off in the next couple of years. I just saw a graph on c|net indicating that the number of analog modems will stop growing by 2002, this should reduce the number of new second analog phone lines/numbers used by residences, businesses, and ISPs.
Also, Follow-Along phone numbers that are consistant between your home and cell phones could reduce the demand for new numbers as well.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
I cannot remember the name of the psychologist who first presented this, but I know the paper was presented at MIT in 1954. But anyway, he hypothesized that humans could retain a list of seven items before losing more. Now, realize that a ten digit number does not necessarily fall into a ten item category. First of all, we associate area codes, the first three digits with an area and thus chunk those numbers into one item. So for me to remember north Mississippi is under 662 is nearly automatic and easy. In general, we can also remember that a specific area of town has certain prefixes for it, so a number in Starkville will be 323, 324, 325, 320, 338, 320, 615, or 312. These numbers become easier for us to remember if we associate them with their cities. Then the final four digits are the most unique and usually have to be remembered individually, thus becoming the hardest part to remember.
Now, this may not be useful if you try to remember phone numbers for places you are not familiar, but for times like that, they created pencils and paper.
Tired of sitting at that karma cap? Start a flame war today! See just how low you can go!
Even here in backwater Nebraska we been using the Area code even in the same Area code. It's been this way for a few years and I would expect more "progressive" states would have done the same thing already. Don't assume that your corner of the world(or even your country) is the same as everyone else.
This is the very first that I, and probably others, have heard of it. How are they going to communicate this to the entire country in just a month?
Those who don't know me, probably shouldn't trust me. Those that do know me, DEFINITELY shouldn't trust me.
At least not here. Your friendly automated message comes on and tells you it's a local call so stop dialing the area code already. Oh, and if you don't want to dial again, you can press a starcode now and we'll redirect you for a 75 cent fee.
Is this post not nifty? Sluggy Freelance. Worshi
FCC officials contend that 10-digit dialing would create tens of millions of new local phone numbers beginning with the digit "1" or "0."
1 signifies dialing a long-distance call, a toll call in all cases except 1-800, 1-500, 1-888, 1-8NN. 0 signifies an operator-assisted call. If the FCC would change this so that you could be dialing crosstown into a different area code and dial a 1 or 0 but not be making a long-distance or operator assisted call. Then, what happens if you hit an extra digit? Look:
Local cross-area call: 162-523-3445
But then add an extra digit, either through a slip of a key, or dialing one of those 777-MONEY numbers or something.
Your local call changes to: 1-625-233-4450, a long distance call. That's what the problem is really about.
Photos of bits of the past hiding in the present: afiler.com
Why not even take it a step farther? Assign everyone at birth the equivalent of a current class-C network, to do what you please. Sort of an expanded SSN system Where ever you live for the rest of your life, you will have the same phone number, etc.
Just a general suggestion that I think deserves future consideration, this is not detailed so keep the privacy flames to yourself for now, I know what they are already :)
The ivory tower has never had to reach so h
For those of you who don't know what 10-digit dialing is (the article isn't very clear), he's an explanation from a phone company employee:
Users have to dial all 10 digits of a phone number whether its inside their area code or not; all phone numbers in the US are 10 digits. This frees up leading numbers such as 0 and 1 for creation of new exchanges and area codes. Please note that adding 0 and 1 to the set of 2-8 increases the size by 25%: thats not too much at the rate that number use is growing in the US. However, any move to 11 or 12 digit phone numbers should be dialing the entire number, so this is a step in the right direction.
If you know that the first 3 digits you dial will always be the same (or maybe vary between 2 different sets), then that becomes part of your long term memory, to which you can easily append the other 7.
Why do we even need 7 digits for local calls? I certainly have less than 100 friends and family that I call. 10 digits are just a waste!
With digital switches, exchanges are basically area codea now, so that takes care of that problem.
All we need is a 3-digit number, and maybe a 3-digit exchange for less-dialed people or long distance calls.
I'm filled with solutions!
-- clvrmnky
From Verizon's website:
nope, in the movies it would have to be 555 000 000 001...
---- Just another spud server.
> Most, if not all telephone switches in the US today support ten digit dialing. Go ahead, try it. Dial:
> 1-<your-area-code>-<some-friend-in-your-a rea-code%gt;
That's 11 digits.
And I live in Cincinnati as well, and I usually dial 7 digits. This 10 digit plan would require you to dial the area code + 7 digit number for all calls, even from 513 to 513. And no more 1 + area code + number for long distance. So how do you determine when you will be billed for a call? Already have this problem somewhat: When I was in Northern VA some 7 digit numbers were metered. That included my ISP access number, imagine my suprise to see that bill! Bell Atlantic gave it to me free, for that month. Then I found a closer number.
OK, I've been using 10 digit dialing for local calls for some time now since I live in Atlanta. But, I do see potential for problems elsewhere.
For example, what about places like southern GA that has an area code of 912? Don't you think that the number of people accidentelly dialing 911 will jump significantly? The one and the 2 aren't very far apart on the keypad of most phones...
With our current system, this isn't an issu in that area code as (I don't think) any areas in 912 use 10 digit dialing. Only, 7 digit or 11.
Yeah, I can get email on my phone too. But what we seem to be talking about here is using an IP address (with dns, possibly) in place of a phone number.
.wireless?), or have something like phone://hemos.attws.com ? Which, again, would tie things to a single provider and would change every time you went w/ another service.
Just thought of another negative: people are always complaining about the lack of domain names as it is. Would we use a new TLD (.phone?
--
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
In Australia we converted our phone number systema few years ago without any major problems.
We used to have (0X) XXX XXXX numbers for metro areas and (0XX) XXX XXX for country areas. Now we have uniform (0X) XXXX XXXX numbers, with an area code covering one or two states. Given us a heap more numbers to play with, and now when i'm calling a differnt area within my state, it's actually *less* numbers to dial!
Then again yankee's dont seem to like updating systems (the metric system instantly comes to mind)
I don't suffer from insanity. I *enjoy* it!
I've lived in those places. If you ask for a phone number, you get something like 4344, because everyone knows to add 327 on the front. 3 more digits may be an annoyance, but it's nothing new.
The key word there is elements. Take, for instance, the phone number 703.555.1212 If you see it as 10 elements (7,0,3,5,5,5,1,2,1,2) it will be harder to remember than if you see it as four elements (703,555,12,12).
The other thing to think about is this: How often do you ask for someone's phone number and try to memorize it there on the spot without writing it down? I would guess this happens very seldomly. Usually the sought-after phone number would be written down, either in a PDA, on a piece of paper, or on the back of one's hand. The arguements against expanding to 10 digit dialing are weak at best.
it would have been better in every way just to expand area codes to four digits
Four digit area codes would introduce ambiguity into the actual meaning of the digits you dialed.
Currently, the rules for dialing are relatively simple:
Any call beginning with 2-9 is a number that consists of seven digits, except if the initial digit is followed by two 1's.
Any call beginning with 1 is a number that consists of 11 digits, unless the next three digits are 010, in which case, the next three digits are used to specify a long distance carrier (220, for example), which is then followed by the remainder of the original number. (Originally the long distance carrier choice only needed to be proceeded by a 0, but recent changes in the phone network have required the extra 1-0).
0#, or 0 followed by a timeout will get you to an operator. 0 followed by 10 digits will get you operator help for that specific number. 0 followed by 1, followed by other numbers is the format for international dialing.
How would four-digit area codes fit into the system without creating any ambiguity? Perhaps if a direct call began with 11, but what about the other methods of dialing an area code?
NO CARRIER
This isn't true anymore (and hasn't been for a while now) because from a technical standpoint the phone company no longer needs you to dial a "1" before a number. The reason there was a 1 in front of the number is so that when you picked up the line dialing the "1" switched you to a line outside the local exchange. Usually this meant extra charges and hence we associate it with long distance. Think of it as being similar to dialing "9" at your office to get an outside line.
Today however, a lot of the phone equipment is computer controlled and packet switched so there is no technical reason for any phone company (at least in the US) to force you to dial a "1" before any number. Those areas that do it, do it mostly for historical reasons. (and for the odd area that hasn't been upgraded yet)
So what's controversial about this? We've been dialing 10-digits here in Atlanta for years, and I didn't hear anyone complain... we already had two area codes in the city, and added a third, so unless you wanted the telephone lady whining ("the number you are dialing is in another area code. you must hang up and dial the areacode first.") for 1/2 the people you called, you dialed 10 digits for every call anyway. It's not that tough. :) It was a lot bigger hassle when we added the second area code and everyone had to get billboards and signs repainted to add the 770 or 404...
... and all I wanted for xmas was a magic 8 ball, but i got this lousy
Well in that case we'll just have to evolve . . .
Blah.
I lived in Maryland when they made us start dialing area codes for the local calls in the DC suburbs- it used to be that I just had to dial a 7 digit number from the DC suburbs of Maryland (301) and get to Virginia (703) and DC (202). They started running out of prefixes, since they couldn't duplicate the prefixes within the suburban DC area. So we had to start dialing area codes to get to Virginia and DC. There was a huge uproar over that. You would have figured that life as we know it was going to cease to exist. It didn't, the phones kept ringing. Then they went to an overlay (multiple area codes covering the same area) and there was another uproar. It happened, and people got used to it. I moved to central Texas (512), and now I only have to dial 7 digits for a local call. It was a weird transition, but I survived (I can dial the area code first, but it doesn't make a difference). In the numbering plan for the area, we will be going to an overlay soon. And again, we will hear all sorts of uproar.
Big effin deal. People will complain, then they will get used to it. It is a matter of growth and progress. People should be proud of the fact that they need more phone numbers- more people in the area, a larger tax base, people are getting better connected- it really is a good thing! It just shows how wired and high tech your area is.
we just switched to 10-digit dialing. it's a pain in the ass, and i don't understand why it's necessary.
pezpunk
Internet killed the video star,
i could live a little longer in this prison
You're asking a government agency (the FCC) to plan ahead and do something makes sense. Think about that.
The future is not 12-digit phone numbers. The future is IP addresses. Dial your phone johndoe.phone.home.com. Once we go to IPv6 and 128-bit IP addresses, phone numbers will seem quaint.
--
Patrick Doyle
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
It's the same case with area code + number dialing. The area code is analagous to the network.
with humpy love,
with humpy love,
humpmonkey
Why not also introduce more specific codes. In the UK, we have a lot of so-called non-geographic codes. In addition to premium and toll-free numbers, we have numbers billed as a local call wherever they're called from, and specific clusters dedicated to mobile phones and pagers (and since, in the UK, the callER pays all charges, not the callEE, this is even more useful).
It always confuses me when visiting the US why this isn't in place - it's really handy, and I think businesses would appreciate it too.
--Remove SPAM from my address to mail me
I thought psychology taught that six digits was the optimal number for human memory; anything beyond was asking for trouble. This makes sense since I can remember Six, as in Six from Blossom, and I can remember most of The Sixth Sense, which had that Haley Joe kid in it, but I'm hard pressed to remember much of Seven, which was some kind of scary Brad Pitt movie, or Seven, as in the number of times you'll probably have wanted to punch me in the face for writing this.
I don't know about any of you, but I find it hard enough to remember a 7-digit number. True, there is a limit to how many 3-digit prefixes exist in an area, so it may be about as easy as remembering 6-digits. With an extra 3, that puts it on the borderline of rememberability. IPv6 bugs me in this way too. As it currently stands, I can remember more than a few current IPv4 addresses, because consistent prefixes apply here, too. Within my university, everything starts with xxx.xxx, so all I have to do is remember the last two bytes, and most of the important stuff is on xxx.xxx.2 anyway, though that stuff actually has names (except when the name server is having problems, which is generally the only time I need to remember such things anyway). I also have a few friends on cable modems, but they're all in 24.xxx anyway. Also fairly easy to remember. All I have to remember is that they're on @home in the particular place they live, and the last two bytes. It's not much more difficult than a phone number, and certainly not more difficult than a phone number with an area code. But still, IPs are meant to be read by machines anyway, so quadrupling their length isn't the end of the world, and the benefits are great. Adding 3 digits to phone numbers is going to be really taxing, though. I have a hard time imagining phone use increasing by 3 orders of magnitude, or even two. Granted, one digit my not be enough do to inefficiencies in implementation, but I think two ought to do it quite well, and hopefully end the breakaway growth of area codes, too.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
It doesn't work like that. America only has a unified dialing with places like Canada and the Carribean. To dial other parts of the world requires you do do something different, i.e. dial 011 + "international dialing code for relevant the country" before the call.
If the FCC does introduce nationwide 10 digit dialing, there will still be areas within international dialing code 1 which are 7 digit, unless Canada follows suit, etc. But then again, as far as Americans are concerned, calling Canada will probably be a long distance call, and dialing will be no different than long distance within the US. The only confusion will occur for travellers (unless they're in Toronto, which already has or will shortly have 10 digit dialling.)
Any kind of plan involving a single identifier to reach a person anywhere would be accomplished>through creative use of DNS, and could involve actual names and words. The accounts themselves might possibly use a email-like name@provider kind of system. But I dream.
Well, it looks someone already tought about that... It's called SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) (RFC 2543) I know it allows IP phone addresses like sip://user@host and support call forwarding and other nice stuff... and its much much simpler than H.323
They were considering going to a area-code+phone number deal here in Kentucky before the decided to just add another area code.
What got me was the 1+ dialing. Surely the phone company could make it so that you could always dial the 1 first, and then they would filter out local calls (not to be charged for) from long distance (to be charged for). Either way your call would go through.
Or they could drop the 1+ entirely. 10 digits would get you any private phone in the country (local or long distance). The one does not add on any more capacity.
I would be willing to do it if either way worked (always dialing 1 first worked or never dialing 1 first). Surely that is not *that* hard for the phone company to do...
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
in maryland, we already have to use 10 digit phone numbers here... we have to dial the area code for every number we dial, whether it's long distance or not... people need to stop whining b/c it's not that hard to remember 3 extra digits.
about nobody actually 'dials' a number anymore, at least not many people. Ok, what's the proper term for using a touch tone pad?
"FCC Considering 10 digit punching"
"FCC Considering 10 digit entering" ?????
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Denver has had this for over a year. Big deal.
I think the phone companys should go straight to IPv6 and give every phone an IP address. Any kind of plan involving a single identifier to reach a person anywhere would be accomplished through creative use of DNS, and could involve actual names and words. The accounts themselves might possibly use a email-like name@provider kind of system. But I dream.
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Vidi, Vici, Veni
Plus the idea that everybody gets assigned a static phone number for life - so now I can't even change it when I get harrasing phone calls. No thanks.
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Stupid sexy Flanders.
Geesh! Can't anyone take a little humor here and there. FYI, I certainly didn't grow up in "the city" and anyone who did would laugh if they heard you call me a "city boy!" I have flown all around the US and have been in some small "towns" in addition to large cities. "Towns" such as Bismark, ND, Dothan, AL, Yuma, AZ, etc. And I know all about dialing a 7-digit number and having it still be long distance, as I used to have to do this when I was a kid to talk to my friends - because my parents sent me to another county for school (Catholic, if you must know). I make one little sarcastic, but I thought humorous, jab at LA and small towns at the same time (which I thought was rather an accomplishment) and it looks like I managed to piss off both the people in large cities, thinking I didn't read the article first, as I always do, and commented without a clue, and the people in smaller towns who didn't seem to get that I was really making fun of large city folks who are the ones complaining, apparently. People, I think we all need to chill a little bit. May be that this election fiasco and Gore's desparate grasp to steal the election, along with the stock market woes which are certainly effected by Gore's selfish motives, has gotten everyone a bit jumpy...
If I remember right from Psychology class oh so long ago, individuals can only store 7 to 9 digits max in their short term memory.
But in today's world of palm pilots, who needs short term memory?
In the UK things are a terrible mess because BT won't spend the money to clean it up.
:-(
e.g. area codes can be anything from 3 to 5 digits and numbers anything from 6 to 8 digits. (I *think* all of the old 5 digit numbers are gone now)
e.g. London
(020) XXXX XXXX
Cambridge
(01223) XXX XXX
Newcastle
(0191) XXX XXXX
Note how the local part (call a friend) varies in length, as does the area code.
There's no way to tell how to group the digits in a given number. You just have to knowl.
Lord Pixel - The cat who walks through walls
Lord Pixel - The cat who walks through walls
A little bigger on the inside than out
Not around here (area codes 703 and 301). We've had to dial all 10 for a good while now. Still haven't quite got used to it, but it's no big deal.
no. you need to dial 1+ area code + number for long distance
As a veteran of the West LA 10 Digit wars, I can attest that this is a non-trivial problem. Some things to consider: 1) People have trouble memorizing long strings of digits. The most commonly held buffer size is 7+/-2. Near as I can tell, 10 is bigger than that. 2) Necessity: Here in So.Cal. it turned out that there wasn't actually a shortage...the phone companies were just reserving blocks of number in increments of 10k, and didn't want to release them. Once the Public Utilities Commission smacked 'em on the wrist and made 'em release number in blocks of 1k, the problem went away. Just my 2 pennies...
But if we do that, then all phone numbers will have to start with "0x".
TheFrood
If you say "I'll probably get modded down for this..." then I will mod you down.
Go ahead, try it. Dial: 1-(your-area-code)-(some-friend-in-your-area-code)
FYI
With 10 digit dialing there is no need to dial the 1 first, since it is a local call. You only need to dial the 1 when it IS a long distance call.
Also, in the original post, the example used appears to be wrong. It should be xxx-xxx-xxxx. They forgot one of the digits in the last group.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
> The biggest problem, in my mind, is that it has long been rumored that humans are poor at memorizing sequences that are more than 7 digits long.
:)
That is why we CHUNK the long 10 digit phone number into smaller groups. It's MUCH easier to memorize a long constant in pairs or triplets, then it is to memorize a long stream of single digits.
AAA - BBB - CCCC
vs
(X, X, X,) (X, X, X, X), (X, X, X, X)
Cheers, where everyone knows your name
Here in Philadelphia, we already have 10-digit dialing; I don't know how many other places have it too. It's a pain in the butt for maybe a week, but then it's really not all that different from dialing a regular phone number - you just have to include the area code. No biggie.
This is all because these gready people have to have 1-4 of their own numbers. Cities should create subnets so that each city has one number, and then runs NAT to contact the individual person... duh!
</sarcasm>
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
DNS? God, I hate having to "type" names to go with the numbers in my cellphone. I'd hate to try to do that on a regular basis.
Of course, DNS WOULD help alleviate the whole "well, I switched providers, so my number is now..." syndrome. Assuming, of course, we don't get to the point where phone numbers really DO follow us around.
My only fear is, "Yeah, you can call me at phone://goatse.cx" Not to mention all the likely spam...
--
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
We've had *11* (yes, ELEVEN) digit phone numbers in the UK for nearly six years now. It really isn't that much of a big deal. I know the US phone system sucks, but I'm sure you can bear to press one or even two extra digits to make a call.
Stuii!
Just think, no more numbers to remember, just look at your lovely list of names and punch one or two buttons!! Wow! I know I would buy one, I should call up RonCo and see if they will do an a television special! Buy one phone with "speed dial" and receive a FREE rotisserie oven!!
Remember folks, you heard it hear first!
=-=-=-=-=
"Do you hear the Slashdotters sing,
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Oh bother.
A good firewall with IP Masquerading and IP banning oughta clear that right up. Beats Caller ID, in my opinion.
El riesgo vive siempre!
Like I said, I'm not ready for video phones. Although, it would be a lot more fun calling up your girlfriend and trying to time it so that she had to run out of the shower;-). WEEEE!
------------
Stop being so shortsighted. We should go with 15 digits.
with humpy love,
with humpy love,
humpmonkey
The only down side to TDD is you do not know if a call is long-distance or local. Ameritech decided to add a bunch of area codes to my region, and now I do not know whether to dial the area code or not, and on top of that I do not know whether it is long distance! I can dial a 7-digit number and get billed "zone call" and a 10-digit number is local!
Best yet, my parents live in 734, the neighbors across the street are 248, and it costs more to call across the street than it does to call my sister 15 miles away!! Not only that, but it cost even more to call my number at school (also 734)
If they would just go to 10 digit and apply charges according to distance life would be much much easier...
I've seen the comments, for and against, the phone numbering systems used in Europe. I lived in Germany for 14 years and remember, very well, the system used. It wasn't difficult to use either. I really think it's just a matter of what you are used to. People here in the States have a tendancy to be very ridgid and to not like change.
---
--
If I actually could spell I'd have spelled it right in the first place.
It used to be this way I think, but New York City now has a new area code, 646. I think other places have codes that break that rule.
When Maryland went to 10 digit dialing there was a lot of whining and moaning about how hard it would be to adapt to it, all the headaches involved all the devices that would have to be re-configured.
Funny, two months after the fact people didn't think about it anymore.
The equipment is able to handle dialing more than 7 numbers. Alarm systems are often configured to call a 1-800 number at a central routing office. Fax machines can dial large numbers to beam a fax to China if needed. Computers...well it took me 20 seconds to switch it to my ISP's new number.
Folks, it ain't that damn hard to do and you'll adjust to it in short order.
What annoys me are the people who complain about the least little change, but when you ask "Well this is our problem (short numbers) How do we fix it to YOUR satisfaction?" Most people say "It Ain't my problem...you figure it out"
Funny, they DID figure out a solution, but everyone pisses and moans about it...you can't win.
Phoenix
BTW: About the confusion about local vs long distance dialing...Ok, that CAN get a bit confising, but you dial a number and it goes through, GREAT, if a voice says dial a "1", then just hang up and dial a "1". It's not like you have to dial long distance in an emergency (if they're in another state, what good can they do anyway?
-- Wiccan Army, 13th Airborne Division "We will not fly silently into the night"
The Atlanta area has been doing this for years and it hasn't been much of a problem. To dial anyone you must use the area code (even if they live next door and then they might have a different area code to begin with.) Sure, the change over is bit difficult (changing business cards, autodialers, etc) but everyone is used to it.
> 859-xxx-xxx
Uh, hate to rain on your parade dude, but that's only 9.
Stuii!
You should try living in the UK under the monopolistic British Telecom (BT)regime.
In the last six years, my area (STD) code has gone from being:
0705 to 01705 to 023 92!
The first "big change" was hailed by BT as being an unfortunate necessity to help prevent them from "running out of numbers" due to all those inconsiderate modem users paying through the nose to get a second line fitted. In less than two years, they had to admit that they had grossly mis-calculated and another change was on the way.
This year, we had the second big number change, and all those small businesses who had their signage and stationary reprinted, as well as their phone book entries, their address book updates, their switchboards, one-touch dialing number fixes done the first time had no choice but to fork out again. Hoorah!
Now I'm told by my mobile phone service provider that they have been forced to add 07 to the beginning of my number to indicate it's mobile status. And because they are running out of numbers.
As far as 12 digit phone numbers go, mine has been 11 for about four years now, (023 92xx xxxx)and I'm starting to think it looks more like my public key or a serial number.
At 11 digits, I'm starting to think they can't possibly be running out of numbers, I mean, that's, like, eight phone numbers for every man, woman and child in the country already, isn't it? (:
Now wash your hands.
Er, AFAIK, the 0/1 middle digitt restriction on area codes went away several years ago. Western Pennsylvania got a new 724 area code, but I don't think they have 10-digit dialing. The switching equipment just got smarter. :)
Let's use 128-bit encrypted numbers that route along others phones and lines in case normal routes are down. And then you can register your name and it will translate into your number...so people can call you at JohnSmith0000000001 (Or was that JohnSmith00000000001?...cuz you weren't the first to register that name). Then we can have an intuitive system!
In Maryland, you have to dial 10 digits if you want to dial your next door neighbor. I know this is the case in other places too. In the twin cities, it's getting close to that now. You see advertisements like "We're so close to you we even have the same area code!". Area codes don't go real far here. My cell area code is different from my home area code.
Backlash may occur, but in some cases there are just too many people with too many numbers (land lines, faxes, mobile family plans, businesses, business mobiles, paging systems, etc.)
I just hope they can get a scalable system that will obsolece (sp?) really slowly. Cheers,
Galego
Que Deus te de em dobro o que me desejas
[May God give you double that which you wish for me]
Business cards, letter head, speed dial numbers, fax machines, tag lines, will need to be changed as well. Oy ve.
III.IIVIVIXIIVIVIIIVVIIIIXVIIIXIIIIIIIIVIIIIVVIII
The reason for all this problems is the bad idea of a unified numbering plan (= all numbers in a country have the same length including area code).
This fixed number length did not allow easy "escaping" for longer numbers and has led to the actual problems.
An variable length numbering plan would have many advantages:
- Different length area codes
Short ones for big cities, longer one
for small towns.
See in germany, the area code for Berlin
is 030 (two digits plus the '0'), but
it can be as long as 034533 (five digits
plus the '0').
- Different length phone numbers
If your area code length is variable,
so the amount of usable numbers in this
area code is variable. This means, while
maintaining a maximum number length in
total (as required by international phone
exchanges), you can still have more numbers
in the big cities. I personally think its
insane to have different area codes for the
same city like in the USA. Here in germany
all lines in the same city maintain the same
area code.
- Easy transition
Our town (rather small) once had numbers
with three digits. When it occured that
this might not be enough they said:
Ok, let all numbers beginning with 'x' be
four digits. They did this of course before
using the first digit 'x' for any three
digit number. This allowed to keep the old
numbers while beeing able to greater the
ammount of possible numbers.
After a while this was still not enough,
but in the meanwhile most of the old three
digit numbers disappeared (they were withheld
when the subscribers changed. For the new
subscriber you can give out a new longer
number), so finally they could reuse the
numbers used for the old three-digit numbers
for newly four-digit numbers.
And because this was still not enough, they
had other unused areas which they declared
to be six-digit numbers. They put new numbers
into this range, removed old numbers when they
got them.
As you can see, this is a very smooth and
nice transition scheme. Nobody needs to be
forced to get a new number, but you still
can cope with the need for new numbers.
- Direct dial-in to branch exchange
Big companies usually have a number like
123-0, -0 beeing the main line. You can
direct dial people in this company if you
know their extension, e.g. 123-101. And
if three digits extension are not enough,
you can make them longer as with normal
phone numbers.
So you know that your companies phone
numbers all beginn with the same prefix,
and you can directly map from extension to
the phone number.
So, you may understand why unified numbering plans are a bad idea, and variable length phone numbers are much more powerful. The question here is: Can -and will- the USA telcos lern from this?
50 years from now, I can see my grandkids asking me: "Pap-Pap, how come everyone in the movies has a comm number like 192.168.something?"
We're not scare-mongering/This is really happening - Radiohead
This sig intentionally left blank.
Where I grew up, one almost always used only the last 4 digits for their telephone number. Back in those days, each town (I lived in an area in SW Michigan where about 6 or 7 smallish towns were in very close proximity, within about 5-10 miles, forming a larger community) had its own exchange prefix. So as long as you knew where someone lived, you only needed to remember the last 4 digits of their number, and then fill in the first part with 983- for St. Joseph, 429- for Stevensville, 422- for Baroda, 925- for Benton Harbor, etc. etc.
Man, those were the days... I fear when IPv6 takes over and we won't even be able to [easily] memorize IP addresses anymore!
kugano
It's the same case with area code + number dialing. The area code is analagous to the network.
In most places I've been the area code has no relationship to the person you're calling. Cities with 10 different area codes that have no basis in geography, you just basically keep guessing until you get the right area code (and call 5 wrong people before you get it right)...
---------------------------------------------
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
In northern Oregon, (portland/salem area) They opted to overlay a new area code over the top of a new one. The fact that many pagers and cell phones have been added to the area was the reasoning. Many people wanted them to add a new area code for pagers/cellphones, but instead they just overlayed the area codes. Instead of dialing a different area code to reach someone on a cell phone, (which would be really easy to remember!!) now my dad has a new area code to dial his friend down the street. Even his two lines in his house have different area codes.
------------------------------------------
If God Dropped Acid, Would he see People???
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
IP addresses are only 4 numbers. I suppose that if we get used to thinking of phone numbers as groups of numbers instead of single digits, they would become easier to remember.
"Like other countries which may have numbers that are area code + either 7 or 8 digits long"
Until just a few years ago, my parents in England had a 5 digit phone number. They've had a four added to the beginning. The area code has four digits. But area codes aren't of fixed length in the UK either. Other parts of the country have seven digit numbers. It's all over the place!
But the big problem is that the FCC wants to make the option to have area codes that start with 0 or 1. See here for my explanation why this is bad.
And is it just me, or does it seem like the FCC is going into this without thinking about how the telephone system works at all? It seems like this would be better handled by a group that does this full time, the North American Numbering Plan Administration.
Photos of bits of the past hiding in the present: afiler.com
Then we'll never run out of addresses!
Once we switch to the 10 dig system, I could end up dialing the FPI in another state (by miss-dialing one number) where my intention was to dial my local pizza shop -- please don't get me started that you never miss-dialed.
With the 7 digit system, I like the fact that I have a *clue* about where my call is landing. I.e.: there is '1' and 'area-code' so I *known* that I am making a) long distance call & b) out-of-stat/zone call. Will that info. still be with us with a 10 digit number?
-- George
Karma stuck at 50? Add 2-5 inches.. err.. 2-5x Karmas Count to your pen1es.. err.. Karma all naturally and private
What would be the difference, your phone number changes now when you change providers (unless they have some sort of portability agreement).
--
Sinepaw.org: Grape Winos
That, coupled with the braindead way they assign phone numbers to companies (in blocks of 10,000) spells big trouble.
The phone companies are trying to correct this problem. The company I work for manufactures switching equipment and one of the requirements is to allocate blocks of 100 numbers instead of 10,000. Not ideal, but it does not break their existing software. IPv4 had a similar issue which is why we are going over to IPv6.
I personally favor each person or company be given one number to which they can add extensions if they like. The user should be able to pick the extension number to keep phone solicitors from getting access to all but the first number. For example I sign up with BellSouth to get a phone number 987-654-3210. I add my cellphone as extension 45 and my second phone line as 555. You can dial the extensions at any time while the phone is ringing.
Remember, You are unique...just like everyone else.
Atlanta has 678...
The downtown core is moving to 647/416 (mandatory 10 digit as of March 5), and the suburbs are moving to 905/289 (mandatory 10 digit as of Jun 9). Just got the "official" Bell Canada notice in the mail yesterday. Only thing is, as of January 8, they'll be playing a reminder to dial 10 digits next time, which will kill any modem/fax transmissions.....
I'm not sure about what other area codes around the D.C. area had this, too, but I'm willing to bet that very few have had 10-digit dialing for local calls for very long. I've spent time in a few, and local dialing has usually been a 7-digit affair.
At least two years... In 301... My dialup number (just down the street) was changed to 240-something over a year ago...
I'm an American saddened by the whole lot of lazy, whining americans. Big deal. TEN DIGITS! OH NO MISTER BILL! WE CAN'T HAVE THAT!
These people are so disenchanted with everything they'll complain about winning the lottery -- since they have to pay taxes of course!
I say fuck 'em and move right into 12 digit dialing.
>> The biggest problem, in my mind, is that it has long been rumored that humans are poor at memorizing sequences that are more than 7 digits long. /short term/ memory is generally limited to 4-10 'items' (and 'item' is a pretty abstract term) and averages out to 7. Long term memory has no such limitations. Plenty of studies have been carried out which back this idea and if I had my books with me, I'd cite a few :)
>That's an Urban legand. When we switched from five to seven digits, people said the same thing.
Ah, to have my cognitive psychology books at work. Okay,
That's only static prefix (your local area code) you need to dial in the front of number - no much more to remember. OTOH here in Finland I don't dial numbers myself - I just select name from a list and my phone does the rest. Why I'd want to remember that Jack's number is 1972609172 and Joe's number is 1972608172? If you think remembering all those numbers is fun be my guest but I prefer more intelligent phone to a memory game.
_________________________
_________________________
Spelling and grammar mistakes left as an exercise for the reader.
So who was making the fuss? Any legitimate reason other than "I don't like it"?
First off, it ain't just the people who have to learn to use the new numbers. It implies the need to update all the auto-dialing devices like alarm systems, speed dial numbers, ISP's numbers for modems, and fax machines. Yet, this isn't the whole of it.
These 10-digit phone numbers have to be processed by telecom switches to make the calls go through. Check out: North American numbering Plan Administration for the latest news about proposed changes and their implementations. As others have pointed out, there were choices made at the outset about the formatting of telephone numbers that permitted the switches to make optimizations in processing the number - as it was being dialed. For example: Starts with a '2'? Then it can't be long distance. Check the local NXXs that start with a '2'.
There is also the concept of permissive dialing. Even though it's NOT REQUIRED to dial the area code, I've long looked forward to being able to put in the whole telephone number (e.g. 1-212-345-6789) in my laptop's list of ISP's telephone numbers, and let the telco sort things out.
Once the people had grown accustomed to using 10-digit numbers everywhere, then it would make sense to me to change from PERMISSIVE 10-digit dialing to MANDATORY.
There are web sites and newsgroups dedicated to telephony (teh-LEF-oh-knee). Here's a newsgroup that I've found helpful: "comp.dcom.telecom" There's also a whole slew of useful sites accessible from google's telephony area.
But intra-LATA toll calls aren't. It's often more expensive to call the nearest town outside your local calling area (via the local phone company) than it is to call the next state (via a LD carrier).
_ONE_ friggin number, that stays the same no matter where I move, and 2 spare digits on the end, so a cell, fax, pager, computer, all share a common number.
i.e.
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-00 = phone
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-01 = cell
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-02 = fax
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-03 = pager
AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-04 = computer
We have the technology, so why aren't we more interested in making things easier for ourselves!
--
The nice thing about standards, is that there are so many to pick from! - Anonymous
We have 10-digit dialing here in the D/FW metroplex, and it works fine as far as I'm concerned. I've often wondered when they'd go ahead and just switch the whole nation. It's rather annoying to have to remember as you're traveling whether a given area is 10-digit or 7-digit. I haven't heard anyone complain about 10-digit dialing being annoying as comparied to 7-digit.
So who was making the fuss? Any legitimate reason other than "I don't like it"?
--Joe--
Program Intellivision!
Program Intellivision!
10 digit dailing, doesn't bother, I hate remembering if someone is in or out of may area code or in my area code, but ZI still need to dial the area code because they too far away from my town...MA-is a great place to dial a phone, most confusing in this manner because we have concentric rings of area codes basically. There are easy ways to fix these issues, and make things make more sense:
1. 10 digits is Ok, let it be.
2. Long distance is anything outside your area code, local is anything in your area code.
3. Have a matching land area code, and wireless area code that is clear about local calls vs. long distance(see rule #2 above) so that for instance 508 is the land code for your area, while 518 is the Cell Phone pager code for your area.
4. Lines that are used for outgoing Data comm Only, Modems, Faxes, Alarm systems, etc do not have phone numbers.
5. Rolled over lines (for example your ISP has tons of lines all of which have a number assigned to it, but you only call one number for access, all those lines should be assigned the one number)
6. Solve the even bigger problem, give my Cell phone and my home Phone the same number, when some one calls me they both ring. Kinda like an Email address, I have 7 machines that all have the ability to grab my email when they are turned on and Outlook is started, but I have the convinence of getting that mail anywhere I want.(Only one of them is allowed to delete it from the email server though)
Haplo "Common sense is not nearly so common as one would think from the name"
Power Corrupts,Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, leaving one person(group)in charge is absolutely corrupt.
We have it here. The problem I run into (the only one, really) is the need to dial the "1" as a prefix for long distance. If I have to dial 10 digits anyway, why not eliminate the "1" for domestic calls and all my stuff, even the old stuff, will work fine without reprogramming.
Still need to print new business cards, though...
Personally, I think the FCC should look into speeding up the viability of Voice over IP in every home. Combined with the (eventual) roll-out of IPv6, this would solve the phone-number problem. In fact, IPv6 enabled telephones for the home might be the "killer app" that it takes to push IPv6 over the edge into wide-spread adoption.
Hey, nows your chance to add a checksum to the phone number, and add code to the firmware of new phones to not bother accepting the call if its wrong.
They come out and set up this embedded system box somewhere in your house that hooks into your demarc and the cable company cable. It looks and acts like a VoIP transponder. It even has a UPS to ensure operation in the case of a power failure.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
They do have this in some places. Germany for instance. Somebody I know was working in Germany as an Au-Pair and the family she was staying with installed an extra phone line just for her. Her number was (xxxxx) xxxxxx and the house number was (xxxxx) xxxxx, both with the same area codes. She had a longer area code because she lived in a village. If you live in a city you can get shorter area codes and shorter numbers.
oojah
Do you have any better hostages?
Riddle me this . . .
Here in Atlanta, we went to 10 digits (area + exchange + 4) years ago. And they keep adding more and more area codes. This in itself has gone over pretty well. Three more numbers hasn't killed anyone, especially what with speed dial and PDAs theese days.
I understand this is not the argument against the new plan, however. It's the new use of those special digits 1 and 0. They can cause confusion because the occasionally mean long distance and big fees and the sometimes would mean a local call.
But then it dawned on me . . . look at my mobile phone. It only ever takes 10 digits. And regardless of what those 10 digits are, the call costs the same thing. No long distance, no BS. Now if mobile companies have figured out how to simplify this, why haven't the telcos?
Sure, their business model revolves around screwing customers on the long distance, but why doesn't some telco just go to flat fee phone lines, maybe a little pricier, but no stupid charges just because you called someone who lives 3 feet outside your area code(s) considerd local.
--
Cherish. Live. Dream.
I mean, come on! Just about everywhere you go you have to use 10 digit dialing right now. I don't see this as a big step at all, as local telephone companies have been doing this for years. I suppose in some backwater place where the population is less than the crowd at the local football stadium it may be an issue, but for everyone else this is old news.
I still live in a small enough town that it has only one exchange. People do still give each other their numbers by saying the last four digits only.
On another note, I think the introduction of zero and one is a bigger deal than simply going to a ten digit number. What's more confusing?
Going from 919-9999 to 818-919-9999?
Or remembering that 1-181-919-9999 is a toll call, but 181-919-9999 isn't?
---
"Life. Don't talk to me about life."
Why don't they just assign everyone a URL? Area Codes mean a little, in that you know what it is for people who live around you, but they seem to change so quickly. Besides, without area codes, the phone company will have to figure out a different way to charge per minute for what in actuality are local calls.
Have you read my journal today?
I'm sure the uproar isn't just over the ability to remember another digit.
There's serious money involved in the switch, when companies have to reprint stationary, advertisements, business cards.. make sure their applications can handle longer phone numbers correctly.
Seriously, just think about how many times when you enter your phone number while ordering something, if you mistype it -- it tells you that it's formatted wrong. That's just a small example of code that needs to be changed.
Just food for thought..
-Jeff
We've had it in Charlotte for some time. Though it's not required at the moment to dial 10 digits, BellSouth has been passing out material about how to 10 digit dial.They have been advertising on the radio that come 2001 it will be required to 10 digit dial and to practice now. Frankly anyone who can't add the 3 digit area code to a number should have their phone service taken away from them because they must be too stupid to use it in the first place! :)
The public switched telephone network could benefit from variable-length dialing. Dial as much as you need to make the number unique; the rest should be considered "identical to your number."
You'd probably have to terminate all dialing with the # key or something to make it work. This would render rotary phones unusable, but how much longer can we really afford to keep supporting these relics?
--
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
If you're dialing a local number, technically you only have to dial 7 digits.
They're complaining they'll have to know the area code.
yea, your right..... and why do peopel think they need more than 640k of RAM? We should never have switched from telegraph, actually. I mean, i can't see a worldwide market for more than 5 computers anyway.
-shpoffo
Waxster.com - trade you wax Edison Wax Cylinders with eveyone! sign up today!
Oh no! Our economy's going to crash! All our old legacy systems that rely on seven digit phone numbers are going to fail. They'll be a run on public phones everywhere! Chaos looms! Stock up on Voice-over-IP software now, before it's too late!
--Brogdon
This tagline is umop apisdn.
This would allow:
- Four digit dialing -- dial "7890*" and the CO will prefix your local area code and dial prefix.
- Seven digit dialing -- dial "4567890#" and the CO will prefix your local area code.
- Ten digit dialing -- dial "1234567890" and the call will go through directly with the specified area code and prefix.
As I mentioned, this would preclude the use of rotary dial phones (but they could be adapted by using a suffix code of "11" instead, which would only be valid if the signal is a rotary pulse).This allows people the maximum flexibility -- dial only as much of a number as you need. The shorter numbers (available if they are local) don't HAVE to be used, and the suffix-code can indicate to the central office that you have finished dialing, just like pressing "ENTER" on the URL bar on your web browser indicates that you've finished entering a URL.
Neat, simple, and easy to implement.
And, of course, this would never be seriously considered.
[sigh]
--
"May I have ten thousand marbles, please?"
The issue of accidentally paying for a toll call is not significant - LD is dirt cheap these days. But the benefits don't outweigh the current convenience of 7 digit dialing within an area code. Better number conservation is still the right answer, as it has been for many years.
sulli
RTFJ.
In Atlanta, we have 678, 404 and 770. In other Cities/States they have Area Codes that do not have a 0/1 as the 2nd digit, such as 321 in Florida.
We're not limited like that anymore, I believe, as we used to be.
the unbeliever
aim:dasubergeek99
yahoo!:blackrose91
ICQ:1741281
Most humans can remember 7 to 9 items offhand; anything longer usually has to be memorized. It's a basic fact of human memory. You can prove it to yourself by trying to quickly remember a list of 5 random numbers, then adding numbers until you have trouble.
11 or 12 digit phone numbers will be much harder to deal with, and not just proportionally so. A better solution would be to introduce a wider variety of symbols, but that would mean upgrading all of the phone hardware in the country.
-John
This actually makes sense...here in Michigan, we've had several new area codes introduced to deal with the huge upswell of cell phones in the area. I'm sure a switch to a 10-digit number would cut down on this.
:)
Personally, I don't mind....I use speed-dial for the few numbers I call anyhow.
--Just Another Pimp A$$ Perl Hacker
El riesgo vive siempre!
All this breakage - continual splitting or overlaying of existing area codes - is due to the much talked about "local number portability", something that doesn't exist and maybe won't ever happen. And it sucks.
... to almost anywhere.
"Local number portability" is the blue sky hope that one day you will be able to take your phone number with you when you move
For that eventual, possibily unattainable goal, people everywhere under the NANP (North American Number Plan - http://www.nanpa.org/) are continually being subjected to having their local area codes made obscure!
Here in Eastern MA, we've already had 2 major splits and are due for an overlay in April 2001:
In 1988, 617 -> 617, 508
In 1998, 617 -> 617, 781 and 508 -> 508, 978
In 2001, 617/857, 781/339, 508/774, 978/351
That's now 8 area codes in a relatively small area. How much fun it will be to figure out if a phone number is in the next town or across the state! Not to mention all those people who had to change their area codes 3 years ago.
Of course, "local number portability" makes it impossible to take the easy approach to solving the apparent "running out of phone numbers" problem, which would involve changing local numbers from 7 to 8 digits. Under that scheme, every area code grows 10x (almost) in size. That's actually numbers than we'll have here in eastern MA after the April overlay.
In other words, we could have all had the pain of changing from 7 to 8 digits a dozen years ago, and never have had to worry about area codes since then.
But, instead, we'll just continue with the breakage. After all, the projection for eastern MA is that the 8 area codes will only be sufficient until 2006.
John
(it is also erroneous to say we are "running out of phone numbers"; the problem is that allocations of phone numbers to local carriers is done in units of 10000, so local carrier competition is artificially consuming phone numbers that aren't actually being used!)
hmm
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Oh, great. I can see films in the future now.
"Hold on, let me get something to write down your number. It's 127 000 000 001. O.K."
Let's see, the web/mail server at work is XXX.XX.XX.XXX My co-lo server is XXX.XX.XX.XXX or XXX.XX.XX.XXX. (Even though you just have to do a whois on my domain, I'm not going to make it that easy.)
Nope, no problem remembering 10 to 12 digits here. Retire IPV4 and use the scheme for phone numbers, and get alot of confused geeks running around trying to ping telephone numbers...
I'm going to go back in my box and will think within the limits of my box: MS Sucks Linux Good I read too much Slashdot.
How does it know which area code you're currently in? Cell boundaries are vague and therefore *can't* match the fixed-line area codes 100% of the time.
Why not use IPv6 addresses as phone numbers? My understand is that IPv6 addresses are already allocated by region (ie if you're calling someone in your region you don't need to type the whole address).. we'd have tonnes of available numbers as well as a consistency between the internet and the telephone system.
Now in New York City, this is a different story they have 11 digit dialing there, the only way to possibly know if you are making a toll call is to actually make a phone call to the operator and ask them.
I propose that if they do switch to 11 digits in the future, call the operator and ask them before you make _any_ call, even if you already know it's local. Eventually the phone companies would have to cave in and find a different way.
/* oops I accidentally made a comment, sorry */
7 digits -> 10 to the power of 7 = 10,000,000 users.
10 digits -> 10 to the power of 10 = 10,000,000,000.
Do they expect to have 10 bilion users in the future?
The article states that the phone companies were hoarding numbers in case of an 'explosive' need in the case of cell phones or fax machines. As if there would seriously be a shortage. It's not like hoarding canned food during price hikes or hoarding water during natural disasters. It is hoarding numbers in case of an outbreak of rampant tehcnology consumerism. Maybe back when cells first got really affordable, something like this was necessary, but not now.
Eric Gearman
--
Atomic batteries to power! Turbines to speed!
I just wonder what is the current way of dialing in the US.
Here in France we have already 10 digits, I thought it was at least the same in the US
In Denver, we have been on 10 digit dialing for 2.5 years. Everyone bitched until the change over. Like most things, no one cares anymore.
"Fat, drunk, and stupid is no way to go through life."
"You're gonna need a bigger boat." - Chief Brody
And this is the message you're going to get, too:
We've had 10 digit dialing in Maryland for years (thanks to Bell Titanic).. It's become a habit here to always mention the area code with any phone number. I had a friend that moved to a state that was still 7 digit and he kept giving out his new phone number with the area code there, and the locals looked at him like, "duh, we know the area code".
The people that most of this will be a PITA for are companies with hardware on-site that makes use of the telephone network. Credit card terminals that don't dial 800 numbers, security systems (!), ISPs with dialup users that can't connect, etc.
Any state that hasn't implemented 10 digit dialing should have done so, long ago.
Johnny will say to Sue who just asked for his 3dimaging communication device, "It is 10223323346782098308049039940390499380928878374 subsector 23400238473340487820238934822309093434.... don't you need to record this in your note taking device?"
she will say "no that's an easy one to remember"
maybe having to remember more numbers will help us evolve... yeah... thats the ticket.
im just looking forward to those blue fuzzy things in 3016. I dunno about all of you.
But everyone did it. And it works fine. Now that I live in austin it's eminently weird to dial 7 digits all over again (though with my houston-based cell phone i still have to dial 10 digits no matter where i am). So my cell is 10, my local phone is 7, and long distance is 11, or 4 digits for intra-building calls. Now that is confusing. Switching to uniform 10 digit dialing is easy and not the pain in the ass everyone thinks it is.
-
Do you have any idea how many databases would need to change? Every product that deals with american style phone numbers has this format: ###-###-####
If for some reason this were to change (as no doubt it eventually will), this would (will) require revisions and fixes like the IT world has never seen.
I see big money in my future...
In the movie Heat, there's a point where someone's reading off a seven-digit number to Robert Deniro. Listen carefully to the number. This may be the only movie I've ever seen where they don't use "555" to start a phone number. Instead, they use something like "140-2407" as the local number.
A very clever touch, in my opinion, since 140-2407 is of course an invalid local number.
They should nationalize telephone service and assign numbers of sufficient digit length to satisfy the requirement of two numbers for each American projected to be alive twenty-five years from now. All numbers should be charged the same way via regulated prices. This way I don't have to determine which of the three carriers I need actually can serve my needs at what price. The original phone service was granted a monopoly by the government, which one of the reasons we have a phone service at all-- they were able to charge as much as they needed to in order to cover all those great Bell Labs and all the infrastructure building they needed to. I wouldn't be surprised to find that there were heavy subsidies and tax schemes used to assist in the build-up process as well.
Now we've given all this over to a bunch of competing firms who are entangled in goofy FCC regulations, and whose main competitive advantage seems to be brand recognition and confusing price structures. None of the emerging technologies (except maybe the internet, another great public project) hold even a birthday cake candle to POTS for voice transmission-- not when you consider range limitations, dropped calls, cost to build whole new infrastructure, etc etc.
Frankly, I'd prefer a government bureaucracy to the insane patchwork of regional fiefdoms for local service and insensitive ubernationals for all other service. It's not as though the prices or service can get that much worse. And then instead of this whole huge department at the FCC doing an incredible number of pseudo-regulatory activities on all those companies, we just need one congressional oversight committee.
I do not have a signature
Sorry, but this just strikes me as wrong. Why aren't we looking into making voice over IP an option. Or maybe start working on something similar that is based on some form of Internet standard. I'm not really ready for videophones everywhere, but surely we can come up with something better than the current telephone. Can't we?
------------
For over 2 years now, the toronto area has used one form of 10 digit dialing, and another one is coming online soon.
The current system works like this:
the 416 was split geographically into 905 and 416. Local calls remained local, but if you were calling across the boundery, you had to specify the area code, i.e. 10 digits.
Now 905 is large, and there are numbers within 905 that are long distance from 905 and 416. Such a call needs the 1+area code still.
The new system is coming in early next year, to split the area codes again. This time, instead of telling people that they have a new area code, all new numbers will come in the new code, so the entire 416 and 905 area will have a total of 4 codes, and all are 10 digit local numbers. Long distance calls still need the 1+area code.
I think that is smarter than making all calls 10 digit whether they are long distance, or not is a bad idea. That way you can't misdial a long distance nubmer and get charged for it.
The flip side, is that the area code will now become a number you have to remember as a number, rather than a geographical place. Anyone studying number grouping will tell yopu phone numbers are bad enough already, and 3 more digits will really mess up some of our... um... less numerically inclined friends.
Thoughts?
More Caffeine. NOW
Of course, what the FCC is talking about is above and beyond area codes, I believe. 7 digits can only hold 10,000,000 phone numbers -- but large chunks are already taken out by fixed combinations (i.e. 911, 0, 411, 1..., 0..., etc.). So for larghe metropolitan areas, like New York City or LA, it seems they are trying to increase the size of the pool of numbers to avoid adding more area codes.
But what is the difference between a 10-digit number and dialing an area code plus 7 more digits? Perhaps there is a difference on the backend, but to the user it seems it would be the same. So why all the fuss?
The biggest problem, in my mind, is that it has long been rumored that humans are poor at memorizing sequences that are more than 7 digits long. Of course, I remember what local area code someone is in separately from the number itself, so its more like associating a 3-digit number with a 7-digit one.
I personally find the dial 1 requirement convenient as it is universal. It's like area codes in many other countries that all begin with 0 (in Japan: Tokyo=03, Osaka=06, Kyoto=075); all LD calls begin with the same digit, so it's very difficult to forget that you're dialing LD.
sulli
RTFJ.
--
Americans are bred for stupidity.
With modern phones you only need to press 2 or 3 buttons to dial any number -- so what difference does it make?
(S)-1,2-methylenedioxy-4-(2-methylaminopropyl)-be
Hi! This is the Sig, blatantly attached to the end of this comment.
So it's just a plot from Microsoft to force us to buy a new version of Outlook 2006.
Developers: We can use your help.
sarcasm.start();
Yes - this would truly be a tragedy. Imagine a dark future where you are required to dial 12 maybe 13 numbers!
We must stand and fight! The future depends on us!
If people are required to dial more than 8 numbers for a phone call, stop and imagine the impact on the chiiilldreen. Please wont someone think of the children! What will this do to our prescious bodily fluids?!? Run! Panic! Hide!
sarcasm.end();
(b) Memory space in phone machinery. Lots of telephone equipment has the ability to memorise or process phone numbers. In adding an extra digit, you're forcing the obsolescence of any equipment which can't cope with the extra digit. This would probably turn into an infrastructure nightmare.
Eric
--
Be who you are...and be it in style!
Here in atlanta its mandantory you dial 9 numbers...to call.. anywhere, even in all the sattelite cities etc.
Jeremy
Is this the system where you would dial the area code before the number (e.g., 703-555-1212 instead of just 505-1212) even on local calls? If so, they're already doing this in a number of places (including VA, where I live). It's tough to tell from the article....
If it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.
Luckily I still have my bottled water, sacks of rice, and generator in the basement from last year.
Come on...you know you all want one!
we made the switch from 5 to 7 digit local calls. For example: if the number you were dialing was 123-4567, all that you had to dial was 3-4567. Now they make us dial all 7! Dialing all 7 is much faster, with the 5 it took a few seconds to connect, but with 7 it starts ringing when you release the last number.
All these numbers get so confusing. Why can't we just ring up Central and have the operator switch the wire to the correct hole and be done. No extra charge, no per minute charge, no hook up fee, no 10-10-10-10- 8475698 numbers. Best of all... no confusing keypad!
[ ]
The DTMF (or "Touch-Tone") specification provides for 16 keys, not just the 12 that are on most phones. (When they do appear, they're just labeled with A B C and D, which is confusing with the lettering scheme on digits 2 and 3).
Actually, this won't bee all that far off in the future.
One of the projects I've recently worked on was developing a system that utilized one phone number for voicemail, email and faxes. You could then fetch them via the web, or get voicemail and email via WAP phone, and use either web or WAP to forward faxes to a fax device for printing.
I think we should see commercial services offering this in the next year or so...
... tens of millions of new local phone numbers beginning with the digit "1" or "0."
I don't know about you, but to me this makes more sense if it refers to a "1" or "0" at the beginning of the current seven digit portion of the number. Seven digit numbers cannot begin with a "1" or "0" because that would indicate a long distance call, but if everyone were to switch to ten digit dialing, there would be a whole new range of xxx-0xx-xxxx and xxx-1xx-xxxx numbers that weren't usable before. This would make 25% more numbers possible in every area code. The new ten digit numbers could still exclude "1" and "0" from the first position to help avoid confusion over long distance dialing.
Compared to the mess here, (some large cities use several area codes, but it's still a local call, so you have to dial 10 digits, but if it's a little bit farther away, it's long distance and you have to dial 11 digits, but if it's real close, you dial only 7 digits), it's beautifully simple. And it is scalable, you never change anything.
--
Calum
Right, but there aren't any 724 exchanges in there, I'd imagine. Unless you have 10-digit dialing, you can't have an exchange and an area code be the same, unless you want to rely on a flaky system of timeouts to disambiguate.
--Joe--
Program Intellivision!
Program Intellivision!
$ man reality
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
Ann Arbor, Michigan. Home of the Big House, our football stadium with a record-holding 111,000+ capacity. Almost as much as the population of the city itself, but not quite! Dialing 10 digits seems like overkill when everyone in the county has the same area code. Even Detroit, just 30 miles away, has 7-digit dialing within each of its 4 area codes. Try spending some time in the *real* backwaters of the rural Midwest, you arrogant city boy, where even calls within the area code can cross half the state and be long-distance. :-p
And just how do you dial a url on the standard 12 key touch tone phone?
To dial "g" you hit the number "1" 1 time?
To dial "o" you hit the number "6" 3 times?
To dial "a" you hit the number "2" 1 time?
To dial "t" you hit the number "8" 1 time?
To dial "s" you hit the number "7" 3 times?
To dial "e" you hit the number "3" 2 times?
Wow, you are already up to 12 key presses, and you still don't have anything close to a useful url...
-Joe
I remember the good ole days in my hometown where we only had to dial 4 numbers to call someone in town.
I have no problem with going to 10 digits, I would like to see the step up to 12 but there would be a bit of equipment expense across the country, so that may have to wait
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
So, I think it's about time the rest of the population be forced to keep up with us. Otherwise, you'll always just be a bunch of hillbillies in our eyes. (grin)
great idea! even better, why not just dial people by their aol screen name?
call me anytime baby, jason3021.
- j
Hey you kinda forgot the 30 million Canadians in there.
It is kinda nice how the US & Canadian area codes are integrated.
I don't even know what the real US & Canadian international codes are.
About 5 years ago or so, the 416 area code for Toronto, Canada was split off into 905 and 416. 416 was used for numbers within the boundries of Toronto and 905 for the outlining areas. I don't recall there being a big bruhaha for more than a couple of weeks, it became second nature to automatically dial 905 or 416 (which ever the case may be) depending on where I was. Now that the Toronto-area is getting a third area code this coming spring, people will have to use 10-digit dialing wherever they are.
The new area codes don't change long distance boundries, and if a person screws up, chances are a nice computerized voice will tell them so.
If you had a pervasive 10 digit number of any sort that is used everywhere, you would have the same problem, tied to ssn or not.
Lowmag.net
Maryland has had 10-digit dailing for quite some time now. It took some getting used to sure, but what change doesn't?
The worry now is, with the explosion [Boom!] of cel phones, modems, spoiled kids with own phones, that the telcos will run out of area codes. Seems like they ought to just leapfrog and start us on the new numbering scheme, we'll be on eventually.
The number you have dialed, 555-555-555-5555 is not a working number, please check the number and dial again. Thank you.
--
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001206/tc/teleco ms_numbers_dc_1.html
It's about time. In my metro area we recently went to a geographic split. I had wanted an overlay because I wanted to keep my phone number, but the stupid corporation commission down here didn't listen to businesses and residents and look at the data, and now we make 60% of our calls across area code lines.
Hopefully this will be the first step to personal ownership of one's phone number. I for one would like to be able to move to Holland and keep my phone number.
It might have to do with how the LATAs are structured in your area. If the call is within the same LATA (Local Access and Transport Area), then you shouldn't need an area code. If it's inter-LATA, you may need an area code, even if the area code number is the same. LATAs are structured differently than area codes, and so make things even more confusing. Wheee....
--Joe--
Program Intellivision!
Program Intellivision!
Actually, the cost is going down down down. The day of portable 10 digit phone numbers will be here quite soon. The major limiting factor is that not areas can immediately participate. Number portability already exists between local phone companies in most metropolitan areas. The technology has been built; it just needs to be scaled up.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Press any digits you want. Then using symbolic Gore logic, the "system" will dial the number you "meant" to call!
Busy aligning my non-linear thoughts.
Just add two more digits: AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-00-01 = phone1 AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-00-02 = phone2 AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-00-03 = phone3 AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-01 = cell AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-02-01 = fax1 AAAA-BBBB-CCCC-02-02 = fax2
----------------------------------
"We're sorry, but the website you're trying to reach has been disconnected."
just add zero to everyone's current number. it's easy to remember. it's easier than "remembering" that area codes are not 3 digits - but actually 4 digits, like 1-800 (or for those insane people 0-800). And it'll have the added bonus of just increasing phone numbers by 1 digit. of course the bozos with 1 800 free call will be a litle upset.
I think people should have their phone number as ipv6 number...
Personally, I'd much rather see all pager and cellphone traffic moved to its own "area code", meaning that to dial those numbers, you'd need 10 digits, and everything else (copper-wire-connected) that is "local" only use 7 digits. It may make matters interesting if you want to call from a cell phone to a local number - you'd only want to use 7 digits - but I'm sure those Eletrical and Electronic Engineering wizards could easily cook up a switching system.
--
Do I play Hockey?
What you say!!
I sometimes wonder if people read before responding... The whole idea of using DNS on top of phone-based IPs would be to KEEP a single identifier for you/your phone.
Maybe I'm the only person who has trouble getting a new number out the all the people that have my old one. Maybe it isn't such a big deal. Yeah, stationary needs to be changed, records all over the place, business cards, etc., but I guess I'm the only one who finds that a PITA.
Might as well keep the crappy system we have now, since it apparently isn't a problem.
--
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
I think 10 digit dialing is a great idea...
EXCEPT...
Our crappy phone system at work DOESN'T WORK WITH IT! I haven't been able to call home since they did an area code split and I work and live in different area codes.
How stupid, now I won't be able to call ANY local numbers. I wish they would just dump this stupid system, but they'll probably give the idiotic vendor till 2002 to fix it.
ARGH!
-- IANAEG - I am not an elder god.
Here in Maryland, we have overlapping area codes, so (at the time) Bell Atlantic implemented 10-digit phone numbers. It's really not all that difficult to handle.
I only have problems when I'm in an area of the country that doesn't have the same issues, and try to dial the area code before the number (like when I was in Delaware last year, and had to use a pay phone for directions).
What's 3 more digits per dial, anyway? Especially in this age of speed dial phones....
--
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
The 10 digit dialing in Atlanta, and also 4 digit dialing in a small town I used to live in not too long ago. I don't think either is really superior. I write down numbers anyways because they tend to get reversed in my mind, even with the 4 digit numbers. That's what palm pilots/cellphone number storage/address books/paper/etc. is for. And as far as dialing the extra 3 digits as compared to most places (with 7 digit dialing) it's not going to take much more effort. It would be good to have a nationwide standard on these things, especially for those of us that travel a lot and forget what to do.
Mas vale cholo, que mal acompañado.
The one and sole reason to not have one phone number. Telemarketers would NEVER get off your back unless you were changing it periodically anyway. Sure, you can always check the caller ID, screen calls with your answering machine, but at least half of those are legitimate calls from people with either blocked numbers or screwy phone systems. Some areas now have the option to put a anti-telemarketer message on your line, but that costs $10/month.
Anyway, if you were willing to change your number more frequently, you could benefit from an expanded number space by making it more difficult to keep a current number. But if the situation were like that, then a telemarketer's association would form that would pool together current numbers from various sources (utility companies are notorious for getting you on "The List"), possibly in some sort of online database. No matter what you do, you're doomed to be interrupted. Add that to death and taxes.
Joshua
Terradot
When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout!
there will be that many more 1-900 numbers. excellent.
Well, they did already a long time ago (or at least have been forced by international treaties) when they agreed to the world wide 15 digit scheme.
gruss
H.
When I used to go to school in PA, specifically the LeHigh Valley Area, they transitioned to 10 digit dialing. I can tell you from exp that it is the most annoying thing a phone company could impose upon it's customers. Especially in the begining when I myself had to get used to it. You dont realize how convienient it is to just punch in 7 numbers and get the person you want to talk to.
"Me Ted"
BOSTON SUCKS!
The real problem is TRANSITION in people's minds.
A little background. I live in Portland, OR that has switched to 10-digit a couple of month ago (they had first announced it in 1997 with planned date of switch in 1998, but it apparently had slipped).
The uniqueness of the situation here is that OUR TWO CODES ARE NOT TERRITORIAL! In most cities like Chicago or LA you can approximately tell where the number is located by the code.
IIRC, here it will be different way with the numbers in different code zones interspersed on the same territory.
In the last few months from the change to the mandatory 10-digit dialing I've had my share of errors, trying to enter 7-digit one just to hear "please, dial 10 digits" or something similar.
In order to install this notification, the phone company have had to catch all number dialed that do not start from 0, 1, our old code 503 or the new code 971. It means that all people whose phones used to start from 503 or 971 had to be changed to something else, and we have had only one code area. Now imagine this thing done at the North American wide scale (YES, it affects Canada as well). Installing such a warning will require shutting the phones with prefixes matching exchange numbers in ALL areas! They just won't be able to do it.
ERRORS WILL HAPPEN not because everyone is stupid, but because some transitional period is necessary. Think about how often you dial a number automatically, without thinking. I can bet that you'll dial 7-digit one until your mind finally switches. It will take you a couple of months. But you'll be in limbo during that time without any pre-recorded message that will tell you about your error.
For further reading:
http://www.uswest.com/areaCodes/
Tigers respect lions, elephants and hippos. Maggots respect no one. (C) S. Dovlatov
That way the synergy between telephone and Internet would be complete. You'd send an e-mail, instant message, voice message or phone call, all to somebody@someprovider.com. Endpoint address length would no longer be an issue.
The issue of compatibility with the current phone system is left as an exercise for the reader.
Well, if you haven't heard of voice-IP convergence or VOIP, then perhaps it shouldn't matter to you.
The IPCC has purposely engineered a massive scientific fraud.
16 Digit dialing! binary people! Binary. Don't waste those bits in the byte with 10! geez...
Papa Legba come and open the gate
we've all become used to the extreme US-centric of the 'net - but what exactly does a story like this do on a "stuff that matters" webpage???
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Before we get really ambitious with something like a common number for all your devices, let's get local number portability. If local numbers were portable there would be *no shortage* of telephone numbers. 10 digit numbers with no 1 or 0 to start the area code or the exchange is 8^2(10^8) = 6.4 billion phone numbers. With a population of ~275 million that's more than 20 phone numbers for every man, woman, child, and little baby in the country.
The whole problem is that there are some exchanges with tons of unused numbers and others that are full. Each area code has 8 million numbers. If we got local number portability, all 8 million would be used. Now *that* would sure beat overlays and splits, let alone mandatory 10 digit dialing just to reclaim 0 and 1.
I hate monopolies.
(Do not sign anything.) -- Fell, Planescape: Torment
Where I live (Maryland) we've had 10 digit dialing for years. It really is not that much of a hassle, and this way the phone company can overlap area codes so that there are enough telephone numbers to go around.
--
--
brave little toaster
"Remember, don't try this at home until the statute of limitations has expired."
Infoworld has reported that the fcc has declined to force 10 digit dialing
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
That's precisely what's needed. A telephone version of DNS. I'm sure if some company started making phones with proper keyboards, hooked them up so they connected to their own exchange which would look up a typed name, figure out the number, and dial it, there would be a market. (Precisely what name should match what number is a question, of course...)
In that way, the actual underlying phone number would be as irrelevant as the underlying IP address on the 'net today.
Let's face it, phone numbers are 19th century technology. The only reason we're still using them is that there are millions of dollars worth of hardware and software dependant on the way it's done right now. A DNS layer on top of the existing system would neatly sidestep that issue.
As for me, I'm located in Bucks County, Pennsylvania -- part of the 215/610 area code. We have been dialing 10 digits for quite some time now. It's not that big a deal...I admit, it was a pain at first, but it's not that big a deal.
Instead of going to 11 digit or what-not, I think it might be worthwhile to explore into some hexidecimal numbers. Just adding an A-F Hex number allowed for each digit (non alphabetical) would allow for millions more numbers. The only problem with that is discerning between alphabetical A and numerical A for the idiots in the world. The other problem would be switching the phones to that system.
It doesn't matter anyhow, because in a few years, phone companies will figure out a way to become net-phone carriers, and we'll all have IP addresses.
I dunno, maybe this is reaching too far into the future but why doesn't the FCC try to move voice over to IPv6 with a practiaclly infinite set of "numbers"? Yeah this would take some time but a transition is indeed possible. Give everyone an address rather then a phone number. Make it something like a social security number that everyone gets at birth, then later if you need a second or third one just apply for one and get it. Then where ever you go, plug in your address to the given "phone" and get your calls, e-mail etc? OK, yeah the address will be longer then a current phone number but thats what DNS is for. In the short term, a current 3-3-4 phone number could be the "domain" and for the long term a regional drill down address locator system could be put in place with "bookmarks". If someone wants a cute domain for their address they can pay for it at a given market price for the requested domain. Otherwise, the domain could be look something like this. rickreynolds.562ashbury.sanfrancisco.ca.us
This way we can phase out the current POTS system over 20 or so years rather then put more patches on top of patches.
They will not require 10-digit numbers for the moment. Instead, they will attempt to work on better management of all the available numbers by the telcos.
We have had it here in Philadelphia for years now... fine with me!
Have a Happy.
Ideally, I would like to see this dialing scheme:
- Require 10 digits on local calls
- Require 1+10 digits on toll calls
- Allow 1+10 digits for local calls. This way people who don't care about local/toll can call all their calls this way and have them go through, but
no one can accidentantly make a toll call unless they dial 1.
Unfortunatelly, the CPUC seems to think that taking away 7 digit dialing is the greatest evil. There were four area code overlays planned in the bay area, for 408, 415, 650 and 510, and they were all cancelled. At least 408 is now in serious trouble of running out of phone numbers. They are conserving numbers now, but I fear that at some point they will resort to another split... btw, under the original overlay plan all calls would be 1+10 digits, so there still wouldn't be local/toll distinction.I have no data to support this, but I suspect that there are such exchanges as 408-650 and 650-408 in use, which would prevent a switch to 10 digit dialing with a transition period. I think the only way for California to switch to 10 digit dialing is to
Atlanta moved to 10 digit dialing a couple years ago. Its not so bad now, but when it first started you had to dial twice as many numbers because you always screwed up.
555-4141 *shit* 123-555-4141.
After a great deal of mucking about, the general situation in europe is that numbers outside your local area start with '0', followed by an area code and a local number.
Numbers outside your local country start with '00' followed by a country code, an area code, and a local number.
Of course we do it differently over here to the way the USA does it, but I think that atleast the '00' seems more logical.
It follows that when dialling other planets, one should simply dial '000' followed by the planet code, country code, area code, and local number.
Galaxy-wide that becomes '0000' (assuming inhabitants of other galaxies have ten fingers/tentacles/etc. or we WILL be counting in hexadecimal)
However, the area codes in the UK have been playing silly b****rs over recent years. Down here in Portsmouth, Hampshire, the area code was once 705, so dialling Portsmouth from, say, London was 0705 xxxxxx.
The first major change was to change the London '01' code to 071 and 081; depending on whether you were in inner or outer London (071 for inner london), this left the 01 prefix free.
The second major change was to add a '1' to the front of the vast majority of area codes in the UK, so Portsmouth went from 0705 to 01705. Some cities opened up new codes starting 011, such as Bristol, where 0272 became 0117, and to keep the length of all national dialled numbers constant, the local numbers were extended from their old 6-digits to 7-digits, by sticking a '9' on the front of existing numbers. So 0272 654321 became 0117 9654321.
Next up, as local number ranges started to run out of numbers, as everyone got second lines for internet use, and the number of local telco's, each with different number block assignments exploded, some areas started to run out of numbers.
One of the affected cities was Portsmouth, and together with Southampton, they were allocated the new area code 023, with local numbers being prefixed with 92 for Portsmouth, and 80 for Southampton, so we had to put up with two number changes in just a few years. Old numbers like 0705 654321 became 023 92654321.
At the end of the day, it's not particularly difficult to remember, and lots of publicity went into the changeover, although that was local to the UK. I dread to think of the number of misdialled international calls; a number of countries charge for unconnected international calls. Ouch.
Anyway, the UK telephone system now appears to approaching some sort of consistency. National area codes now all begin 01xxx, or 02x, with room for expansion into 03x. Special rate numbers start 08xxx, and premium rate (some as high as GBP 5.00/minute) are 09xxx.
Over here is a list of all of the information you never wanted to know about UK telephone code assignments, but were too bored to ask.
As far as this being necessary I really don't understand. Where I live now (Iowa) we just split the 319 area code. This gives the ~2 million people in Iowa 5 area codes or a total of 50 million possible phone numbers. I realize that some of these start with 0 or 1 or x11 and can't be used but it just seems pretty excessive. How can the system be this inefficient? Do we really need to have 25 phone#s per person?
_____________
I don't want free as in beer. I just want free beer.
In LA, the real objection was to overlaying one area code on top of another. People didn't want to give up the 310 area code, so the PUC and the phone companies agreed to use another area code on top of 310. If you asked for a new phone line in your house, it might have been with a different area code than your present line. As a result, there was 11 digit dialing required to call next door.
One of the costs of switching was changing the dialing machines used by many apartments as a replacement for a door bell. For several months it was impossible to visit my son's apartment, because the door "bell" dialer only dialed the seven digits and never reached his apartment two floors up!
This is how "normal" telephone and the internet could grow together: 8-digit hex phone-numbers! Use your IP, Luke! Or in others words: I am off, having a talk with www.whitehouse.gov ...
Guess what, we already have 10 digit numbers, and four different area codes. Deal with it everyone.
-matt
If it ain't broke, don't fix it!
We're not going to run out of phone numbers, get real! We already have a usable range of 6.4 billion numbers which takes into consideration the legacy rule where a prefix or areacode can't start with 0 or 1. That's just for the american system. France uses 8 digits, as well as a few other European countries. Now logically if that's not enough, well maybe some people should have their excess lines disconnected and returned into the pool of available numbers. Breaking every legacy phone dialing system and confusing the hell out of senior citizens and all-ages of retards isn't quite my idea of an enhancement.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Since Wireless will eventually take over the phone industry, why not fix the wireless to work with IP's, and leave local phones alone. That way the change happens gradually and is more accepted, because younger people are more likely to accept the change than people on social security.
Just my opinion...
--
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
Ok, I know it's terribly un-geeky of me, but I don't have one of those palm-like devices, so i store phone numbers I don't remember on my watch. If they make phone numbers longer then I'LL HAVE TO BUY A NEW WATCH!!!!
Typically, if your call is within your area code, you don't need to dial the area code, just 1 followed by the last 7 digits. If the number isn't long-distance, you only dial the last 7 digits. This is referred to as "7 digit dialing." In the larger metroplexes, where the metroplex itself is covered by multiple area codes, this just starts getting silly, because a number can be local, but not in your area code. Many of these metroplexes have converted to 10-digit-dialing, which means for all local calls, you must dial all 10 digits, and for long-distance calls, 1 plus the remaining 10 digits.
To give you an idea of the current state of the universe, in the D/FW area we have 972, 214, and 817. Chicagoland has several, none of which I can remember. Detroit has 810 and 313 (and maybe more since last I looked). It's getting freakin' ridiculous. And I've done nothing to make it better -- my fiancee and I both have mobile phones.
One of the nice things about 10-digit dialing is that it now opens up new exchanges and new area codes. It used to be that area codes always had a 0 or 1 as a middle digit, and that exchanges never did. This allowed the switch to be able to tell an area code from an exchange. In areas w/ 10-digit dialing, they can bring in new area codes which violate this rule (eg. 972 in the Dallas area). Once 10-digit dialing is establised, they can start brining in exchanges which violate this rule as well (for instace, my fiancee's cell phone is in the "817-800-xxxx" exchange.)
--Joe--
Program Intellivision!
Program Intellivision!
And the nice thing here is, since all 3 area codes start with different numbers you can write it 4-555-1212, 7-555-1212, 6-555-1212 and most people know what you mean. Still can't dial it that way though.
I was happily surprised when I discovered the redial capability of my caller ID unit supported several forms of >7 digit dialing. 8 digit, 10 digit, 11 digit...
Here in Atlanta we've been using 10 digit numbers for a few years, and additional exchanges are slowly added now and again. We've got 404, 770, and 678. I don't know how many more will be added over time, but with the increase in mobile phones and other devices utilizing phone numbers, it's inevitable.
brilliant. absolutely. bat that has nothing to do with the lack of phone numbers in metroploitan areas. At least you have a great solution to make it feel like nothing's changed.
Phones are on the way out people...As one Mr. Cletus the Slacked Jawed Yokel from Springfield would say, instead of using a telephone itself, climb up the telephone pole and just yell real loud to talk the person...."Hay Ma!" errr... "Hay Sis!"
better bring the funk on a nasty dunk...have a take and don't suck!
Just put an Enter key on the phone.
In other news, online black-market auction
site E-bay was |-|@X0r3d by some 31ll3333t scrvipt
k1dd13z and MS-D0S'ed, resulting in a substantial loss of 245 septdectillion nanocents. Film at 11.
which would look up a typed name, figure out the number
Similar to 411.com, or any pother online phone book. They're great.
The current case is, 1 - lookup name in phone book, 2 - dial number into phone. Step 1 is usless, and should be obsoleted with better phones.
Have you read my journal today?
Of course not, this is the goyernment we're talking about. They spend billions of dollars on Anti-Ballistic Missile systems, and next to nothing on the space program. My calculator is more powerful than the shuttles computers. They're that old. I could continue to rant, but I'm not.
Shave the Whales!
In California, the number of available plates is further limited by the fact that there are only two standard issue license plate formats on the road. The six digit plate, only seen on older cars, which uses the format XXX111 where X is a letter and 1 is a number, and the seven digit plates which are currently issued using the format 1XXX111.
Given those limitations, and the space issue, I think your figure is a tad bit too high. For instance, a 7 digit license plate cannot choose all 7 digits from a pool of 37 characters, it can choose 3 digits from a pool of 26 and 4 digits from a pool of 10. I'm too lazy to do my own calculations, though, so feel free to flame me :)
ToiletDuk (58% Slashdot Pure)
With 7 digits and 37 possible characters (26 letters, 10 numbers, and a space) there are 94,931,877,133 possible combinations. I don't think they're going to run out of plates any time soon.
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Technoli
>even if you are calling your next door neighbor,
>you will have to dial 1+Area Code+Number
This comment isn't quite right. If you read the actual web site you'll see that starting 4/2/2000, you must dial local calls with 10 digits and the prefix 1 will be optional. AAA-BBB-CCCC. Long distance calls will still require the 1 prefix. This is the part that seems screwy to me. Why not allow people to drop the 1 for long distance and make *everything* 10 digits?
Why do we need length-delimited phone numbers at all? As long as they're reprogramming the switching systems, why not set things up to accept the (otherwise useless) # key as a terminator? That way 123# would be distinct from 1234#, etc. and the availability of numbers is no longer an issue.
Need an area code? Identify that with the * key. 212*123# would be distinct from your local 123#. By the same logic, we wouldn't be restricted to three-digit area codes anymore either.
Those keys have been on every keypad I've seen for thirty years and the phone companies never gave us a reason to use them before. And what about people with rotary phones? Screw 'em. Tell 'em to buy a $10 touch-tone unit when they pick up their new HDTV.
I live in Portland, Ore. and we've been using 10-digit dialing for a couple of months now. It really sucks;
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$_='hfflbwfsbhfzp vs';s/(^.{4})(.{7 })(.+$)/$3 $2 $1/
Remember, ten digit dialing just means you have to dial the area code.
I believe that in most places, the current system is that if you are dialing an area code, you first dial a '1.' If you are not dialing an area code, you do not first dial a '1,' even if it is a long distance number. Some phone companies will, on request, block 7-digit dialing for non-local calls.
Now if they wanted to make my phone number be something like (xxx) xxx-xxxx-xxx, then that would be a pain, not only for remembering phone numbers, but also for all the old phone equipment that has the current system burned in firmware. Even if the equipment is upgradable, the cost of doing so would be significant.
To quote briefly from the Reuters article (available at Yahoo here):
The Reuters article is dated Wednesday December 6 1:01 PM ET. The LA times is dated the same day, but doesn't mention the time.
Over here we have two main forms of number
(0xxx) xxx xxxx, and
(0xxxx) xxxxxx,
giving 11-digit numbers. Seems to work ok. Major cities use the first form, everywhere else uses the second, ie London = (0207/8) xxx xxxx, Glasgow (0141) xxx xxxx, Aberdeen 01224 xxxxxx.
This seems to work out ok for us...
...we're moving to that come the beginning of the year. We can already dial it, it's not yet mandatory though.
I don't know a single person who thinks this is any sort of "big deal".
(Oh my god, I have to remember what area code he's in and press 3 more buttons!)
Get with the times, amerika, and stop being so digitally lazy (both finger and law, come to think of it!)
mindslip
Did you go to high school with Jesus?
It is inane that we switch over to 10 digit numbers if we are going to move to 11 or 12 at some point in the foreseeable future. Heloooo! Humans resist change. Therefore, make changes that will work for long periods of time, not temporary fixes.
Let's see... Other similar instances where a lack of foresight caused huge hassles for us humans: The 640k barrier, y2k, potentially IPv4, and SUV gas mileage (well, the hassles will come later on that one, trust me).
Wouldn't it be simpler just to go with 12 digits in the long run.
--
Do I play Hockey?
What you say!!
The FCC ruled out separate area codes for services such as cell phones and pagers. It would have been biased against new companies getting into those markets. The traditional local telephone monopoly would have gotten to keep the old familiar area code while the competitors would have been stuck with the strange new code.
For the authoritative site on area code issues, see the North American Numbering Plan Administration.
Quis metamoderunt ipses metamoderatores?
I don't have the textbook anymore because it was last year, but in our psychology class, we learned that the optimal chunks of data in a series to memorize is 7. Now think about current phone number digits.
Looks like all of us will be messing with our Palm Pilots a little more often if this goes through.
I don't know about other places... but northeast ohio, or at least the akron-cleveland area, just switched to 10 digits -- the area code is required all calls, including local.
I realize that 10-digit dialing has been commonplace for many areas now, but what about those of us that live in rural areas, where the entire state is using a single area code. 10-digit dialing would be a complete waste for us because ALL of our local calls are in our area code.
Think of all the databases in the US that would have to be updated. I wonder how big a task this would be!
---
Sig Return: 204 No Content
deal with it
Boycott Coke!
:wq
Before the nation stoops to this, I'd like to see the phone companies encourage phone lines without phone numbers. Think of how many second, modem only lines are out there, or how many businesses have additional numbers they only use to call out (telemarketers). I would think this would lead to a reasonable reduction to last us a little longer.
Second that, I'd prefer to see 3+8 numbers, but of course that wouldn't be backwards compatible unless consumer phones started including the A-D buttons.
There is a good psychological reason for the 7 digit phone number: it is a high estimate of the average person's short term memory. Jump straight to 10 digits and you're well beyond that limit.
Anm
Seven-Digit Dialing:
2XX through 9XX = 800 area codes
2XX-XXXX through 9XX-XXXX = 800K local numbers
800 area codes times 800K numbers = 640M
Ten-Digit Dialing (sorta):
0XX through 9XX = 1K area codes
0XX-XXXX through 9XX-XXXX = 1M local numbers
1K area codes times 1M numbers = 1 billion
This obviously dramatically increases the pool of numbers available. We would always have to dial the area code first, thus freeing up the 1 and 0 as possible number prefixes. However, it seems like a stop-gap solution. We would still only have 3.3 numbers for every person, as opposed to 2.1. And as population grows, that number will obviously shrink.
Twelve-Digit Dialing:
2XXX through 9XXX = 8K area codes
2XXX-XXXX through 9XXX-XXXX = 8M local numbers
8K area codes times 8M numbers = 64 billion
This obviously seems like the best solution. We can continue to dial 1 + area code + number for long-distance calls, dial zero for operator, and dial only one more digit for local calls (the XXXX-XXXX format might even be easier to remember.) Existing numbers and area codes could just have zeros tacked into the middle or the end. 1-312-555-1212 becomes 1-3120-5550-1212, or maybe 1-3120-5551-2120. Either way, it's not much harder. We now have 213.3 phone numbers for every U.S. citizen, and numbers are virtually no harder to remember.
I'm not upset at having to remember my area code or dial the extra numbers. I just don't like that it will be harder to tell whether you're dialing a local, local toll, or long distance call. In my area, there are about 5 area codes within a half-hours driving distance of here, and many same-area-code calls are long distance, or local toll, or whatever. Well, I don't want to pay for long distance if I don't have to, right? So I try it without the area code first, and if it tells me to dial the area code, then I know it's a toll call. With the new system, unless I'm missing something, it wouldn't work that way.
"It is well that war is so terrible, lest we grow too fond of it."
Time is fun when you're having flies.
-Kermit the Frog
"Federal regulators are expected to consider a controversial proposal Thursday that would require telephone users to dial 10 digits for all local and long-distance calls."
I personally don't have much of a problem with switching to 10 digit phone numbers, but I truly see this causing a massive public outcry. I just don't believe that most Americans are ready to give up the ease of making local calls. I remember how much of a pain it was in New York City when 212 got split into 212 and 646. And with the 718 and 917 area codes in NYC as well, it's just a pain to call someone down the street from you. 10 digit dialing is viable, and New York has managed pretty well, but I'm wonderring how the entire country would react. Lot's of people react poorly to change, and changing how one makes local calls is just going to be a hefty change for most people, even if it doesn't seem that big of a deal.
---
"Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong." --Dennis Miller
"You must dial an area code when dialing this number. You must now hang up and try again."
It's great!
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. -- Oscar Wilde
since last nite at 6pm when the local l.a. news was on , on channel 4 (nbc) they claimed to have " found " 850,000 numbers in all the area codes .
and now they wanna put another 3 digits ?
i used to live in the (818) then (213) and (323) . worked as far away as (562) and (310)
as lame as the nitely new is , its right . a lil more research would save all that reprinting of the four and a half inch phone book ( (323) area only )
I live in Houston, where, it has been pointed out, we've all gotten accustomed to 10-digit dialing rather nicely. Unfortunately, my lusers keep entering the "area code" into their dial-up networking setups... it works fine if you give it all 10 digits in one little white box. Except for winfax, I think. I dunno. I don't support them anymore. We got another schmuck for that. But in any case, there's quite a bit of software that will need some petty tweaking to support this on a grand scale...
Close. CA has several classes of plates. The main classes are non-commercial, commercial, and trailer.
non-commercial (most plates) are 3 numbers + 3 letters. When these ran out they went to 3 letters + 3 numbers. When these ran out, they went to number + 3 letters + 3 numbers. This is where we are now.
Commercial plates are 5 numbers + letter. When these ran out they went to number + letter + 5 numbers.
trailers are 2 letters + 4 numbers. When these ran out they went to number + 2 letters + 4 numbers.
There are other classes too as well as realy old plates (e.g., mid 50s and earlier, cars had "trailer style" plates).
They ran out of prefix codes.
This happened because there are lots of rate centers (billing areas), and each rate center needs its own prefix (NXX) code. Now, with competition, each carrier needs its own NXX within each rate center that it's in. That eats up NXXs faster than Pac-Man.
There are technical solutions. NXXs can be shared among up to ten carriers by using hte next digit to identify carriers, so for instance 924-5 goes to VeriZontal and 924-6 goes to AT&T Local. Some states have ordered it, but some haven't, thus worsening things.
Even better, telephone numbers could be shared from a common pool, since they are already portable (can be moved to a different local carrier). A phone number is now like a DNS name, NOT an IP address. So a neutral pool registry could let carriers assing numbers from the common pool, and East Frog Dick (population 133) wouldn't need five prefix codes. BUT the FCC hasn't ordered that (the incumbent telcos are opposed to giving up their numbering advantages).
Which 9 do you dial? I assume you use the seven 555-1234, but what are the other two? Do you pick randomly from the area code?
All of the greater Houston area is on 10-digit dialing code... and nobody seems to care much anymore. There are actually 3 different area codes, and nobody forgets to dial it. Most software concers are really unfounded, because anything that's been written well has the extra 3 digits on it (does this remind anyone else of Y2k bugs?). I'm just saying that if they made the move, no houstonian would notice for a while.
The only problem, i think, would be when people automatically dial 1 for a long distance call... and end up talking to George in Texas instead of Jeb in Florida because it's actually a new area code now.
~Kooshman
The idea strikes me as a Fully Qualified Telephone Number, like in DNS.
My cell phone will automagically dial the 1 for me, so every entry in my address
book has xxx-xxx-xxxx format. I always know what area code somebody is in.
This is a Good Thing. (I live in San Diego, we have 3 area codes in a relatively small area,
so this *REALLY* helps)
--Dave
There was a study done back in the seventies, and I believe a book was published on the subject. It was about short-term memory. (Human RAM ^_^ ) The conclusion of the study said something along the lines of, "An average person can store seven unique things in short-term memory without data corruption, give or take 2.". (Yes, "Seven, Plus of Minus Two" was an official title, IIRC.)
Good Christ, I have enough trouble as it is with phone numbers, much less the populous general. This could prove interesting!
The One,
The Only,
--The Kid
So it goes.
We switched to 10 digit phone numbers about a year ago as well. Didn't seem to be much of a problem for anyone, except for people who had to track phone numbers in databases for various organizations. It gets important to know the actual area code and have it implicitly stated rather than implied when you start getting more than one area code in an area.
Personally, I don't know what this fuss is all about. Can't people handle punching 3 extra numbers? Most of all the numbers you call for the time being will have the same first 3 numbers.
The IPv6 idea was interesting...think of the things you could do: ping someone's phone to see if it's alive (or busy or whatnot), telnet (ssh?) to a high tech answering machine... Now we just need to get the telephony devices to handle such a thing.
I just found a new sig.
The US & Canada International country code is +1
Convienient, isn't it?
The Los Angeles/Orange County region is stopping it... it was proposed here a few years ago, and people had fits about it...that was back when LA was 213, OC was 714, and 'the valley' was 818. Since then, its become less of an issue, since dialing 11 numbers is almost required ( LA is 213, 210, 323, OC is 714, 949, the valley is 818, 626, and there's also a few in the outter lying regions that used to be 714/818 that are now 909, 661, etc).
The logic in this move is basically that the mass of new numbers caused a mass of new area codes, and now dialing the extra digits is almost mandatory anyway, so why not just take the extra step and force people to dial them to free up more numbers.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
Calling from Seattle (area code 206) to nearby area code 425 presents some interesting challenges. Sometimes you have to dial 1+425+number like any other long-distance call. Other times that will fail ("the number you reached is not in service or has been disconnected") and you have to dial 425+number -- the full ten digits -- but WITHOUT the preceding 1. I suspect it has something to do with which areas are considered local vs. in-state LD for tariff purposes, but why the f*** should I as a consumer have to know the difference? I mean, if someone leaves a message that says "Call me at 425-555-1000", I have no way of knowing in advance whether I need that leading 1 or not. Retarded!
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
Jesus didn't go to high school. In fact, he didn't even know how to read! And he was a Palestinian!
Granted, I have their nationwide plan, but I have to dial all areacode-prefix-last4 all the time on my phone, even local stuff.
Of course, this will mostly go away if we zap long distance charges in the USA. What a benefit to the consumer! Watch the rapidly declining long-distance rates, and notice how Sprint is already tying their rates to flat fees [following somewhat the idea of flat-rate ISP services].
Now, where have I read the abolition of LD calls before? Oh, yeah, Arthur C. Clarke's 2001. But he had the end-date for LD calling as 12/31/1999. I guess that would be a Y2K problem, huh?
--
-- Geof F. Morris
Currently we do have 10 digits, if you include area codes, there are a potential 10 billion numbers available with our current system. Even if every single one of the 300 million or so Americans had a land line, cel phone, fax, and a dedicated dialup, there would STILL be over 8 billion numbers available.
I think it would be better to reform the current system of area codes. For example, why does Vermont need their own area code? They only have a million or so people. All of New England could probably fit on 4 area codes, but currently they use 13.
Is it really necessary to expand to 10 trillion potential phone numbers in the States? My cynical side is going to come out and suggest that its a marketing ploy by the phone companies who will undoubtedly make a ton of cash replacing all the equipment (and then again when they say we need 12 digits)
The ivory tower has never had to reach so h
It would require different phones. The idea is similar to quick dials on a persons phone, remember this button ather than a phone number.
Have you read my journal today?
Actually that was only about 20 years ago, but it was a small rural town
As x approaches total apathy I couldn't care less.
Since I got a cell phone -- where you have to dial the full number regardless of where you are -- I've been using the complete number on all phones. So this kind of arrangement wouldn't affect me, even if I lived in the states. I can't be the only person doing this, can I?
At least here in California, a local (toll free) call is defined as a call to less than 12 miles away.
There are plenty of calls to the same area code that are toll calls, and also plenty of calls to neighbouring area codes that are toll free.
The only people who are fussing about this are the folks who don't want to dial three more digits for LOCAL calls.
And for those of you wondering, we switched about a year ago, and it's been painless. Took me less than a month to get used to it.
* Split Infinity Music
* ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
Seems to me, thinking back to Phone Phreaker days on the Commodore64, I once read some military phones include the A/B/C/D keys, for "secure" phone numbers that could not be dialed without those keys. Anyone know any details?
* Split Infinity Music
* ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
Two is not enough. What about companies, like Microsoft, that own a couple thousand lines? Add up all the corporate phone lines and you'll need a half dozen per person, before you even get to pagers, cells, faxes, modems, etc.
* Split Infinity Music
* ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
I had this back in Bucks County outside of Philadelphia before I moved to Florida. At first everyone thought it was stupid, but after it was implimented nobody really cared. It wouldn't effect me in the least because I already do it, although the county I am currently in doesn't require it :)
Did they really run out of numbers or did/do they do a really crappy job of managing/salvaging the numbers they know about? It seems a combination of new area codes and filling up the exchanges should more than fix the set of required numbers. Maybe it has to do with how they allocated per CO. But is is possible there is a large number of dead numbers out there that haven't been reclaimed? Anyone know about this?
By analogy I work for a company with a Class "A" internet space and we ran out of IP addresses in many regions of the world and I'd be shocked if in the worst case possible we used or legitimately reserved even 20% of that space.
A common case is where a LEC (*Bell) or large established CLEC (GTE) has an extended local calling area agreement with small rural cariers. The confusion arises when calls are placed onto the networks of CLECs in large urban areas who do not have agreements with rural carriers. The rural carriers will charge their users long distance or not depending on who owns the called number.
The real issue that people seem to have is not that an additional 3 digits is hard to remember, but that people are used to dialling 11 digits (starting with 1) for long distance.
Something better might be a notification tone to users letting them know when they have dialled a number that is non-local and billable. Those who unaware they were about to dial a toll call could then disconnect.
--
--
The government is not my daddy.
I live in London, England, and we already did something like this over the last few years. In fact, we've done it a lot. Here's some information:
Originally, London had the "area code" 01-xxx-xxxx
Around 15 years ago (?) this changed to inner london (071-xxx-xxxx) and outer london (081-xxx-xxxx)
Eight (?) years ago the whole country changed, adding a "1" onto of all area codes, so London became 0171-xxx-xxxx and 0181-xxx-xxxx.
Last year, several large cities (manchester, birmingham, and of course, london) changed to have new number, again. Now, london is 020-7xxx-xxxx and 020-8xxx-xxxx. The most significant change here is that all local numbers change due to this too. With the other changes local numbers stayed the same (xxx-xxxx, no prefix), but now you needed a 7 or 8 just to dial the number locally as well...
All these changes were due to shortage in numbers. I am surprised this hasn't risen its head sooner in the USA.
So what can i tell you about them? They are a) disruptive, b) obviously costly to the Telco (and to businesses!), and c) shows they have no forward planning nor vision of what future demand will be.
Every one of these "upgrades" in London were promised to be the last. Can you imagine if this sort of thing happened with domains? We're seeing it happening with IPs, at least IPv6 has enough foresight to not need to be expandable hopefully ever again...
In short, moving to a 10 digit number with an eye to expand later to 11 and 12 is short-sighted and will lead only to further disruption. If you anticipate the demand will be there, upgrade to 12 immediately.
Fross
North American Numbering Plan Forum presents my alternative. It ends up with 8-digit local dialing (4+4), which should be adequate for all but the largest metro areas (which will need two area codes). It also sorts the area codes into geographic, nongeographic/functional and an expanded freephone (800, etc.) space.
Implementation of such a change will take years, because there are necessary transition phases, the first of which is to move to mandatory 10-digit local dialing. Assume that that is inevitable; the only question is when. The plan I discuss has no flag days, plenty of "permissive" time for every stage of transition, and makes new numbers predictable.
The web site is a Delphi board, which means that it has its own discussion forum. I dont' know if it's a good idea to advertise it on /. :-) but hey it could use some activity!
Turn your "way back" dial to when there was no assurance the technology would take hold, when the first mobile phones were coming online... There is NO WAY that the FCC would have authorized an overlay area code back in the 80s (when the technology for overlays didn't even EXIST yet) for some piddling little startup company offering a few thousand-dollar wireless phone systems. No sane government group is going to risk its neck like that.
The bottom line is that nobody (except maybe some venture capitalists) expected the mobile phone market to explode like it did.
So once again, the government got caught with its pants down. No surprise there. It's just how our bureaucracy works.
* Split Infinity Music
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--Brandon / Split Infinity Music
seriously! cell phones and freebie calculators have 'em, but on those expensive telephone handsets in every office in the U.S. you're screwed if you misdial one digit -- you have to start all over. WHY?
"Biped! Good cranial development. Evidently considerable human ancestry."
Calls to either area code are considered local as the two area-codes perfectly overlap.
During the initial roll-out plan, the original idea was that cellular (wireless), fax, and pagers would end up on 720 and the wireline-based phones would stay on 303. However, this was (rightly) shot down during the review period as unfair to the cellular carriers and unenforceable -- it would give the existing USWest (now Qwest) monopoly too much leverage. "Want to keep your 303 numbers? Stick with USWest."
So there was a little confusion for the first couple of weeks and a few PBX's and fire alarms had to be adjusted. They did a short period where the 7-digit dialing still worked but gave you a brief message reminding you to dial 303 the next time.
In all, since a vast majority of people I work with now in Denver weren't native Denver-ites they don't remember a day when seven digit dialing worked for half the state, and therefore there are very few complaints.
Meanwhile, my grandparents still have two rotary phones with real bells hardwired into their walls -- lots of changes for this little cow-town in two generations!
+++OK ATH
In my area, it has already been decreaed that in 2003, they will switch to 10 digit dialing - at least they gave us some warning..
Something I honestly don't understand is why they aren't planning ahead a bit more, and doing a system where the number of digits after the area code (1 area code per area, please! one area code for every area in the world, and only one ;) shouldn't be a fixed. When they run out in the 7 digit numbers, add a digit. When they run out in 8, add a digit! It lasts and lasts! (ok, it dosen't sort your mail). Honestly though, I don't see why we keep putting fixed amounts of digits on things we know will grow significantly in the not so long-term future, or even things where there is a chance of that happening. I have a similar rant about ipv6, but I'll save that for another day when I put out a specification ;).
SSL Certificate
In Phoenix, the former 602 area code was split into 3 area codes: 602, 623, 480. You do not need to dial the area code if the phone number you are calling from is in the same area code as the number you are calling, otherwise you have to use 10 digits.
It is somewhat annoying but there's simply not enough numbers to go around so you can complain all you want, it's not going to change a thing...
The method of using a different long distance carrier is actually 101 plus a four digit code for the carrier. The changes in the network allow for ten times as many companies to get their own code. Adding a 10 would only allow for the same amount of long distance carriers. As for the current companies, 321, 220, etc, just had a zero appended to the beginning, so they are 0321 and 0220 respectively.
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