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Ditching your Landline Just Got Easier
QuePasaCalabaza writes "The FCC has approved a bill 5-0 that allows consumers to take their land line phone numbers and carry them over to thier wireless phones. USA Today has one of the first scoops on this ruling. The official news release [Word|PDF] is there."
and on vacation find me...
unless I want to get into bed with the evil cable company that is
Well, you're already in bed with the evil phone company... so what's the difference?
Someone needs to just run fiber to everyone's house/business and put all these bozos out of business.
--
"What do you want me to do? Whack a guy? Off a guy? Whack off a guy? Cause I'm married."
On a side note, does it disturb anyone else that a mere 5 people control such weighty decision affecting telecommunications?
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur
Just as long as you don't need to use your phone during an emergency.
Hell, I cannot get reception during home football games much less after a tornado rips through the state.
Land line is also good for your home's alarm and tracking where a 911 call is made from.
I guess I'm just an alarmist, but when you need to call someone, a land line is significantly more reliable than a cable phone or cell phone.
... in the UK. I've managed to keep my mobile number for a couple of years now, but they did it by requiring every mobile number to start 07... That makes it impossible to have your home number on the phone :-(
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
An easier way for the FBI to monitor us all.
-Seriv
No, you just need a physical line, connected to a dslam on one side, and a dsl modem on the other.
He tried to kill me with a forklift!
What about wanting to go back to landline service?
I'm tired of my cell service and just want to put my wireless number on a landline. Or better yet, put my wireless number on a vonage line.
a commerical for a new service from Cingular that would allow you to tie your cell phone to ring to your home phone when attached to a device they sell. And you don't use wireless minutes when answering at home. So, you could have the bext of both worlds.
Technically, yes. But when I used to have DSL (cable wasn't available yet when I moved here), I was required to have a voice line by Verizon in order to get DSL service. And no other company could connect me with DSL due to problems communicating with Verizon - even Verizon took 4 months.
Anyway, saving $40/month by switching to cable and dropping my landline was the best and most cost effective upgrade I ever did and I don't have to pay a dime to Verizon ever again.
-N
I've nothing to say here...
How will TiVo know what's going on?
You can't even record a single show without first making a telephone call on a landline. Even the DirecTiVos which get their listing from the satellite.
Is there a way to plug a normally landline-connected device into a cell phone for the occasional call?
Send your friends messages of love at fuck-you.org
Even if I had a plan that could put the big telcos out of business, I wouldn't. They own and operate too much of the Internet infrastructure. Wouldn't want to risk killing that, now, would we?
Remember when UUNet threatened to only pass traffic of paying customers? That would have cause a severe disruption in the...well...nevermind. But the point is, the same thing could happen if one of the big backbones were to kick the bucket.
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I have (luckily) gotten no telemarketing phone calls on my cell phone, but I was littered with them on my land line. Why would I want my cell number published? Why would I want to pay *extra* to not have it published, and why would I want to pay more in phone company "surcharges" for this "benefit"?
I ditched my land-line a long time ago, and never missed it. I appreciate the concept, but I think I'd take a pass on this opportunity.
I understand if you've had your phone number for years why this might be a nice option, but for me (who moves all too frequently, which assisted in my desire to ditch a land line alltogether), this just isn't a factor.
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.
are you mad?!?
... hell i didn't even -need- the do-not-call registry.
one of the few things that makes sole cell ownership preferable to a landline is that the cell companies don't (or can't) sell their registries to telemarketers.
since i've gone land-line-less
but if i took my landline number onto my cell service - man i'd be doubly infuriated at any telemarketing - even if it was restricted to traffic allowed by the do-not-call registry.
(non-profits, political advocacy, and any company who has sold you products or services in the last 18 months -- all cleared to bother you as much as they want.)
// "Can't clowns and pirates just -try- to get along?"
I never got any telemarketing calls on my cell phone, but I do get quite a few on my home phone (regardless of do-not-call thing). I am guessing I will start getting them on my cell if I switch the number and will have to waste minutes / be bothered all the time by the telemarketers? No, thanks. Caller ID helps, but only to a degree...
...remember good 'ol times when IP used to mean Internet Protocol....
A few articles have detailed the problem, and it all revolves around area codes. Without expressed limits what would stop some idiot from New York wanting to transfer his line to his new California home?
Perhaps if the phone system could ditch area codes as geographical representation. It should not be too hard, in Atlanta we have 4 area codes all covering the same LARGE area (largest free calling zone in US)
404,770,678, and 470
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
a burglar cuts your land line before hitting your house; oldest trick in the book. Cuts off the phone-home feature of most home alarm systems, particularly since the ones that do have a "cellular backup" feature charge big extra fees for that feature.
I like always having a cell phone available. If you suspect a home burglary and find that your phone doesn't work, you'll be damned glad you have that cell, because you're facing one of two kinds of opponents.
#1. A professional who has anticipated your alarm system.
#2. A stalker-type who has surveiled you, knows you are home, and has plans for you.
Either way... I'll keep my cell AND land line.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
Now telemarketers can no longer screen out cellphone blocks so expect more telemarketing calls on your cellphone as they can correctly claim that they no longer have the ability to tell if a number is a cell number or not.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I couldn't agree more. However The Bell Bitches are every bit as evil.
Lets say I want to run VOIP to bypass SBC. I have to have Cable. What about DSL you say? If I want DSL I have to have a landline so I can't bypass them. It takes cable + VOIP to bypass the Bell Bitches as of now for any ADSL. This is a total L.O.S. I've called SBC and asked them why I can't get _just_ DSL. There answer was "WE need a copper pair to run the signal on". Ok, then run it like you would if I were going to have a phone. Poof, copper pair. "Uh...we can't do that". Why? "Let me speak with my supervisor". "It is not possible to have DSL without a phone line". No it's not I just went over this with you. "Sir, it is not possible, if you'd like I can take an order for Phone + DSL and have a technician dispatched within 5-14 business days." Sure there is DSL competion...sure there is. P.S. !@#$ you SBC
A $4.99 monthly charge on your phone service with a line item description of "Number Portability Fee". After all, the telcos will certainly claim that they will need to spend billion$ to implement number portability. They will certainly be entitled to recoup their costs.
Pick up the phone... not working... cant make a call or anything as if the line was dead.
DSL experienced no problems at all
So i called them and apparently DSL works on two frequencies completly seperete from the dial-tone. And theyd had some problem in which the dial-tones operating frequency was cut off at theri network.
long story short.... is it possible for them to give you DSL without a phone-number.... yes. But it is beyond doubtfull that they will.
--Idiots, Every single one of YOU, A flaming mass of conglomerated morons, hey wait a second, isnt that how RAID works?
Of ditching the land line:
1.
Multiple outlets no more. I know when Grandma calls it is nice to have a few of us able to listen in at the same time.
2.
TiVo/DSL/BBS's.
3.
Emergency Calls. Would suck to not have service/coverage during an emergency.
4.
Battery life. (I can choose to not go wireless with a jack or two in the house to ensure dead batteries and misplaced handsets don't ruin the chances of contacting me)
On the plus side: I am sure the companies that build and sell aftermarket replacement batteries for cell phones love this ruling. At $29 - $59+ a pop -- and a life span of less than a year (of being able to hold a full charge)that equals some big cash.
(+1 Funny) only if I laugh out loud.
NYC has a dedicated area code of 917 for cell phones... does this mean I can take the (very highly) coveted 212 number and go wireless with it?
-n-
Uh, Neo, hate to say this but...
"I only speak the truth"
Karma: null(Mostly affected by an unassigned variable)
Someone needs to just run fiber to everyone's house/business and put all these bozos out of business.
... And then we can deal with the "Evil fiber optic companies."
Sorry. Already got it. Quirky internet service, frequent outages, crappy tv reception, and an incompetent customer service department that thinks it should work banker's hours. I thought this was going to be great when I moved into my new home, and after about 6 months ditched them and went with Time Warner. Thank Cthulu I never let them handle my phone lines as well. They may not be the best, but they're better than ClearWorks.
Non tam praeclarum est scire Latine, quam turpe nescire
-- Cicero
Business service through Cox costs about the same as residential service, and about the only thing you can't do is run a warez server or a spamhaus on it. Port-25 traffic is blocked on dynamic IPs, but static IPs are only $10 per month.
With most of the calls to my home phone number being solicitations for credit-fixing schemes and satellite-TV systems (so much for the Do-Not-Call list), if I ever go cell-only I'm not entirely sure I'd want to keep my phone number.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
Well, you're already in bed with the evil phone company... so what's the difference?
Someone needs to just run fiber to everyone's house/business and put all these bozos out of business.
What makes you think that wouldn't end up being the evil fiber company?
Wiring peoples houses is conductive to natural monopolies. Some part of me can't help but think it might be better off as public infrastructure (a la roads), but then I think of how much I would be paying to wire all the people who have chosen to live in rural areas in that case...
Perhaps wireless is the ticket (there is a company two houses down from mine that sells 802.11b broadband - unfortunately they pointed there directional anntenna in the other direction...)
If I lived in Philly, I wouldn't feel safe without a howitzer, an M-60, and booby-trapped windows. I'd wear kevlar to bed. I'd crouch-roll on the way to the bathroom.
But yeah, keeping a land-line is a good start.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Verisign also handles wiretapping. If your phone is being wiretapped, Verisign reroutes all your calls (in and out) to a wiretapping center by altering the routing database. From the wiretapping center, the call is then routed to the destination. This allows both interception and, potentially, man-in-the-middle crypto attacks.
Another proposal in front of the FCC is to allow someone to take his/her phone Number from New York to California. It has either been approved and waiting for implementation, or will be approved soon (assuming the telco's don't bribe the FCC).
I use Sprint PCS and for the last few months (as many of know) Sprint (and the other phone companies) have been charging a $1.10 portability fee. BTW when I called the customer service line and asked what the fee was for I was told it was a tax and told to call the "tax people".
Anyway, you are being charged this fee even if you don't plan on moving to another service. Now compare the number of people with land lines to the number of people with cell phones. Now imagine that your a Phone executive looking to bost the bottom line. Answer just charge the fee to everyone with a landline. Land line number poratability is nothing more than a landline surchage.
I have no
This would go from a software change at the local level to a software change required across nearly all industries.
Too many are trapped into the geographical thinking about area codes. Look at all the business systems that are setup based on area code. When the system was changed to permit digits other than 1 and 0 as the second portion of an area code there were many ramifications outside of the telephone industry.
Another concern, long distance interstate is separate from long distrance intrastate, or intra exchange.
What we really need is for the FTC to set down a new standard declaring that the area code is no longer geographically based. From that we can then end up with numbers unique to people and have true telco freedom.
Of course the side concern is that with one number anti-spam laws will need to be really strong and they will have to include stopping politicians and charities from calling too.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.