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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.
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
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?"
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
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
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.