Fighting Back Against Ghost Calls

An anonymous reader writes "You're doing something interesting. The phone rings. You get up, pick up the phone, and hear only silence. It could be a slasher waiting outside your house, but it's probably an errant computer at a telemarketer. This article describes how some are fighting back by setting up websites to track the worst telemarketers by their caller ids. The article mentions whocalled.us (one of the funnier urls I've ever seen), 800notes.com and numberzoom.com . One intrepid guy is even writing a program to check these sites when the call comes in before ringing the phone."

Comments

Key opening questions...

[gillbates]

I usually just hang up if there's no answer. But sometimes, I'll play their game. They invade my privacy, I figure I'm within my rights to ask a few questions:

1. Who is calling?
2. What is your name?
3. Most people have a last name, too. What is it?
4. Do I know you?
5. Haven't we met before somewhere?
6. (sometimes) DRUNKEN COLLEGE KID VOICE: I swear you sound just like that chic I met last night. (Also useful for male callers, but in an even worse way...)
7. Please wait while I Google your name.
8. Are you pregnant?
9. Boy or a girl? You must be so proud! Congratulations! (for added effect, I'll pretend to tell my wife in a loud voice: Hey Honey, so-and-so is having a ...)
10. Are you a college student?
11. At this point, I'll ask if they'd like to play a game of 20 questions.
12. Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior?
13. Do you believe in the theory of evolution?
14. Are you a Democrat or Republican?
15. etc...

Now, understand that these people are paid by the hour. I'm not wasting their time, I'm wasting their employers time.

Telemarketing is profitable because most of the people who don't want to buy will just hang up the phone. If everyone they called insisted on having a nice, cordial, and polite conversation about political topics, the business model would fail entirely. So, if you hate telemarketing, use the calls as a nice way of promoting your favorite political party, religious position, human rights advocacy, etc... You might even explain to them such topics as:

1. Why DRM is bad for consumers.
2. Why torture is immoral. Remember, the revenues they make are supporting the current administration through taxes, so it is most certainly relevant to the discussion of any sale they might make.
3. The difficulty of using Windows Vista.
4. The importance of privacy.

Remember, it's a captive audience. Don't be afraid to speak your mind - people need to know!. Don't be intimidated by them. Rather, use the opportunity for political activism!

Re:Internet-connected phone

[spyrochaete]

This software already exists! It's a free open source application called Telecrapper 2000. It refers to a text file full of phone numbers deemed "annoying" by the user and checks caller ID when the phone rings. If the caller is on the list the Telecrapper jumps into action, playing WAV files and waiting for the person on the other end to pause before playing the next WAV. After a while Telecrapper resorts to a subset of WAV files and plays them randomly until the caller hangs up.

This cute Flash animation shows the Telecrapper in action. Hilarious stuff!