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Are Phone Numbers Doomed To Die? (fortune.com)
HughPickens.com writes: Valentina Zarya writes at Fortune Magazine that the top 2016 prediction for David Marcus, Facebook's vice president of messaging products, is the disappearance of the phone number and its replacement by applications like Facebook's Messenger. " You can make video and voice calls while at the same time not needing to know someone's phone number," writes Marcus. "You don't need to have a Facebook account to use Messenger anymore, and it's also a cross platform experience – so you can pick up where you left off whether you're on a desktop computer, a tablet, or your phone." Jonah Berger, Wharton professor and author of "Contagious: Why Things Catch On" agrees. "For most of us, I think it's really hard to actually remember what someone's phone number actually is. We use our phones so often or we click on a button that has it. But if there was a test where you had to say, do you remember your best friends number or could you type in your best friend's number I think most of us would fail."
But not everyone agrees that Marcus' predictions are objective and disinterested. "It's all very well the company wanting to be the de facto Internet — especially in places like India. But drier minds and eyes might wonder whether the wish to eradicate phone numbers has something to do with not everyone having yet given Facebook their phone numbers," says Chris Matyszczyk. "It may well be that phone numbers will disappear. Some, though, might wonder how making their disappearance a company theme squares with what Marcus claims is the ultimate goal: 'It's all about delight.' This one's easy. It's all about delighting Facebook."
But not everyone agrees that Marcus' predictions are objective and disinterested. "It's all very well the company wanting to be the de facto Internet — especially in places like India. But drier minds and eyes might wonder whether the wish to eradicate phone numbers has something to do with not everyone having yet given Facebook their phone numbers," says Chris Matyszczyk. "It may well be that phone numbers will disappear. Some, though, might wonder how making their disappearance a company theme squares with what Marcus claims is the ultimate goal: 'It's all about delight.' This one's easy. It's all about delighting Facebook."
But I hope the "database" isn't Facebook. I would hope it would be something like DNS/Bind in the IP world....
What a waste of an article. Obvious trollbait for Slashdotters outside the Facebook reality distortion field.
I bet Facebook would think twice about wanting to replace phone numbers with Facebook IDs when they see the regulations common carriers operate under.
I'm mostly OK with as long as pseudo anonymity is preserved where it counts. I don't want a potential employer to have to go through a service like Facebork for instance in order to contact job candidates. Classifieds like Craigslist don't need that kind of info either. If I want to sell something, all someone needs is a phone number. They _might_ be able to get the rest of my info from that number, but it's not right out in the open and most people won't bother.
I could see the phone system at work soon becoming integrated with the email address book... that wouldn't really be a bad thing. They already have IP phones with screens, so that seems like a small step.
Blame God. Or Adam. Then again, probably all Eve's fault. Damn women.
Quite a few people are not on Facebook, Twitter, etc. It would also be _hugely_ unprofessional to do any job-related communication over such a venue.
This is just the usual bullshit from people that get starry-eyes when fantasizing how the future will be, but have no clue how reality actually works. Basically the only old global communication channel that has vanished is the telegram. And there are services in many countries that will print out an email and deliver it to the target address for a fee. So, really, complete nonsense.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Please, someone reply with something hopeful, like "On the whole, overhyping topics is actually on the decrease"....
These days, phone numbers are used for more than just making calls. They're integrated into authentication and authorization services like Duo, ITunes, Amazon (maybe), Google authenticator, etc. I think it's going to take a while to disengage/decouple phone numbers from business processes.
Did IP numbers disappear?
Behind the comms there will still be numbers or codes to lead to the address.
I'd be damned to use Facebook's spying services when I don't even have to log in or go to a specific site or app to press a pre-set button and make a call.
Or simply scan through my address book, click on the name and talk.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
I'd Love it if someone turned the lights off on facebook.
Facebook wants to become the DNS for phone numbers. Don't give them that power.
I have a home phone, a cell phone, and a Facebook account.
None of those know anything about each other. I can't think of any reason to change that.
You still need to verify someones identity to contact him and a number is the most data efficient way to do so.
Aside from that, contact lists have not killed the phone number, why should Facebook?
Telephone service is a public utility, and as such has a variety of regulations, including on how pricing works, and where service is provided. If it is to be replaced, we need some other sort of public utility that can be used for communications.
- Universally Ubiquitous
- Nationalized
- Lowest Common Denominator
- (for POTS anyway) Pretty damn rock solid in most of the world
Did Facebook kill Email? No.
Did Google kill the address bar? No.
Did Apple kill the PC? No.
Did solar panels (insert any other energy technology) kill the grid? No.
Will Facebook messenger (or any company-centric IM system) kill telephones? No.
Next flamebait topic please.
Bye!
That is all.
Betteridge's Law of Headlines.
Phone numbers are the defacto, common and relatively stable identifier that most people possess today. Yes, it may be archaic, but most people are comfortable with it, a global, relatively neutral means of communication. It's neutrality is protected by a patchwork of government regulations worldwide, and until one single company, alliance of companies, or single open standard becomes globally adopted at the same level as the phone number, Facebook or anyone else isn't going to replace it. While I'm sure Facebook dreams of usurping that role, their penetration isn't nearly global enough to provide the scale to challenge it. Now, if they created alliances with the Tencents of the world for a unified standard, maybe, but we're a long, long way from that.
There is a need for a universal identifier standard for recipients and communication of some kind. A proprietary one is not acceptable, in the least because tech companies come and go like pop stars.
A new standard would only replace phone numbers if it offers something significantly better. Standards are rarely displaced by something just a little bit better. It's why QWERTY keyboards and SQL (as a language) are still common.
A communication ID standard that offers letters and longer identifiers may be competitive, but there's nobody pushing such in a non-proprietary way. (Phone numbers can also spell out short mnemonics, but in an awkward way.)
The phone system could morph into such because an existing phone number could still be a valid identifier within the new standard, somewhat like how UNICODE still contains ASCII.
Table-ized A.I.
"You don't need to have a Facebook account to use Messenger anymore"
Doesn't it bind by phone number if you don't want to create a FB account?
I can't see phone numbers disappearing, but I can see the possibility of shorter numbers being created for accounts that can only handle SMS and data.
that way all of us not on Facebook will be ignored by them.
Seven years ago, I met my wife (we were not yet married at the time, I can assure you), and we exchanged phone numbers. That the last time I think I ever looked at or thought about her phone number. I don't call numbers, I call contacts. The number in this case is like an initial handshake; once I have it I don't use it anymore. The phone number can go away quite easily because our mental schema is already prepared for it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I hereby predict that Facebook will disappear before phone numbers.
Let's come back in 20 years and compare my track record with David Marcus's.
all at once 3
In the present, everyone Googles everything through some sort of Chrome/Firefox awesome bar and nobody types in a domain anymore (except me and a few die-hard fellow type-in-traffic generators). Therefore in years to come Google will be just a collection of IPv6 addresses. Google will hardcode a bunch of them into chrome
As a replacement, Google will eventually implement a new system based on HTTP requests to some RESTful API they designed that returns an IPv6 address when queried with a human-readable name, therefore re-inventing DNS in a less efficient manner (but who cares because we'll all have 100GbE to the door by then)
Getting rid of phone numbers could get rid of bullshit phone sales people or so-called telemarketers, nonsense charities, and bill collectors. Since I uusally get several annoying such calls, every day, I think getting rid of phone numbers is a great idea.
but there are actually a few phone numbers that I remember, and can type on a telephone keypad (or the numbers-only widget on a smartphone) quicker than I can look them up (even with type-ahead on the person's name). They're also harder make data-entry errors with than a written-out e-mail address, or, worse, someone's Facebook or Google+ name.
>> "I think it's really hard to actually remember what someone's phone number actually is."
That's not how phone numbers are used. Today, they are one-time use IDs that we use to contact someone else, then both people's phones remember the number forever. In a way, it's like how Skype works: you type in the other person's ID (once) and you're forever connected.
I suppose you could look at phone numbers kind of like the current DNS system, but who gets to administer the DNS servers/entries? Good luck getting the various telecommunications interest to give up their lists as they look at them like salable items (I've tried). And the phone system would need some reworking due to the issue that if you try to dial an area code when it is a local call you often get a "we're sorry" message or a busy signal for some reason, imagine if your website requests were rejected because both you and the website were on 40.x.x.x
I would say you heard it here first, but I would be surprised if it weren't posted already. :)
You still need some id over the mobile network. Ad of 4G it is an MSISDN.
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
This ideal that everyone has a social account is ridiculous. How many create these sign ins and then close them out? Nothing is that permanent with the internet. How would these ID's be billed? Through the origin of your user name? I hardly trust Facebook or Twitter or any other site with even more information.
Phone numbers may very well disappear, but there will still be some sort of "number" that ties you to whatever communications device you are using, even though it may be hidden. Just like right now on your Smartphone when you hit the "Call Mom" button. You may not even know the phone number, but it's still used. Call it another name if you like, like a userid, but it will still be there in one form or another.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
Phone numbers are going to die. But Facebook isn't the answer. Any proprietary solution isn't the answer.
telephone service costs like 60 dollars a month minimum
I don't know where you're getting that figure, as I get telephone service from Virgin Mobile USA for $90 per year.
will never die. even the black and white ones!!!!!
I got to the chocolate box before you, that's why the hard ones have teeth marks.
Imagine if you called Marcus ... and got Mercus instead.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Zero, four, three, zero, two, nine is much easier to get correct than Esss, Eff, Bee, Pee.
That's why schools need to teach the long names of letters. "Sierra foxtrot bravo papa" should carry just as well as "zero four three zero two niner" over any given voice channel.
"phone numbers" are how the switching -- and billing -- are done for landlines, cell phones, and for many data services like DSL.
they are not going away. he can hide his, but he can't change everybody elses.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Today, they are one-time use IDs that we use to contact someone else, then both people's phones remember the number forever.
"Forever" or "until I buy a new phone or have to borrow someone's"?
"Reports of the phone number's death have been greatly exaggerated."
(If nothing else, there will always be "867-5309.")
but who gets to administer the DNS servers/entries?
Perhaps the blockchain can do it.
Intermodal public transit systems may require the user to transfer from a subway train to a bus.
...they will never go away. They will only be patched over and worked around.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
In the past 15 years, I've been through over a dozen phone numbers in 5 different area codes, but have had a single email address (using my own domain).
Why would I count on an particular vendor's IM service to be my "phone number"? If I'm going to trust something to be a permanent identifier to reach me, I'm not going to use a company that's only been a public company for 4 years.
Good grief, do you think nobody here knows what Google's requirements for an interview are? You MUST have a Google account that they can track to YOU for an interview you dumb fuck! They don't hire people named "John Doe" unless the person has a birth certificate, drivers license, and SSN for John Doe.
I hope you choke to death on that shit that comes out of your mouth.
If you believe that Google will interview you over an anonymous channel I have a nice bridge you can buy.
Does it matter if it's not a "phone number" anymore, whatever it will be (certainly not an Facebook account), will function pretty much the same way, just with less oversight and more government and corporate snooping involved.
I don't see how the International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet would cause a problem to speakers of English as a second language. In fact, it might clear up confusion. Case in point: G is called J in French, and J is called G. But the long names are "Golf" and "Juliett", which eliminates the problem.
You still need some id over the mobile network. Ad of 4G it is an MSISDN.
That threw me for a moment. How can 4G be modern if it uses Microsoft and ISDN?
Because that's what this idiocy is suggesting.
IM didn't even kill e-mail; it has no prayer at destroying phone numbers.
I'm wondering what the "Facebook" form of [...] the pizza place down the street to order some dinner
Probably something like Domino's Tweetzza.
Instant messaging services where starting to go this way a decade ago with Jabber, then Facebook and Google decided all of a sudden that this was somehow a BAD idea?
Because spam. WhatsApp, for example, is built on the same protocol as Jabber but has deliberate incompatibilities to discourage spammers.
My phone, likewise, I've moved between multiple carriers over the years; if carrier A started pissing me off too much, I'd move to carrier B.
Once AT&T pisses you off and T-Mobile pisses you off, who's left? The other two major U.S. cellular carriers use CDMA2000, which is incompatible with the GSM/UMTS that AT&T and T-Mobile use. Or do most phones include both CDMA2000 and GSM/UMTS radios now?
This will have to be more universal, with one provider seamlessly connecting with another. I don't want to keep 1 account per service and only having 1 account might limit who I could speak with. Imagine if email would have caught on if you had to have a gmail account in order to send an email to someone on gmail.
XMPP chat did most of what would be required, but it seems it's not catching on.
The answer is "no", you ignorant web-obsessed dipsticks.
Phone numbers will be around for a long, long time, so stop babbling this nonsensical bullshit.
Obviously it's "Whackjob Wednesady" at slashdot, where the dumbest "news" article gets posted to the front page while real news is buried where it will never see the light of day.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
let me laugh harder. Regulations are for old tech. New tech (like Facebook, Uber, the sharing economy) is free to innovate without those pesky little things.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Anybody that has ever tried to look up a friend on Facebook or Skype knows how stupid this is. Apparently there are dozens of people in the world with the same exact name as the person I'm trying to contact... who knew? I was even surprised, when googling myself, to discover that there is a band out there that goes by my exact name, first name AND last name! (I'm thinking of suing them for trademark infringement, but they have yet to reply to my emails.)
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
AT&T & Verizon are working hard to kill POTS because it's burdened by tons of consumer protection laws that require them to offer good service to unprofitable customers in exchange for monopolies. Mobile has a lot fewer regulations. VOIP has almost none.
It's really hard to eliminate existing protections for consumers, but it's easy to prevent new ones from being created. Nobody even notices when they new stuff doesn't have them. That's what the "Sharing" economy is about. Getting rid of those pesky labor rules. This is the same thing.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
If this proposal goes into affect wait 'till you see the continuous robocalls and other "advertising" and non advertising spam on your cell phones voice calls. It will be continuous and not just 10 per day and you won't be able to keep up with it. What is happening to land lines will happen to cell phones.
In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act. George Orwell
...there's so sort of open connectivity between disparate messaging services, the way there is for SMS or phone calls. Right now, I can call anyone with a phone from any other phone, regardless of who made the phones or what company is providing the service.
Meanwhile, it seems like every couple of weeks, someone is asking me to install whatever the hip new messaging app of the month is. No, I'm not going to install a program that just duplicates the functionality of four or five other programs I already have just so I can talk to one person.
I am sure as a fellow DHI meat puppet, I am sure this was passed to someone hoping to be published, in return for another job..
this is just an advertisement for someone's IDEA and product..
Its a vehicle used to gain market share form someone else..
phone numbers are owned by someone else. But hey If I advertise my product enough perhaps i'll get more sales traction, or something..
thanks DHI, er um /.
Maybe if there were a "standard" domain, such as "usa.phone" (assuming USA), then people can have "email" addresses like "BillGates38@USA.phone" that can also serve as a phone and texting number.
And the URL www.usa.phone/BillGates38 could be defined to publish more contact info (if so desired by ID owner).
No private organization could own "usa.phone", only manage it, or specific ID's using it. The ID part would be kind of like registering a domain name: you own the name, but can assign (rent) an ISP to host it. It's even similar to how you pay a phone company for your phone activation. The government would typically not host it, equipment-wise, only enforce ownership and transfer rights.
Old-style numbers could piggy-back on it so that you can have "987-654-3210@USA.phone" if your existing phone number is: 1 (987) 654-3210. Nobody else would be allowed to take it, as long as that's your phone number.
(Maybe alias the "1" so that "1-987-654-3210@USA.phone" means the same. That could avoid look-alike scamming.)
Table-ized A.I.
Next question.
And no one could be on the interwebz, email, Skype or place a phone call without the Mark of the Zuckerberg on his phone or PC.
I can see the phone number giving way to an IPV6 addess eventually, but it's not going to transform into some messenger app.
This is a really idiotic idea proposed by someone who clearly has never had to contact people while having no Internet access. If he can't remember someone's phone number he could either look it up or just recognise the fact that he's really dim witted.
So for most of the people we deal with every day, we will access them using the personal information we know, which in most cases would be name and address, with some of our friends being communicated with by phone, some by email and others by text, without having to know just one kind of communication address for each person. It's the same way we tag airline tickets with a locator code without realizing that as a hash, the code is not unique and always has to be used in conjunction with other information in identifying a record. Nobody every has to see the giant number that is the real unique identifier.
What nationality are these people who speak broken English? Is it NATO or otherwise? Because my solution would teach the spelling alphabet worldwide to speakers of all languages that use Latin letters. Your Chinese collaborators would learn it alongside Pinyin.
Can I Skype or Facebook you from jail? No? Then get fucked.
The phone number is not going away any time soon. Why? Fax machines. Still proudly advertised on business cards and websites every where.
I was talking to an older lady one day a few years ago, and she told me that her grandchildren were telling her that Facebook was going to replace e-mail.
The notion that phone numbers are going away any time soon is just as idiotic!
No one remembers phone numbers today because we just tap a contact in our smart phone address book (i.e., we don't need to remember) + remembering a phone number is a hassle = therefore FB Messenger or its ilk will take over because then no one will need to futz with them gosh durned cumbersome phone numbers? Would you like fries with your non sequitur?
aka "the internet for stupid people".
Intelligent people have always known that they could go directly to the net with a browser and an ISP.
Idiots always seem to need a layer of glitzy-looking insulation that spies on them and directs them to stuff advertisers are paying to have them directed to. There used to be a huge number of people who thought AOL was the internet. Now these people seem to think Facebook is the internet.
There is simply no need to give ANY information to Facebook/MySpace/AOL, no need to make them rich by letting them spy on you and sell everything they learn about you to anybody who will pay them for that info, and no need to give them more control by getting them involved in your telephone.
The LAST thing I want is Facebook acting as a platform for ANY of my essential communications. They have repeatedly lied - over and over - about privacy. No way!
So no I don't need to remember a phone number, but a pseudo-random variation of my contact's names, plus probably a number that was their age 15 years ago. Or birth year. Or truly random.
Why is this a benefit?
Stop using Facebook.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
It's been years since just about everyone stopped using phone numbers for anything so I do see them going away - but not in 2016. People over 60 still "call" and do use "telephone numbers" to do that and they are not all going to die in 2016. Phone numbers will probably be around a decade or two, they will not go away in 2016, they will just become increasingly irrelevant.
One thing that is kind of funny: They appear to be trying. Even my old mother switched to VOIP like 5 years ago because the idea of paying by the minute for calling someone became totally absurd the moment the Internet came around. Now I see "mobile phone companies" offer "plans" where you get free calls and free SMS and some amount of data for a fixed amount of cash per month. Telephone numbers could actually get a comeback! I say could, though, because it's not likely. Nobody I know has been using numbers to call anyone for years and I don't think they will start now.
9/11: Never forget it was a false-flag operation
[Phone numbers] are one-time use IDs that we use to contact someone else, then both people's phones remember the number forever.
until I buy a new phone
Not sure what phones you've been buying, but that isn't in any way a factor and hasn't been for a long time.
What mechanism ensures that my contacts are synchronized when I buy a new phone on a different platform and port my number to a different network? Because it's a different network, I can't store contacts on a SIM and carry them that way, and some phones for CDMA2000 networks don't even have a CSIM slot to move service to another phone on the same network. Because it's a different platform (Android vs. iOS vs. feature phones), I can't sync using the operating system publisher's backup server. Consider, for example, the case of porting my number from an Audiovox 8610 on Virgin Mobile USA to a Nexus 5 on Straight Talk.
I have a lame phone that doesn't lock or use internet. To keep the numbers of people I talk to safe, I've memorized all of them (mind you, it's a small #). I don't call people often, but unless I finally decide to be willing to pay for a smartphone and data every month, I need my number to stay in touch. With anyone (I don't have any social media accounts).
And all US carriers are moving to SIMs and LTE anyway.
Even for voice, or only for data?
Phone numbers are the universal mechanism that people can use to contact each other around the entire world, whether by voice or (now a days) message.
Can I use Facebook Messenger to talk to someone using ICQ? No.
Can I use Skype to talk to someone using What'sApp? No.
As long as we have these idiotic balkanised bullshit systems run by companies for the sole purpose of harvesting your personal data first, and maybe money second, phone numbers will *never* be replaced, nor would I want it to be thank you very much.
David Marcus can say what he wants about telephone numbers going away. Linkedin has 350 entries for David Marcus. .....................
When David Smith was my manager, he was one of 22 David Smith's in IBM US. Linkedin now has a total of 22,807 results for David Smith.
The problem isn't having 1 number for a person, it is having home, cell, & work phones; personal & business email; and id's on facebook, whatsap, skype,
Told us we'd all be signing up for Microsoft Network instead.