The notion of the family phone as a shared family resource is as passe as Ma Bell.
Posted on 06/19/2009 11:19:06 AM PDT by JoeProBono
The concept of a home phone may soon be going the way of the corner pay phone.
Government research shows that more and more households are getting rid of their land line. And for the first time, cell-phone-only homes outnumber those with just land lines.
Kelly Fitzsimmons did not give up her phone without a fight. The instrument of gossip and grand plans, and the bearer of bad news and good, the land line to her was a lifeline.
"I just had in my head you gotta have a land line. You gotta have a land line," she says. "That's the phone to your home, not to me, Kelly, or my husband, John, or the kids individually, but to the family. It's home base."
But last fall, with the down economy forcing hard decisions, Fitzsimmons was finally persuaded.
The telephone and answering machine have been cleared from their perch on the kitchen counter, the phone jack above it vacant.
"It's a beautiful thing," she says
The notion of the family phone as a shared family resource is as passe as Ma Bell.
History will clearly show that out-of-control telemarketers killed the home landline phone. They’re the reason why I got rid of mine years ago.
I haven’t had a land line in close to 10 years now. My home security system calls my cell and there is no land line for a burglar to cut. That’s what happend to a couple of neighbors with security sytems a few months back. Some punk cut the land lines and did a smash and grab on two houses.
I thought about that as well. However, I am just not sold on Skype yet.
I love my land line, cell phones don’t work well here in the sticks.....plus I always have light when the electricity goes off.
http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.777
One caveat - if you have medical issues or other reasons that require the ability to summon aid under almost any circumstance, the landline phone is still the most reliable. Even with a UPS for the cable modem (or whatever) and VoIP box, you have limited connectivity - IF your internet stays up. Many cell sites don’t have back-up power and the telcos are fighting a proposed FCC rule that would require only a 4 hour backup power capability. Plus in emergencies the cell sites may be overloaded to boot.
I figure VoIP with cellular backup is good enough for me, but YMMV, just do your homework - it’s not strictly a financial consideration. The landline telephone system has evolved for over 100 years to provide service under adverse conditions, as long as the wires are intact.
Why would anyone want to pay a bill for multiple cell phones over a landline phone for the family is beyond me.
True story. I have a Verizon tower a couple of hundred yards away from my home. Can’t get reception. Everywhere else is fine.
If you never need to make calls outside your home, get VOIP.
I’m about ready to dump my Verizon land line and FIOS.
They are gouging me with high prices...me no like dat no mo!
I probably would have dumped my landline a long time ago, but after 9/11 I will hang on as long as they let me. Remember how everyone in NYC was trying to get to a landline when no ones cell phones were working.
I can still receive faxes, and messages at home, while I am out, by people I don’t want to have my cell number.
Same here...sitting at home one day with the phone bill for two lines and had a epiphany of why two..count’um two land lines when we had two cells phones. Canceled the two land lines.
Will be great to see Verizon suffer for land line losses.
RE: “Taht’s OK. I will keep my landline phone as long as it’s available.
Why would anyone want to pay a bill for multiple cell phones over a landline phone for the family is beyond me.”
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Agree — I will be the last person with a landline if that’s what it takes. I DETEST the blasted cellphones and though I have one, I only use it on very rare occasion re vehicle breakdown.
I LOVE my landline!
One nice thing about a land line is that you can’t misplace it. Another is that you can’t drop it inter the terlit. Uh...a friend told me about that...
Now if I could only get my parents to embrace the cell phone. They have cells but they turn them off when they are home, forget to turn them back on when they leave and while they're at home with their cells turned off, they have no call waiting on their home phones. I guess they're just set in their ways.
Haven’t dumped the land line, but we’ve changed to the cheapest available plan.
We make our long distance calls by cell phone on the weekends (when they’re free)
We (the wife and I) each have a cell, and we HAD a home land line (unpublished for more than a decade).
We dropped the land line and added a new cell line with the same number for not much additional extra to our existing cell bill.
Now, for the important part: The hew (home) cell line is connected to an Xlink Cell Bt Gateway. The gateway connects to the cell via Bluetooth, then our home phone is plugged into the XLink and our existing cordless phones (one on each of three levels) work just as before. And we are saving money.
It's a great system.
We dropped our land line about four years ago.
Maybe my cellular phone is just not too good. The quality of the sound on the cellular phone is just not the same as on a land line phone. When people call up from a cell phone, you can tell they are on a cell phone and not a land line. And the fuzzy scratchy signal and dropped calls just don’t happen with land lines. If cell phones get better in quality I would consider just having the cell phone.
And phone polls will continue to sample a poor slice of contemporary citizens.
$30 in phone company “taxes” and FCC fees (thank you Al Gore) killed the land line.
We will keep our land line here in Northern Virginia.
When the last hurricane came through all the cell phones were out for about a week while the hard line phone never quit working.
I also make sure we have one regular, hard wired phone so that when the cordless ones go out with the power we still have communications capability.
Progress: you used to pay 12 bucks a month telephone bill for the entire for the family, now you’re paying, what, $200?
Progress: the quality was such that you could hear a pin dropped on the other end, now every other word is unintelligible.
after having landlines (Verizon)with all the bells & whistles, cell phones, etc... I have finally settled on what works for me.
I have a landline stripped down service, just like the old days , no call waiting, no caller id, etc.... If I make an out of state call I’m billed but there’s no extra charge for that service just the out of state calls you make for a nominal fee. The landline costs $10.00- out of state calls are like 12cents a min... yeah, that might be high but i don’t make many.
Now , if i could only get my hands on a pushbutton desktop curly cord model phone circa 1970-1980. It has a beautiful ring tone.
I’m with you, except that I don’t have a cell phone. When I am out of touch I want to be out of touch.
My cell phone doesn’t work. There’s no dial tone.
Are you logged in?
3 years without land line for me. Never miss it. I am not a big phone person anyway. my cell does everything & more than my “home phone did”
regarding bygone days..
I am such a techie dinosaur anyway. My cell phone is just for phones even though I have a blackberry.. I do text now & then but am slow & inefficient with it. So much easier to click/call.I love the neat things available now but just dont have most things due to economic constraints. My brother provides my cell phone on his family plan. So in Ohio I have a Oklahoma number ! and feel a bit constrained to not abuse the shared minutes.
I use my computer /email/etc for most communication.. like 90%
We have cell phones, too, for when we're around town, etc.
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