ITALIAN926
join:2003-08-16
Stratford, CT
| uh
First of all, in my opinion, if someone switches their home number to voIP, it should still be considered a landline. Call it a "housephone" if you have to. Dialtone is dialtone, I dont care if its coming from a central office, ONT, or cable modem.
The vast majority of the FiOS installations I do are triple plays. Landlines or " housephones " are not going extinct. Families will always have one of these to represent their household, a number to reach anyone within the house.
Single people need a cellphone only, a phone that is with them at all times. This isnt rocket science. |
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Lazlow
join:2006-08-07
Saint Louis, MO
| I know a lot of families that have a cell phone for every member, even the first graders. With all the events in the last decade (twin towers, school shootings, abductions, etc) parents want to be able to call(and often locate by remote means) their children. When cutbacks are made it is usually the land line that goes and not one of the cell phones. Going right along with that I am seeing a lot of working people with two cell phones, one for work and one for personal. Considering that the cost differential is minimal (for what you get) I think land lines are on borrowed time (unless they change). |
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elray
join:2000-12-16
Santa Monica, CA
 ·SONIC.NET
 ·RoadRunner Cable
·Verizon Online DSL
| reply to ITALIAN926
said by ITALIAN926  :First of all, in my opinion, if someone switches their home number to voIP, it should still be considered a landline. Call it a "housephone" if you have to. Dialtone is dialtone, I dont care if its coming from a central office, ONT, or cable modem. The vast majority of the FiOS installations I do are triple plays. Landlines or " housephones " are not going extinct. Families will always have one of these to represent their household, a number to reach anyone within the house. Single people need a cellphone only, a phone that is with them at all times. This isnt rocket science. Housephone yes, landline no. All Dialtone are NOT equal.
A landline is circuit-switched on a dedicated copper pair.
VOIP is VOIP, packetized and dependent on an IP connection; while Fios and Cable should be more reliable than internet-based servers, the jury is still out. Ask the TWC customers here in LA about their connectivity over the past three weeks. Ask them about their "Dialtone is dialtone" cable-telephony service.
Fios Triple-Play customers will soon find out the true cost of planting all of their eggs in one basket.
As for the single folks who choose not a landline, it is not a question of "need" but a measure of perceived cost and convenience trumping call quality. Personally, I don't take to half-duplex conversations whose main content is the word "What?" or an endless series of voicemails or text messages.
I will keep my POTS line, on a copper pair. The voice quality (compared to cellular) is worth a modest premium, though I can't say $18 a month is that steep. Voip voice quality can beat it, but only when voip is working, consistently, which it can't on a public internet, and won't on a cable network. |
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Mce Saint
join:2007-10-03
Saint Louis, MO
·AT&T Midwest
 ·Sprint Mobile Broa..
| reply to Lazlow
We just cut the landline at our house within the last week. The wife and I both have and use cell phones. Anyone who wants to talk to us knew to call our cell phones not the home phone. In fact 99.9% of the time the ringer was off on the landline.
AT&T landline per month was $26 for basic service; in addition, Sprint long-distance charged about $6 for just the *ability* to make long-distance calls (none were ever made). $32 x 12 months = $384 for a line we NEVER used (except to allow the DirecTV receivers to dial out).
We have an 8 year old so didn't want to go *completely* without a "back-up" phone in case the babysitter didn't have one OR we keeled over with a stroke and our phones weren't charged.
Solution? Boost mobile "burner" phone. Cost $25 for the phone and $20 every ninety days to "recharge" the minutes. Cost now (1st year) = $105; following years = $80. The Boost phone has GPS and is e911. We keep this in the kitchen right where the old landline was and we keep it charged up. We've only used it once - to confirm that it works. |
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systems2000
What? You Say It's Fixed. Hah
join:2001-11-29
Cyberspace | All cell phones will call 911 without any service contracts of any type. |
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