A recent article shown on the MercuryNews site refers to a survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that shows, for the first time, the number of people who have only cell phones has surpassed the number of people who have only traditional wired telephones. So, when you look at it, one in five homes doesn’t have a phone hanging on the wall…and the number is growing. Is anyone really surprised?
The traditional telephone is connected to our homes by a fairly robust network cable that’s capable of carrying more than just a conversation (DSL). Why, then, is our home phone…just a phone? Why doesn’t my home phone:
- play music?
- synch to a database of contacts?
- receive email?
- send and receive text?
- take a picture?
- use the same number as my cell phone?
- have an FM tuner?
- connect to the internet?
As mobile networks become faster and faster, and the devices have become these amazing little electronic versions of the Swiss Army knife, how do I justify making people play roulette to talk with me? With the advent of 3G, it became possible to use VoIP on a cell phone that was internet capable. So, it’s entirely possible to have a cell phone provided by a telephone company that gives you an internet plan so you don’t need the telephone company. Instead, I choose to pay for two land lines, one cell phone plan and at least a couple ways to get online.
While I’m scratching my head about why I have so many numbers, the research also shows 2% of the surveyed home-owners had neither a cell phone nor wired phone. The lives of these people must be fascinating and it would be great fun to see how they live. They would have to drive to get a taxi and how would you get a pizza to show up at your house? On the upside, they never interrupt a conversation with, “Hang on…I need to take this.”
Posts
0 comments:
Post a Comment