The Reliable Landline
Lately I've been obsessed with the idea that landline phones are so incredibly reliable when compared to cell phones. Obviously, their functionality is more limited: you can't play video games or send text messages or take photos with a landline phone. But dammit, landline phones always work. You can always hear the person on the other end; you can always pick one up and make a call; you can talk as long as you want without the call being dropped. I can't say that for my cell phone
(Some people say it's because AT&T sucks in Manhattan, or that cell phone service generally sucks in Manhattan, because all the skyscrapers block the signals, but I have the same problems in relatively skyscraper-free Jersey City.)
In my 20 or so years of using landlines, the only glitch I can recall (other than storms or other damage knocking out phone lines) is that, sometimes, if I hung up with someone and then picked up the receiver again too quickly to make another call to someone else, and the person I'd been previously talking to hadn't hung up yet, then I'd find I was still connected to them. This usually led to a slightly awkward moment as we both realized what had happened (for instance, the other person would hear me dialing and then speak up). I'd have to hang up all over again, and this time wait a solid 30 seconds or more before picking up the phone again.
All in all, a pretty trivial glitch, with an easy workaround.
Landline phones work so well, and have been around for so long, I find it tempting to think things like, "Back in the old days, all technology was as dependable as landline phones." But that can't have been the case. Things must have broken and gone awry all the time; you just have to do a little digging to find the firsthand accounts of that.
(N.B. I don't see the old "party line" system as disproving the dependability of landlines; rather, it was simply an annoying limitation that eventually went away.)
(Some people say it's because AT&T sucks in Manhattan, or that cell phone service generally sucks in Manhattan, because all the skyscrapers block the signals, but I have the same problems in relatively skyscraper-free Jersey City.)
In my 20 or so years of using landlines, the only glitch I can recall (other than storms or other damage knocking out phone lines) is that, sometimes, if I hung up with someone and then picked up the receiver again too quickly to make another call to someone else, and the person I'd been previously talking to hadn't hung up yet, then I'd find I was still connected to them. This usually led to a slightly awkward moment as we both realized what had happened (for instance, the other person would hear me dialing and then speak up). I'd have to hang up all over again, and this time wait a solid 30 seconds or more before picking up the phone again.
All in all, a pretty trivial glitch, with an easy workaround.
Landline phones work so well, and have been around for so long, I find it tempting to think things like, "Back in the old days, all technology was as dependable as landline phones." But that can't have been the case. Things must have broken and gone awry all the time; you just have to do a little digging to find the firsthand accounts of that.
(N.B. I don't see the old "party line" system as disproving the dependability of landlines; rather, it was simply an annoying limitation that eventually went away.)