Cell phones

[BurtWorm]

Poll question: Cell phones

[greatauntoftriplets]

1. I have had a cell phone for years, which I use on occasion.

It is good to stay in touch when I need to, and an important safety tool for a woman who is often on her own. I do NOT use it to chat while driving. That is potentially dangerous.

[xJlM]

4. Makes no big difference to me

I hate talking on the phone anyway, so I don't want one. But yeah, nothing looks more idiotic than some dummy trying to hold a conversation while they're driving, especially if they've got a cigarette going or a cup of coffee (or both).

[blondeatlast]

2. I try to avoid using mine if I can, but

it gives me a sense of security (I have insulin dependent diabetes). But I pull over in the car before I use it, avoid using it in public and NEVER in a restaurant or theatre--horrors.

If you'd had "other" I would have voted that; I consider it a necessary evil.

[BurtWorm]

6. I added the choice of "necessary evil"

and I'll vote it, for you.

[Raven]

3. I have one but I hate them.

I have always thought that people need to be alone and disconnected once in a while.

[BurtWorm]

7. That's just how I was feeling tonight

when I was out by myself noticing all the people out by themselves chattering away into cell phones. And I remembered an article I'd read in the Sunday Times magazine close to 10 years ago that predicted one day soon every one would have their own personal phone and their own personal number and could be contacted 24 hours a day no matter where they were. That thought sickened me.

But, for the record, I do have a cell phone. Just got one last month. And it has come in handy a few times when I'm trying to locate my wife in crowds.

[shanti]

17. exactly

but i need mine to keep in touch with my teen!

[madrchsod]

5. i`m switching to

cell phones only. i`ll save at least 60 dollars a month. when i pay my last land line bill then all i have to pay is 42 a month for dsl. alot of people i know are switching to cell phone only,esp the plans with more than one cell phone.

[hlthe2b]

8. It's not the cell phone technology that is bad...

just the rude people who use them while at the post office, grocery check out or other service areas-leaving the poor service provider feeling less than human. The ass holes who think they have the right to subject everyone in line behind them to listen to their personal discussion; the idiots who put lives at risk as they dial or become upset at those calling them while changing lanes at full speed. And on, and on, and on. People are the problem-- not the technology.

[BurtWorm]

9. Cell phones don't kill people...

guns kill people.

[DS1]

10. Had one, hated it, got rid of it

Never again will I allow myself to be that tied to work, or even friends for that matter. When I'm doing my own thing, I'm doing my own thing, god-dammit!

If I wanted to talk to you, your phone would be ringing.

[BurtWorm]

11. What if I wanted to talk to you?

And you were not near your home phone, but were out enjoying a nice pleasant stroll in the sunshine, with a light breeze stirring the leaves, and everything was so quiet you could finally hear the thoughts in your head!

[Dirk39]

12. I hate hate hate cell phones...

although we germans call them "handies". The idea that every single person on this earth should be available all the times, is for perverts. I just hate it. Before I could always pretend that I wasn't at home. Answering machines are o.k. somehow, too. But I just hate mobiles. And even more I hate, how they operate. It's o.k with me, to make everything as small as possible. I like small things. I'm even somehow small myself, and I like it that way. But the distance between my ears and my mouth isn't adjustable. And my fingers are bigger, too. How can people buy such a shit. Look at the size of T.V. remotes. They fit your fingers, than look at mobiles, again. O what a time, when telecommunications wasn't privatized. When AKG was building the microphones and the speakers in our phones. When these units were build to last, 'cause otherwise THEY had to come to YOUR house, to repair it at THEIR costs. I'm a hightech freak, I just come to hate capitalism and privatisation more and more. And this pseudo high-tech idiotism. I talk to people, when I want it too. Mobiles are for slaves.
Angry in Germany,
Dirk

[BurtWorm]

14. I hear you!

I happen to have a Siemans phone and it's smaller than my wallet. Which is saying a LOT! And the buttons have to be pushed with the tip of the finger nail. It's a very unnatural way of communicating.

[Dirk39]

18. Could you please repeat this, again, my cell phone is making...

a picture right now and tries to re-connect to a file server, to reach my MP-3 files. Sorry, BurtWorm, I just happen to work in a hospital, and cell-phones are not allowed there. Besides, I decided to cut my fingernails yesterday. It was a hard decision to make, but hey, I had to arrange my life somehow. It's somehow, funny, how people accept this. I work in the software industry for years, and one of my experiences is: the more educated people are, the more sh*t they accept. If you try to explain a "simple" guy, that he's just 39 mouse-clicks away from his goal, he will throw you out. If you try the same with an academcic, he (or she) will tell you: wow, that's really complex. This must be really worth it, if it's 39 mouse-clicks away. I guess, you're just so gifted to sell me somehting like this with 56 mouse-clicks tomorrow.
Dirk
P.S. And sorry for Siemens. I hope their weapons are disfunctional as their mobiles!

[BurtWorm]

19. Ha ha!

Have you tried text messaging with a Siemens? You feel like a character in Darkness at Noon tapping a spoon against your prison cell wall!

[CanuckAmok]

20. Hands up who LOVES Dirk's English!

I sure do--it's always so direct. I love that.

[FlaGranny]

26. They can be intrusive,

but they can be turned off. They have caller ID so you don't have to answer. They usually come with an answering service. If your car breaks down in the middle of the night, you can call for help. On the whole, I like them. I don't mind them ringing in public places, but it annoys me when people talk loudly on them for what seems like hours.

[wtmusic]

13. love the phone, don't like the headsets

people walking down the grocery aisle talking to themselves. I wanna smack 'em with a bag of rice.

[BurtWorm]

15. When they first came out a few years ago

I thought there was an epidemic of crazy people talking to themselves. And I live in NYC!

[wtmusic]

16. Maybe it was!

never know in NYC...

[Buns_of_Fire]

21. I suppose I'll be getting one shortly

out of self-defense, more than anything else. Remember when pagers were the ultimate "I'm so important that the White House needs to be able to get in touch with me at any time" yuppie status symbol? That was before companies found out they could use them as an electronic leash and started ordering employees to carry them. (Which was shortly before I figured out that keeping a set of dead batteries in the house that I could swap out with the batteries in the pager saved me a lot of aggravation.)

But the phone isn't for game-playing, web-surfing, MP3 downloading, playing "Doctor, My Love" as the ring, or sending pictures of my latest beer to everyone I know. Just one that makes calls from Point A to Point B. Best of all, since I'm paying for it, I'll decide when it's turned on and when it's turned off. And its gotta have the "vibrator" option instead of the ring -- not only to enable me to make a discreet exit in restaurants and theaters, but also because I just like being vibrated (I'm the person with the roll of quarters in the car who keeps the "Magic Fingers" company in business at all those cheezy roadside motels).

So long as these things have an "off" switch that works, I've finally decided that there's no reason for me not to use the technology. But there's no way in hell I intend to let the technology use me.

[BurtWorm]

28. What a rational approach to cell phones!

:toast:

[VOX]

22. Bad. Keep it in my car for emergency use only.

Cell phones are one of the worst things to happen to humanity. They go off in theaters, gyms, restaurants, meeting rooms, you name it. People walk like zombies, blabbing mindlessly into the damned things (probably to another mindless soul on a cell phone). I have literally witnessed such gripping discussions as someone describing everything on the supermarket shelves to the listener. One day I was visiting the Santa Barbara Mission -- a historic place, a terrific day, beautiful weather, and there's some bozo, yakking into a cell phone on the mission steps, thank you very much.

Cell phones are a terrible intrusion into our lives. We really could get along quite easily without these things.

[BurtWorm]

30. I'm noticing that a lot of women find them to be necessary

if only necessary evils. My mother echoes what several women have said in this thread, that cells are potential lifelines.

[scarlet_owl]

23. Don't have one, Never will

Only when normal phone service is no longer offered will I give in and get one. I don't get that many phone calls as it is and a cellular phone would only be a waste. I am a storyteller/volunteer school tour guide, and it really pisses me off when some moron's phone starts ringing in the middle of my presentation. It is unbelievably distracting. Just once, I would like to be in a public place and not hear "Over the Rainbow", or "Fur Elise" played out in tones. :mad:

[curse10]

24. I only have a cell phone, no land line

Although no one ever calls me :-)

[FlaGranny]

25. Many people are beginning to give up land lines

and have only a cellphone. I would do it because it is a lot cheaper than a land line, but how do you "do" the internet with no land line?

[Superfly]

27. I have a cell phone, but I really need one of these

as I am often in the woods alone and without help, I should get either a EPIRB or a SatPhone

http://www.iridium.com/product/iri_product-thumbnail.asp?productid=446&method=normal

[LWolf]

29. Necessary.

At my place of employment, (school), we have 30 classrooms or so and one land line going out for all of us to share. It's rare you can pick up the phone and actually get a dial tone. Our families are not allowed to call in and leave messages unless they are critical emergencies. If you are still in your classroom working after the office staff goes home, no one is answering the school phone. So teachers keep cell phones so that they can be accessible to their families while they are at work. Ten years ago, I was in a staff meeting before school when a family member called the office to contact me. The office staff refused to interrupt the meeting to bring me to the phone, even after being told that it was an emergency. I didn't get the message until after the meeting. My ex-husband, father of my boys, had been in an accident and was in critical condition. I was supposed to pass the news on to my boys.

I also use the phone for work-related things; if a student is having a problem, has had some opportunities to resolve it and has chosen not to, I simply take the phone off of my belt, punch in the numbers, say to the parent, "Johnny is having trouble today with _______. Please talk to him." And hand Johnny the phone. Dead silence rules the room.

I used it last week when I had my class out on the field for PE; we were a long way away from the office or the nearest building. Two boys from the local jr high were loitering, one with a wooden chair leg that he used to pound on the fence poles while screaming obscenities. A quick call to the office, and our VP came racing out in the electric cart to evict them.

I carry it for emergency purposes, although the only emergencies I've ever had were in spots where I don't get a signal.

I don't chat on it for fun. I leave it on "discreet" so that no one around me hears it ring, and my family knows not to call the number during business hours unless it is a critical emergency. If not, leave a voice mail message and I'll check it after school, meeting, or whatever. It's not a social tool, and they are the only ones with the number. I do find listening to other people's phones in restaurants, movies, meetings, etc. to be irritating. The discreet function is an easy way to be polite.