cell phones redux
Aug. 26th, 2010 05:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mmegaeraWell, I got about what I expected to hear from my last post. [wry g]
There are a few Luddites out in the forest with me. And then there are the cell phone proponents, who seem to bypass most of my major objections and zero in on why they think cell phones are so fantastic and why I should have one.
I do feel the need to address several comments, but I'd rather do it here than in the other post.
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norabombay says that once I get used to all the gadgets and goodies, I will never go back. This appalls me on more than one level. For one thing, it completely ignores the cost issue. My landline is $20 a month -- even if I cancelled it in favor of the cell phone, $20 is not going to get me email (which would be kind of cool, but about the only whistle I can think of that would be). Even if I doubled that amount it wouldn't, because I've gone to Radio Shack and the kiosks at the malls and asked. For another thing, the very concept of "never going back" kind of creeps me out. Yeah, I have other electronic toys I would miss if they went away, but they're not things I carry with me whenever I leave the house. I don't like the idea of an electronic leash.
Oh, and I can't kill my landline without completely rearranging my Internet access which would likely cost extra, since my DSL is tied to my landline phone account and from what I understand inseparable from it.
azurelunatic asks me if I ever feel tied to the house by my phone, and the answer to that is I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that's happened in the last fifteen years or so. Like newaytowrite I get a landline call maybe twice a week, tops. I also use exceedingly small amounts of long distance, although that might change if it didn't cost extra. azurelunatic also says to check the cellphone coverage before I kill the landline. There are issues with cellphone coverage where I live -- my condo's kind of down in a little valley, and I know my next-door neighbors had to do some finagling for connectivity when they moved in several years ago. I have no idea what that finagling involved.
The smartphone capabilities do sound intriguing. They also sound incredibly expensive and probably overwhelming.
Several people suggested prepaid phones even after I mentioned in my original post that the concept of prepaid is not workable in my situation. One of the reasons both the prepaid phones I bought are no longer with me is because I kept forgetting that I had to deal with them, unprompted, periodically or the phone service went away. If they don't bill me, it's highly unlikely that I'm going to remember to pay, and I don't want to waste my money on another phone that will turn into a dead piece of electronics after a few months of non-use. Not to mention that minutes (not to mention the entire phone number) on prepaid phones do go away after a period of time, so I would still be paying for minutes I'm not using. Also, the kinds of service that would be likely to tempt me (email, for instance) are not going to come on a prepaid plan.
Then there's the whole safety issue [wry g].
This, I am told by several of the commenters, as well as my mother and most of the people who care about me, is why I should have one, especially since one of my alltime favorite activities is to be behind the wheel of a car on my way somewhere, in an as out in the middle of nowhere a place as is possible.
This bugs me, for a couple of reasons. One. The only time I was ever in a car wreck, the phone (the big clunky one in 1999) was trashed in the wreck. Two. Most of the out of the way places I go get lousy cell phone coverage. Look at an AT&T or Verizon map of Montana sometime, for instance. Really. Yes, Montana gets good coverage from a little local cell phone company that specializes in out of the way places, but it's not available here near Seattle. Maybe I'm tempting fate, but I've never, ever felt the need of a cell phone on any of my jaunts. I'm not sure why I should. I take good care of my car. I'm a safe driver. I've driven hundreds of thousands of miles, a lot of them well off the Interstate, without incident.
People drove the way I do for decades before cell phones were invented. A very low percentage of them were ever run over by semis, honest.
BTW, if all you've got to say to this response is "well, if you don't want one, don't buy one," then don't bother. But I really would like some responses to this that actually address my specific issues, and maybe even give me some good overwhelming reasons why I should get a cell phone in spite of or perhaps because of them, and tell me how to do it in a way that doesn't overwhelm me or my budget.
Either that or would the world lay off insisting that I'm inadequate and unsafe because I don't have one, please?
There are a few Luddites out in the forest with me. And then there are the cell phone proponents, who seem to bypass most of my major objections and zero in on why they think cell phones are so fantastic and why I should have one.
I do feel the need to address several comments, but I'd rather do it here than in the other post.
norabombay says that once I get used to all the gadgets and goodies, I will never go back. This appalls me on more than one level. For one thing, it completely ignores the cost issue. My landline is $20 a month -- even if I cancelled it in favor of the cell phone, $20 is not going to get me email (which would be kind of cool, but about the only whistle I can think of that would be). Even if I doubled that amount it wouldn't, because I've gone to Radio Shack and the kiosks at the malls and asked. For another thing, the very concept of "never going back" kind of creeps me out. Yeah, I have other electronic toys I would miss if they went away, but they're not things I carry with me whenever I leave the house. I don't like the idea of an electronic leash.Oh, and I can't kill my landline without completely rearranging my Internet access which would likely cost extra, since my DSL is tied to my landline phone account and from what I understand inseparable from it.
azurelunatic asks me if I ever feel tied to the house by my phone, and the answer to that is I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of times that's happened in the last fifteen years or so. Like newaytowrite I get a landline call maybe twice a week, tops. I also use exceedingly small amounts of long distance, although that might change if it didn't cost extra. azurelunatic also says to check the cellphone coverage before I kill the landline. There are issues with cellphone coverage where I live -- my condo's kind of down in a little valley, and I know my next-door neighbors had to do some finagling for connectivity when they moved in several years ago. I have no idea what that finagling involved.The smartphone capabilities do sound intriguing. They also sound incredibly expensive and probably overwhelming.
Several people suggested prepaid phones even after I mentioned in my original post that the concept of prepaid is not workable in my situation. One of the reasons both the prepaid phones I bought are no longer with me is because I kept forgetting that I had to deal with them, unprompted, periodically or the phone service went away. If they don't bill me, it's highly unlikely that I'm going to remember to pay, and I don't want to waste my money on another phone that will turn into a dead piece of electronics after a few months of non-use. Not to mention that minutes (not to mention the entire phone number) on prepaid phones do go away after a period of time, so I would still be paying for minutes I'm not using. Also, the kinds of service that would be likely to tempt me (email, for instance) are not going to come on a prepaid plan.
Then there's the whole safety issue [wry g].
This, I am told by several of the commenters, as well as my mother and most of the people who care about me, is why I should have one, especially since one of my alltime favorite activities is to be behind the wheel of a car on my way somewhere, in an as out in the middle of nowhere a place as is possible.
This bugs me, for a couple of reasons. One. The only time I was ever in a car wreck, the phone (the big clunky one in 1999) was trashed in the wreck. Two. Most of the out of the way places I go get lousy cell phone coverage. Look at an AT&T or Verizon map of Montana sometime, for instance. Really. Yes, Montana gets good coverage from a little local cell phone company that specializes in out of the way places, but it's not available here near Seattle. Maybe I'm tempting fate, but I've never, ever felt the need of a cell phone on any of my jaunts. I'm not sure why I should. I take good care of my car. I'm a safe driver. I've driven hundreds of thousands of miles, a lot of them well off the Interstate, without incident.
People drove the way I do for decades before cell phones were invented. A very low percentage of them were ever run over by semis, honest.
BTW, if all you've got to say to this response is "well, if you don't want one, don't buy one," then don't bother. But I really would like some responses to this that actually address my specific issues, and maybe even give me some good overwhelming reasons why I should get a cell phone in spite of or perhaps because of them, and tell me how to do it in a way that doesn't overwhelm me or my budget.
Either that or would the world lay off insisting that I'm inadequate and unsafe because I don't have one, please?
