Feelings on Cell Phones?

What are your feelings on cell phones? Do you like them? dislike them? Why?

I'll start. I've had a cell phone for a few years now. As of about a year and a half ago, I got rid of my land line and started using only the cell. I love it! Free LD, can take it anywhere... long battery life...

I really don't know why anyone would still use a land-line phone.

Dialup... internet....

OHHHH I think I remember that... you used it to find 8-track tapes, right?
;)

Yeah... I'm a geek. :) Broadband is #1 priority. After that, #2 is A/C.... and #3 is food.

hehe

/me giggles

yep, same here.

If I had the cash, I would spring for broadband, but seeing as how I'm now unemployed (they won't let me do workstudy when I'm not a student for some reason ;-) that's not happening.

 

I hate them, but I have one anyway, mostly for emergencies.

I can't stand the concept that it's such a horrible thing to sometimes be inaccessible. we got by just fine 10 years ago, and back then, our dinners and concerts weren't interrupted by cell phones.

I really don't know why anyone would still use a land-line phone.

because it's too uncomfortable talking on something that you can't quite hold in your hand and where the microphone is 4 inches from your mouth. if they made a cell phone that was designed to fit my hand and my face, I'd definitely give up my land line.

Oh, see, land or cell, I use a headset when talking. I hate having to hold a receiver to my head. Ick.

And... as for being sometimes inaccessible.... I think a cell is BETTER for that, not worse. You can just turn it off. :)

It would be nice if my new apartent were located in a place with decent cell phone coverage.  Instead, I hear *bleep-bloop* ... *bloop-bleep* ALL THE TIME, as my cell phone jumps from digital to analog coverage.  Don't even ask me to use it at home, because I can't even get a strong enough signal to make a call.

I can't seem to handle owning a cell phone. Due to a credit card fiasco a few years back I don't have a credit rating that'll allow me to be billed, and therefore I'm restricted to doing pay-as-you-go. but I'm always too stingy with the minutes, and for the most part anytime I need to phone someone I'd rather use the land line where I'm at, or a payphone. eventually I'm in a situation where I don't use my cell phone enough, so I don't really buy any minutes for it, (since they expire) and with ut minutes I never think about it, and the -phone number- expires so they give it to someone else. this has happned three times. I'm don't think I'm ready for the wireless era yet. yay for we involuntary luddites!

i absolutely love my cell!  i'm lost without it.  for the longest time, i was anti-cell, but as my car gets older & phones get cheaper i thought i should really get one.  oh yeah, and i work for the largest carrier in the US.  i guess i love my phone because it has so many features.  it means i always know what time it is. i don't have to write appointments on pieces of paper & then lose them. i get my news all day & can access pretty much anything anywhere.  the best part of it all is: i can turn it all off if i want.  it stays on all the time now, but that's just because my mom needs me as her personal chauffeur since she can't drive for medical reasons & her mother is in the hospital again as well.

granted, i still have my landline... but i just have that for telemarketers & creditors ;-)  all my friends & family have my cell number.  the landline is what i put on non-essential stuff, like applications & online registrations.  half the time i can't find my landline receiver when it rings anyway, so a lot of people talk to the answering machine.  i guess i just can't part with a landline even if it is just a dial tone. 

I can't really think of any reason why I would want one.

I'm not fond of the phone to begin with (I'll use it, but I'd rather not), why would I want to have one on me all the time?
Also, I hate talking on a cell phone. Smaller is not always better, if I had to have one, I'd probably have to go back in time and get a big one that would be comofortable to talk on.

Oh, and they should make them all without audiable ringers. Ok, I know that won't happen, but I'm already sick of them.

I don't mind if other people have cells. I think it's somewhat absurd, but I'm not about to ban absurdity ;-) I don't think they're nessisary either. Yes, there are times when it would be nice to be able to leave and still get a phonecall...but it's also nice to not be expected to have a phone on me. It's amazing how shocked some people are that I don't have a cell phone.

Mostly, I'm just amazed by how fast they have become the norm. It's one of the things I look at them as a sign of my being in the future...today!

 

 

But I think it's more of people like it to ring and annoy others to tell us "hey I have a phone and an important call on the other end."

Yeah, exactly.

I have my phone set up to vibrate a few times, then ring if I haven't answered.
If I have it on me (which is when I'm out of the house usually) I just answer before it ever comes close to ringing. The only time it rings is when I'm at home and it's sitting in the base acting as my "home phone". :)

I don't think they're nessisary either.

Well, they certainly are necessary if they're your only line...
;)
And I know more and more people who that's the case for.

Give it time, I don't see land lines lasting too too long. Just like dialup internet.

My dad bought me a cellphone this year because I took my car with me to college.  He wanted me to have a way to call someone if I got in an accident.  He got the family plan, so our calls to each other (the majority of my calls) are free-ish.  I never leave the ringer on when I go out in public unless I'm expecting someone to call.  And although some people have free schedules, this semester I lived by the minute and whenever I called my parents I'd be in the process of walking to someplace else for a meeting/rehearsal/class.  So while I don't like some of the more annoying people w/phones, it serves me quite well.

About ten years ago customers I delivered freight to and/or picked it up from stopped asking me if I had one of those mobile phone thingies and started asking: "What's your number?" Until then their communications had to go via fleetcontroller and twoway radio, very inconvenient, timewasting and prone to error. Thats when I got one of those, even though it cost me an arm and half a leg.

Its just a tool to me, part of the truck, and it paid for itself in no time. Its also very convenient. Quite a few times had I hardly left the driveway to get a message like: "Can you come back? We got another pallet we want to send today." Or: "Don't you want to take the paperwork with you, scatterbrain?" Via fleetcontroller the news would have reached me way, way down the road.

Privately, it can be most welcome too, like when I picked up one of my sisters from the airport. The fog had just lifted and several planes emptied their passengers simultaneously. Without the phone we wouldn't have found each other in the crush. On weekends I could drop my daughter off at the beach. If I couldn't stay, I'd give her the phone and she'd ring me when she wanted to be picked up again. One day I ran a bit late for a show and someone from a group we were meant to go with rang to tell us which usher held our tickets while they were already inside. And so on.

Once upon a time we did without a lot of things that quickly changed from being a luxury to a necessity. Cars, refrigerators, electricity, forklifts, internet, cellphones..., not to mention all those machines that go "ping."

I first really got my celphone because my car was unreliable and I didn't fancy getting stuck somewhere, especially as remote as my route could be. I still barely ever used it for years. It was a miracle if I actually left it on and somebody could reach ME. It was just for me to call out when I very much needed it. It's good for calling home from the grocery store, too, when you need to check on something. :)

Now I use it almost daily because my work phone doesn't register on the caller ID at home and I want the phone to actually be answered when I call home. :) But if it weren't for that, I'd still barely use it.

I think they're alright. I don't have one. I don't need one. But if I did, I would get one.