A couple of years ago I replaced my electric phone attached to my landline with an old-style one so that if the electric goes down I have a phone using the old copper system. Cell signal here is patchy and weak so we can't rely on it. Infrastructure is incredibly vulnerable to disruption these days.
Yes it is. I saw an article about copper phone lines...but I didn't read it ... it looked like they were phasing those out? As I said, I didn't read it, but hope it remains a connection for you!
Happily, our national infrastructure is appalling so it's unlikely to happen here. It's only 4 months since I got what is described as "superfast" broadband which is actually medium fast, I.e. the minimum speed really. There was work by one supplier on phasing out copper lines somewhere but then some bright spark realised that elderly people without cellphones would be unable to call help in case of an emergency so it was stopped. Not sure if it's restarted. But given the state of everything in our country right now, I think the removal of copper landlines probably won't happen in most places.
I think you're probably right. And yes, just labelling something as 'superfast' ... is super irrelevant. I pay for a pretty high rate of wifi and a couple of the channels like paramount+ and BritBox just spins and spins and ... so I don't watch them. But I'm thankful for connections that do work!
I only know a handful of phone numbers off by heart, and it has been perhaps a dozen years since I've used a landline, but I often wonder if we left the best version of the 'phone' behind us. Having a mobile phone on us at all times provides some benefits, but many downsides too.
1. It's interesting how easily populations have been eased into using mobile phones for everything. Makes it very easy for what happened with AT&T on a much more massive scale (like all cellular companies, worldwide).
2. For those who do still have a landline, when the cellular networks go out, there literally may be no one to call, because virtually no one else has a landline.
There’s a program called Landward on Prime that has interesting segments about life in Scotland. Pieces about farm animals and wildlife, articles about land management and carbon footprints and one I especially liked about tweeds. But there was another one I liked featuring those red phone boxes - that many of them have been sort of decommissioned. But some communities have come up with interesting ways to repurpose their boxes. One used theirs as a village “take one and leave one” library, some decorated theirs with plants and flowers, and one place turned theirs into a local location to hold an AED (defibrillator) for anyone in the village who needed it. Pretty neat!
Remember Who is in control.
There are no surprises in the throne room of Heaven.
Case closed.
Yes, He is in control!
A couple of years ago I replaced my electric phone attached to my landline with an old-style one so that if the electric goes down I have a phone using the old copper system. Cell signal here is patchy and weak so we can't rely on it. Infrastructure is incredibly vulnerable to disruption these days.
Yes it is. I saw an article about copper phone lines...but I didn't read it ... it looked like they were phasing those out? As I said, I didn't read it, but hope it remains a connection for you!
Happily, our national infrastructure is appalling so it's unlikely to happen here. It's only 4 months since I got what is described as "superfast" broadband which is actually medium fast, I.e. the minimum speed really. There was work by one supplier on phasing out copper lines somewhere but then some bright spark realised that elderly people without cellphones would be unable to call help in case of an emergency so it was stopped. Not sure if it's restarted. But given the state of everything in our country right now, I think the removal of copper landlines probably won't happen in most places.
I think you're probably right. And yes, just labelling something as 'superfast' ... is super irrelevant. I pay for a pretty high rate of wifi and a couple of the channels like paramount+ and BritBox just spins and spins and ... so I don't watch them. But I'm thankful for connections that do work!
I only know a handful of phone numbers off by heart, and it has been perhaps a dozen years since I've used a landline, but I often wonder if we left the best version of the 'phone' behind us. Having a mobile phone on us at all times provides some benefits, but many downsides too.
Thanks for writing this.
Yes, benefits and downsides ... very true. Maybe I should memorize a phone number or two. Just in case!
A couple of thoughts, John:
1. It's interesting how easily populations have been eased into using mobile phones for everything. Makes it very easy for what happened with AT&T on a much more massive scale (like all cellular companies, worldwide).
2. For those who do still have a landline, when the cellular networks go out, there literally may be no one to call, because virtually no one else has a landline.
I love that picture of the phone booth 😁
There’s a program called Landward on Prime that has interesting segments about life in Scotland. Pieces about farm animals and wildlife, articles about land management and carbon footprints and one I especially liked about tweeds. But there was another one I liked featuring those red phone boxes - that many of them have been sort of decommissioned. But some communities have come up with interesting ways to repurpose their boxes. One used theirs as a village “take one and leave one” library, some decorated theirs with plants and flowers, and one place turned theirs into a local location to hold an AED (defibrillator) for anyone in the village who needed it. Pretty neat!
That sounds like a very interesting show! Cool uses for the phone booths!