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Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!cca!ima!inmet!rgh
From: rgh@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: A serious flame against telephone so - (nf)
Message-ID: <287@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 31-Aug-83 18:45:33 EDT
Article-I.D.: inmet.287
Posted: Wed Aug 31 18:45:33 1983
Date-Received: Thu, 1-Sep-83 11:01:07 EDT
Lines: 57

#R:ut-ngp:-49700:inmet:3900045:000:2697
inmet!rgh    Aug 27 10:32:00 1983

Re:  wanted and unwanted phone calls

    If you can stand to listen to the spiel you'll learn, sooner or
later, the name of the company which is soliciting.  Call their sales
manager and let him/her know what you think of this particular
advertising technique. 

    Where do you suppose they got your phone number from?  My guess is
that the phone company sold them a list sorted by address.  The most
plausible explanation I've ever heard for why it's more expensive to 
have an unlisted number is that it deprives TPC of this revenue.  You
might call your local TPC business office and make inquiries and
suggestions.  

    Strange as it may seem, you are not legally required to answer
your telephone.  The next time you're having dinner, or using your
bathroom, or sleeping, and you hear the phone ring, DON'T ANSWER IT.
The first several times you try this, I realize, it will cause you
great waves of anxiety, doubt, guilt, and fear.  But persevere.
Eventually you may actually come to believe that the phone is for
your convenience, and not the convenience of your callers.
    Well, you are fighting well-engrained attitudes here.  I've
gotten very strange reactions from some people when I've confessed
to this practice.  Some people are so Pavlovian that
they will interrupt coitus to see what random human might want
to talk with them.
    By the same token, it makes sense to try a call again, after
a few minutes.  ["Did you call a little while ago?  I was in the
bedroom with a door-to-door solicitor and didn't make it to the
phone in time."]  You, or the switching system, may even have
misdialed your first call.

    The difficult problem is distinguishing wanted from unwanted
calls.  An extreme solution is two phone lines, one listed 
and one not.  
    A technique which works fairly well is to tell the people
from whom you're willing to accept calls to [e.g.] ring twice, hang
up, and dial again.  I once lived with someone who insisted on
this system for our phone [she REALLY didn't want to talk with
her mother], and it worked fairly well.  Most people accepted the
access system with amused tolerance -- actually, I believe most
of them thought it was kind of fun.
    I've speculated on a variant of this system:  it must be
technically feasible to have a gadget which answers your line,
waits for someone to dial an access code, and hangs up, or
takes a message, if one isn't dialled.  Then you could even
give different people different passnumbers, and be quite dis-
criminating about who you'll talk to.  This probably
works best if you cultivate people with touch-tone service.

		    "Don't call us, we'll call you",

			Randy Hudson
			{harpo,ima}!inmet!rgh