Old school landline telephones.

[hardcorestitch]

The landline… it was a crucial piece of communications technology back then. Recently, Hitchcock, OK was thanos’d out of landline service by AT&T in favor of cellular.

Who still has this old but pioneering piece of technology?

 

[citruscurtis]

I thought that the party lines were pioneering technology

 

[Forevermarypoppins]

I do. With our internet package, it's free. For emergencies to get a hold of me that is the one that would be best. I am NOT nor never will be a "cell phone on my person always and looking at it all the time" person.

 

[kdonnel]

I made a great career out of POTS proactive maintenance.

Back in 2000, despite the fact that everyone in my office made their living from POTS, no one had a POTS line at their home.

POTS has been dead for a long time.

 

[Stargazer65]

Does soup cans and string count?

 

[citruscurtis]

Ex-wife....who only wears dresses and skirts had a rotary for 30 years... not a single push button phone.... but I think phone service disconnected land lines to her neighborhood or rotary phone stopped working... when were married we had 9 rotary phones in the 7 bedroom house.... nieces loved it!!!!...
And she still has her 1960s VW

 

[hardcorestitch]

Does soup cans and string count?

No lol…

 

[tvguy]

I still have one. My main phone as I don't give out my cell phone number. A.T.&T. service I get flyers and e-mails regularly to switch to either their fiber or cellular based service. They have been trying to get their designation here in California as "Carrier Of Last Resort" dropped. The law means if their landline service is the only option to an area, they are LEGALLY required to provide it no matter the cost. Public Utilities Commission basically said "no and don't ask again until 2030". They are lobbying the Legislature now ($$$$$) trying to get around that. Unfortunately our wildfires have prompted a lot of attention on emergency communications, and the failure of cellular and WiFi systems. In particular the Santa Rosa wildfire killed 22 people in areas where cellular and WiFi communications were destroyed, but buried landlines never went down.

 

[lynlynch]

We have landline. Surrounding pockets lacking towers hamper cell service. It works when the cell carriers are down, but it is tethered to cable. That is generally more reliable for us than cells.

 

[AnnaS]

I still have my landline and will not get rid of it (yes I can save $30).

I have forgotten my cell phone plenty of times - my son's home (after babysitting), JC Penney, etc. I am solo - what do I do when I get home and realize I left my cell phone somewhere.

There are times when cell phones are down - a few days ago, Verizon was down here all day. Many thought it was their phone since they were not home. A landline is great to have as a back-up. I have one that works even if we lose power - the others are all cordless and will stop working.

 

[hardcorestitch]

I still have my landline and will not get rid of it (yes I can save $30).

I have forgotten my cell phone plenty of times - my son's home (after babysitting), JC Penney, etc. I am solo - what do I do when I get home and realize I left my cell phone somewhere.

There are times when cell phones are down - a few days ago, Verizon was down here all day. Many thought it was their phone since they were not home. A landline is great to have as a back-up. I have one that works even if we lose power - the others are all cordless and will stop working.

Indeed a great example about having fallback plans…

 

[CynBeth]

We also still have a landline. Only a few people have my cellphone number.

 

[LuvOrlando]

When Verizon went down a few days ago it occurred to me how idiotic is is that there is no such thing as public landline telephones anymore. It would seem in the public interest to have at least some form of public communication available throughout every community for safety reasons. If the US cell system ever came crashing down we'd be back to morse code and wishing for carrier pigeons in the blink of an eye - yikes, it was chiiling to think how life as we know it would grind to an absolute halt with zero backup.