BlogHer - Going Cell Only - Comments

Agreed

Virginia DeBolt — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 09:01:50 -0600

I have not missed my land line at all.

Virginia DeBolt
BlogHer Technology Contributing Editor
Web Teacher
First 50 Words

No More Land Line

Asher — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 07:41:06 -0600

I am 30 something and been without a land line for 3 years and I don't miss it at all. I came accross a site on the net from the Bureau of labor statistics that shows how going cell only is not nessisarily a matter of age but a reality of the developing world. I also read The Sullivan Report on the net that shows that a cell phone is more important in safety and security than a land line, and I suppose it's logical - how can a land line help in an emergency if your not at home? The Sullivan Report also showed how much more money and time a person can make and save per month by having a cell phone. I used to have a contract mobile phone but cancilled that as soon as the contract time expired - I found so many hidden costs that they didn't declare when taking the contract out. Now I use a Tracfone, it's great because I don't make a lot of calls so I save and I got the DMFL (double minutes for life of the phone) and I find it really pays. My husband is more vocal than me (on the phone, not in life) so he bought the Net 10 phone because it's 10 cents per minut with free roaming and he loves to use his phone to look up something on the net just to prove that I'm wrong in a conversation. I really cannot think why people still bother with landlines accept for an office.

http://www.bls.gov/cex/cellphones2007.htm

http://www.newmillenniumresearch.org/archive/Sullivan_Report_032608.pdf

You could consider switching

earlgreyrooibos — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:42:18 -0500

You could consider switching to cable internet or getting a wireless connection in your house. That's what my fiancé and I decided to do. It actually costs us less to have cable internet than DSL, but we never inquired about a dry loop, so I don't know how that would stack up against cable. But you definitely have other internet options.

This is What a Feminist Blogs Like

When my mom moved, she never

earlgreyrooibos — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 11:38:04 -0500

When my mom moved, she never got around to getting a landline. Because my sister is away at college, her cousins live in different cities, her sister lives in another state, and I just moved 1,500 miles away, she realized it would be more cost-effective to go cell-only, despite the restrictions. That's also why I'm cell-only; we have cable for the internet, and it's cheaper to call with my cell phone than to call family and friends long-distance.

This is What a Feminist Blogs Like

Access and cost

Virginia DeBolt — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 07:48:34 -0500

There are access issues for a lot of people. Luckily, landline access is pretty much universal.

I think cost is an issue for some people, too. Having a cell phone at all looks like an unnecessary expense on some budgets.

http://www.webteacher.ws/ http://first50.wordpress.com/

not me!

veronicay — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 04:46:09 -0500

If we went cell only, we would be incommunicado most of the time because cellphones don't work in our house, or within a convenient distance of it. And we need our landline for internet access (no DSL or cable here).

As ever, the picture is very different for those in rural areas: the "digital divide" is alive, well, and growing every day, as phone companies are simply not interested in the remaining 2% of us without effective access.

Rant over!

Veronica
http://www.larecettedujour.org/

Those Marketing Stats are for marketing

Achaessa — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 23:13:39 -0500

I think those marketing stats are just trying to target their particular audience - up and coming 30-somethings - and don't reflect reality at all. We went cell only in 2003 (I was 45) and turned off the internet and cable, too - and didn't miss any of it. No more dinnertime marketing calls were the best benefit. We didn't miss internet at home, either. In fact, it improved our marriage immediately. Instead of me or my husband at the computer until all hours of the night, while the other half did other stuff around the house, we got library cards and went to the public library for max 2 hours an evening to get our free computer fix and then went home and enjoyed the evening together. Plus, no technology to maintain. It was heavenly.

But now that we're in Mexico City, I've kind of gone backwards. We have a landline again because TelMex only sells a combo pack and since I work from home I have to have internet, so I get the landline, too. But it's okay. I have no long distance charges to the US or Canada because I pay Skype about $5/month for great reception (better than my office VOIP phone, though how that is when they run on the same internet line is a mystery to me) and my Skype-in number costs another $60/year but it's a number local to our US residence in Seattle so there's no difference in charges to our friends and colleagues when they call (and it's free to F&F on Skype). And it's so cheap in comparison with my ATT/Cingular Mexico plan $185/mo (2700 minutes, and no extra charges for calling to or from Mexico - but they're cancelling that plan in September so I had to find another option). I reduced my US cellphone to the minimum and keep it for emergencies when we're on the road - but $50 a month is a big reduction and that left over $135 can buy a lot of tacos!

Achaessa - life in the extremely big city
http://achaessawrites.wordpress.com/

I will keep both

Candelaria Silva — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 21:36:44 -0500

My daughter who's 30, was cellphone only for years and now that she has a daughter, she has a land-line as a back up.

There have been times when she lost her cellphone or forgot to charge it and couldn't be reached or reach out in an emergency.

She and I are both still uncomfortable with what cellphone use may be doing to brainwaves and while the studies are inconclusive, there is more concern with young children's developing brains. I don't want my granddaughter talking over cellphones exclusively while her brain is growing.

When 9/11 happened, I was happy to have several different ways to communicate and to receive information. Each of them worked at different times. My St. Louis family was able tor each me on landline and not cellphone. My Charlotte family reached me on cellphone. When the cellphone went down - the computer helped. So, I save money in other ways but I'm keeping both.

I thought about it

sassymonkey — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 16:14:50 -0500

I was cell phone only for a bit when I first moved to Toronto a few years ago. It was ok but long distance packages at the time sucked - not good when most of your family and friends live far way. Cell coverage wasn't fantastic either. Skype was a possibility but I wasn't sold on it yet plus I was still using my ancient computer.

When I moved again I was working from home. Cell phone only wouldn't work when I was on the phone 8 hours a day and using lots of long distance (again, cell phone plans in Canada frequently SUCK). Skype was a possibility but I wouldn't have been able to run it on the work computer (it would have killed the poor thing) and being on the phone on one computer while working on another just seemed like a hassle. So I went with a traditional landline and bought myself a nice little Plantronics hands-free phone and it was all good (I love that little thing).

We went with a landline this time too but through the cable company instead of a traditional landline. Right now it works for us but if cell plans in Canada ever get good enough I might consider switching to a cell only home.

Sassymonkey and Sassymonkey Reads.

A fellow idealist, how refreshing!

windysblog — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 14:29:04 -0500

Oh, Virginia, I so hope that we can all band together and demand better service from the cell companies! It makes me think of the old days, though. Remember Ma Bell? Well, it's become Ma Cell now. Even if we could all get together, they'd just say "Go ahead and leave us and see how far you get."

They've got us by the little antennas....

What I'm seeing

Virginia DeBolt — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 14:21:17 -0500

in the comments, even from people who retain a landline, is that almost everyone has thought about doing this. The ones who have not done it yet have very good reasons, but they have thought about it.

Think we could take this trend toward cell-only existence and use the power of numbers to get better service from the cell phone companies?

http://www.webteacher.ws/ http://first50.wordpress.com/

My reasons for keeping the landline

Nordette — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 14:10:00 -0500

The only reasons I still have a landline, which is through a cable company, is because my parents live with me (My dad's just not getting with the cell phone only idea.) and because there are still some people out there who seem to think if you don't have a hard line you're not a real person.

Ever since I bought my son his own cell phone and also because my adult daughter, who also lives with me, has a cell phone, I haven't seen a critical need for a landline.

When I lived in Jersey, I experienced what Denise has. Only telemarketers called my landline and really blew up my voicemail box with computer dialers. And there was one male friend who called me only on my landline. I think he was paranoid about people listening to cell phone conversations or something.

Eventually I stopped checking messages on the landline and he had to get with the program. Should've added the number to the Do Not Call list, but since I didn't use the phone, I didn't bother.

Virginia, this post is very relevant to life in our changing world. Thank you.

Nordette Adams is a Contributing Editor with BlogHer.com whose personal blog is at this link. Two recent posts are John McCain's Words on loving America vs. Michelle Obama's Word and John McCain's Vagina Monologue.

Good Move

kiddingcat — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 13:07:42 -0500

victor D manneh

I am considering making this move myself, between my house phone, cell phone, internet, the bills are killing me. no idea

Not Quite Ready Yet

windysblog — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 12:52:36 -0500

I have phone service through the internet, and it's okay except when I am downloading or using a lot of bandwith on the computer. In those situations, I lose the connection and the calls just drop with no warning. This is sometimes a problem, especially if I am FINALLY talking to a customer service rep from some company that I waited for what seems to be 80 minutes to speak to! But it's an option for those who don't want to go cell only, and it's a heck of a lot cheaper than a landline.

My cell doesn't work well in the basement (where my office is) so I can't use it for important calls. I'm hoping that technology will catch up to that need soon!

Also, I've found that after about two years, my cell phone battery loses its umph, or the phone breaks down, and I am facing the decision of a new phone once again. Funny how that seems to always happen right when the contract is about to expire with the cell phone company. Hmmm....think that's a co-incidence?

So I'm going to wait a bit more before going totally cell. I expect that soon the cell phones will work everywhere, they will last more than two years, and all of my problems will be solved.

I can dream, can't I?

YES!

Mommyto5 — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 11:59:03 -0500

I use a Blackberry and that is my only phone. I haven't had a "land line" in ages. The expense alone was foolish. I had a $75 cell phone plan and a $45 land line plan. Now I have an unlimited "everything" cell phone for $90 a month (I bargained it down with AT&T and they did it with a longer contract!). I get all my emails on my blackberry, use it as my wireless card on my laptop and can even type my blogs from my phone.

Love multifunctional stuff AND saving money!

Land lines won't be around long. Great post

Cheryl

http://dailyblonde.blogspot.com

Going Cell Only

Virginia DeBolt — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 07:30:09 -0500

I just became a cell-only household. I didn't use my landline much–not for long distance, not for Internet service. I really didn't see a reason to continue keeping the account.

According to this recent study Pew/Internet: Polling in the ago of the cell phone being cell-only means I'm likely to fall into this demographic:

Among the most notable and interesting findings in our analysis are that, compared to those we reach on landlines, the people we contact on their cell phones are:

- younger (more likely to be age 30 or under)
- more likely to be minorities
- more likely to tell us their household income.

Hmmm. I'm not under 30, not a minority, and my household income is none of your damn business. I know the information that Pew/Internet is reporting about is related to their phone polling and to overall trends.

I have a number of friends who are over 30, non-minority, who are cell-only families. On the other hand, I have an older friend who can't figure out how to find the contact list in her cell phone in order to call someone whose number she has not memorized. So, as with the case of the Senior PC, I think the cell-only phenomena is a trend related to overall cell phone acceptance throughout every age and social level, and not so much about age, ethnicity or income.

An article in The Washington Post Our Cells, Ourselves reported that

From essentially zero, we've passed a watershed of more than 3.3 billion active cellphones on a planet of some 6.6 billion humans in about 26 years. This is the fastest global diffusion of any technology in human history -- faster even than the polio vaccine.

The article goes on to say that soon 5 out of the 6 billion people on the planet will have a cell phone. My question is, how many of these 5 billion people are going to consider it necessary to pay a second phone bill for a landline?

Are all 5 billion going to be as frustrated as I am with cell phone plan restrictions?

Photo by Kevin Rosseel

My big issue with plulling the plug is I'm stuck dealing only with a cell phone company. For example, much as I'd like to have an iPhone, I'd owe my current company over $200 to get out of my deal with them and switch to ATT. I think we need to change the way the phone companies keep us in a strangle-hold while we're switching to cell-only households. In Free the Cell Phone by Jennifer Granick at Wired. She uses a fake company in her example:

Like most U.S. cellular providers, CellPhoneCo electronically locks the handsets it sells so the phones can only be used with CellPhoneCo's service. CellPhoneCo claims that the sale of unlocking software is illegal.

. . . a burgeoning market has developed for unlocking software that allows customers to modify their phones to accept signals from the service provider of their choice.

Here, CellPhoneCo is making a novel argument: that it can stop a business with which it has no contractual relationship from selling software that customers might use for these purposes. Does CellPhoneCo have a legal right to squelch unlocking software?

This is an interesting legal issue. No one can force you to have a particular landline (or VOIP) contract. Yet, once you have a cell phone, you have all sorts of restrictions about what you can do with it. This is because the cell phone company sells you a phone at a discount and then expects to recoup the loss by making you stay with them for at least two years. To get different treatment, should we start paying full price for our phones so we could do as we wanted with them? Would you pay $400 instead of $200 for your phone if you didn't get tethered to a contract that would cost you $200 to get out of?

Do the cell phone people think consumers are too stupid to figure out that they end up paying full price for the phone anyway if they fulfill the contract terms?

I can go to Target and buy a landline phone that I can carry all over the country, plug into the wall, and use. There's nothing about that phone that requires a single phone company's service to make it work. More importantly, I don't have to worry about whether or not I have coverage in my house. BlogHer Contributing Editor Laura Scott from rare pattern went cell-only and discovered that since the company she is forced to use has poor coverage, she gets bad to no service inside her own home.

BlogHer Contributing Editor Kalyn at Kalyn's Kitchen told me,

Personally it has been a bit of a pain, dropped calls and forgetting to charge the phone. But I'm old and resistant to change. And for a savings of $60 a month, I doubt I'd get a land line again.

I was worried at first that the cell phone wouldn't work with skype, but I have a blogger friend in Italy who calls me on skype and no problem!

At Stepcase Lifehack, in Lose Your Landline, Now, Thursday Bram points out some more advantages of going cell-only.

While not everyone is in a position to get rid of his or her landlines, I’ve found that — in general — losing the landline can really help simplify life. After all, without a landline, you don’t have to worry about

- the expense of a landline (including long distance!)
- remembering to pay at least one bill
- checking messages
- waiting by the phone

There were some interesting pro and con reasons in the comments for this article that make some good points.

In Do You Still Have a Landline?, geeksugar says,

We all know escaping your cell phone contact can be brutal, but cell phones provide some serious (and obvious) benefits. They are portable, relatively inexpensive and most of them offer handy features that make your portable home phone look like a brick. I ditched my landline a long time ago because no one called me on it anymore and I always have my cell with me. Have you pulled the cord yet?

Geeksugar also did a survey on a wedding cake topper with both the bride and the groom talking on cell phones in Cell Phone Couple Cake Topper: Love or Leave? that earned some interesting comments. I predict this couple will not install a landline in their new digs.

Kelly at It Was a Dark and Stormy Night wrote in Not Much of a Juggler, the reasons for switching to cell-only were both financial and part of an effort to simplify her schedule.

I realized I was juggling a few too many balls and needed to set a few down and concentrate on the important stuff. . . . I also cancelled cable. Granted, this was more of a money saving item than a time issue, but I realized I hadn’t actually watched much tv since the writers strike and since it was costing me nearly $40 a month, it seemed a bit silly to pay all that money for something I wasn’t using. And while I was at it, I cancelled my land line as well and switched to using my cell phone as my main number, saving me another $20/month.

Going cell-only made sense for me. It may not make sense for you. What's your view on this trend?