Do you text message?

[mjs1973]

I'm not a huge fan of cell phones, although I do have one. When it comes to text messaging on the cell phone, I'm even less of a fan. My wife text messages more than she talks on her cell. In fact, she bought a special phone, and a plan for the deaf just so she can text message.

Maybe I'm getting too old, but if I have something to tell someone, a phone call or a voice mail seem to get the job done just fine.

[SmartWombat]

OH yes, I use it a lot.
Particularly good for work, as it's not intrusive like a call.
You can handle a SMS message in your own time, rather than having to answer immediately.

[drg]

Depends upon the environment. Push to talk is far quicker for a lot of things, texting is O.K. if it doesn't take longer to encode and if regular email isn't available.

With the integration of email in so many 'phones' now it blurs the difference.

There are definite uses though for short messages in many environments, but I personally prefer speaking with some one.

Too many years working with 'talk' utilities under UNIX to see if they could be made 'friendlier' left me fairly cold to the whole concept.

[Xia_Ke]

I text message all the time, more so than talking on my cell, for the exact reasons Paul mentioned. It quick, convenient, and unobtrusive.

[MJS]

Not me, I'm too cheap.

[Frog]

I don't even have a cell phone...never saw any purpose for them worth the price.

[JETA]

I don't mind getting them, but generating them is another story. I detest it. No kidding, it must take me 10 minutes to type out 5 words. Did I mention I detest it?

We have unlimited texting too.

One thing I do like is I can text from my computer. Now that's the way to do it imo.

[Tiago Rohrsetzer]

I txt more than I talk in the phone, the reason is, I hate to speak English on the phone. I am from Brazil and sometimes I just can't understand a word depending on the person's accent, when the coverage is poor, then I get completely lost.

[Medley]

I occasionally text for some of the reasons already outlined, but my biggest use of text involves bulletins. I can send the same message to up to 25 people at once. Impromptu staff meeting? Let 'em all know. That sort of thing. In those sorts of situations, it's way more efficient than calling everyone.

- Joe U.

[walterick]

I'm in the "mega-txt" category. I use my cell to call older people, and use it to txt younger ones I bought a dual-hinge phone last year that gives me a full qwerty keyboard so I can get through a txt faster. I also had to upgrade my phone plan as those suckers get expensive!

c u ltr

[mn shutterbug]

I text my daughter about once a year. A phone call she'll forget, a text she'll maybe pay more attention to and save. In other words, it has to be pretty important for me to go thru the grueling porcess.

I suppose it's like everything else. The more you do it, the the better you get. I'm just amazed at how fast some of these teens can type on that tiny keyboard. What bothers me is, the people who text while driving. That is done and has been the cause of traffic fatalities.

[mwfanelli2]

I don't even have a cell phone...never saw any purpose for them worth the price.

Gee, I've been cell phone only for about 5 years now. I don't get the point of a land line: there is seldom anyone at home to answer the silly thing! Besides, my Pay-As-You-Go cell phone is a lot cheaper than the basic land line ever was!

No, I never text.

[walterick]

What bothers me is, the people who text while driving.

Guilty, here. It is MUCH more dangerous than talking on a phone and driving too!

[Franglais]

I think I'm on another planet from most of the people who have replied. The Windows Mobile GSM terminal (you would call it a PDA telephone) is an integral part of the corporate messaging and collaboration system I'm implementing.

In other words on my "telephone" I have :

- the corporate mail system
- my two personal mail accounts
- the text messaging that comes with the telephone
- my corporate calendar
- my corporate contacts list
- the corporate list of users
- full Internet access
- my salsa videos (for revision in the subway)
- my favourite photos

All that and yet - it still fits in my trouser pocket. I don't write many messages with it, the user interface is too small. It's very useful for staying in touch and searching for information, as I found in London last weekend.

[rylan]

i text alot, because with my wireless provider i have unlimited text messaging.
and instead of using up my 200 day time minutes i just text because i like keeping my bill at 40$ lol

[Asylum Steve]

I don't get the point of a land line: there is seldom anyone at home to answer the silly thing!...

C'mon now, Michael. That's your situation, but everyone's different...

My mom is 82 years old, and would not have a clue how to use a mobile phone. We regularly call my sister in Europe, when four or more family members want to talk to her (or at least hear her) at the same time.

Having an automatic 911 locator (where you dial 911 and simply can leave the phone off the hook and they know the call is from your home) is important to us.

There have been instances of severe weather in Florida where cell service is out but land lines work.

My brother is a Web TV addict, which requires a land line dial-up connection. I need a fax machine connected to a land line.

The list goes on and on...

Wanting a land line does not always mean a fear of mobile technology or resistance to embrace it. Some of us need both.

[Jaedon]

I text regularly. I have unlimited texting as well but I don't think I am really getting the $4 a month worth of texts for it. There's no way I send enough texts at 15 cents each to reach $4 a month...

I use the predictive setting mostly but it occasionally messes up the words so I have to correct them. Mostly it is because I can send a text to friends at work who cannot take personal calls when I have something that I need to tell them quick before I forget. They all know that after years of Chemical abuse as a teenager my memory isn't what it used to be lol. So they know if I dan't day it now I will forget in 10 minutes or so.

[mwfanelli2]

C'mon now, Michael. That's your situation, but everyone's different...

My mom is 82 years old, and would not have a clue how to use a mobile phone. We regularly call my sister in Europe, when four or more family members want to talk to her (or at least hear her) at the same time.

Having an automatic 911 locator (where you dial 911 and simply can leave the phone off the hook and they know the call is from your home) is important to us.

There have been instances of severe weather in Florida where cell service is out but land lines work.

My brother is a Web TV addict, which requires a land line dial-up connection. I need a fax machine connected to a land line.

The list goes on and on...

Wanting a land line does not always mean a fear of mobile technology or resistance to embrace it. Some of us need both.

Obviously, land lines still work for some people. I never said anything about "fear." Yeah, land lines are better for 911 when compared to regular cell phones. Most cell phones these days come with GPS that can be used the same way by fire and police.

You can now use Tivo and DirectTV DVRs with broadband. I don't use either as there just isn't enough to warrant spending the money (HD is useless for me as well). If you watch a lot of TV with a DVR and have no broadband, yeah, spend the money on a land line to support it.

My FAX comes in via email (eFax). It lets me see a FAX wherever I am instead of running home to see it.

Land lines staying up and cell phones not working? That is extremely rare and odd as cell phones are wireless, hard wired telephone lines on poles can go down. I have not yet, even in violent storms and one blizzard, to have my cell phone die. In the blizzard case, a neighbor had to borrow my cell phone as the telephone lines went down (as well as the electrical lines).

CNN (TV) had a short story about the falling market for land lines in the US. Right now, about 15% of Americans are cell-phone only. That number is growing quickly, enough that land line phone companies are trying to generate business outside the US. There, the land line business almost static but not falling as fast as in the US.

Its a matter of what you want and what works for you. For me, going with a land line costs much more and lacks convenience. The cell phone costs less and is with me regardless of where I go. One is legacy, the other is progressive. They will co-exist for quite a long time but, in the end, wireless will win out.

[walterick]

in the end, wireless will win out.

The accuracy of this statement may depend on the outcome of longitudinal health studies on the effects of cell phones on the human body, as a new generation of children and their forming minds are subjected to cell phone radiation for the majority of their lives...

[mwfanelli2]

The accuracy of this statement may depend on the outcome of longitudinal health studies on the effects of cell phones on the human body, as a new generation of children and their forming minds are subjected to cell phone radiation for the majority of their lives...

True, but the health effects of cell phones has been hotly debated. Some studies saying "problem" and others saying "no problem." I personally believe that if the problem really existed we'd be seeing signs of the effects by now. But maybe not. Of course, we are only starting to get preliminary long term studies for Lasik eye surgery. That doesn't stop huge numbers of people from getting it done anyway (I use good ol' eyeglasses!).

I look at it in terms of other dangers. Look at the mercury scare going around with CF bulbs. When I was a kid, the dentist would give kids a small vile of pure mercury to take home and play with! As far as I know, I'm not mad as a hatter even though the concentrations dwarf anything seen today. Yep, mercury is extremely dangerous, but is it dangerous enough to yank fillings out of one's head and not use CF bulbs? I drive to work, one of the most dangerous things a person can do. Should I lock myself in my house... with all those harmful indoor pollutants...?

Even if cell phone radiation is dangerous, how dangerous is it in real life? Still an open question but, again, I think we'd be seeing real, rather than imagined, consequences by now.

[mn shutterbug]

Land lines staying up and cell phones not working? That is extremely rare and odd as cell phones are wireless, hard wired telephone lines on poles can go down. I have not yet, even in violent storms and one blizzard, to have my cell phone die. In the blizzard case, a neighbor had to borrow my cell phone as the telephone lines went down (as well as the electrical lines).

Cell phones may be wireless, but see how good of a signal you get if a tower blows down. There are many people in rural areas that are are not within range of a cell tower. They would never dare go 100% wireless. Although there is a tower right in town where I live, I still would never trust wireless totally. About once a year there is a problem with a switch in the tower. Guess what? No service. Although I don't think I could live without my cell phone, landlines are still more reliable.

[mjs1973]

What bothers me is, the people who text while driving.

I saw on the news this week that New Jersey had passed a law making it a primary offence to text while driving. What that means is that Johnny Law can pull someone over just for texting.

[mn shutterbug]

I saw on the news this week that New Jersey had passed a law making it a primary offence to text while driving. What that means is that Johnny Law can pull someone over just for texting.

Great. All states should follow suit. Drivers have enough distractions the way it is.

[mwfanelli2]

Cell phones may be wireless, but see how good of a signal you get if a tower blows down. There are many people in rural areas that are are not within range of a cell tower. They would never dare go 100% wireless. Although there is a tower right in town where I live, I still would never trust wireless totally. About once a year there is a problem with a switch in the tower. Guess what? No service. Although I don't think I could live without my cell phone, landlines are still more reliable.

LOL! Towers falling down? Come on now, if that were even the least bit common people would be in an uproar! Yes, I've been in rural areas in Colorado and Kansas that have no wireless service. Fine, those people are stuck with a land line. But it's a lot cheaper to erect a cell tower than to run tens of miles of telephone cable out to the middle of nowhere and service the switch to serve the area. More and more, at least I believe this will happen, you'll see cell towers going up, not endless miles of copper.

I worked for US West (before Qwest bought them out) many years ago. Switches are a terrible weakness in the system, often overloaded. You have no idea how many times a switch dies and the calls have to be transferred to secondary lines on other switches, if that is even possible. In the Denver area, ESS switches and DMS-100 (I think I remember that right) were constantly being repaired. Land line calls get delayed or dropped more often than people realize. They put it down to having misdialed or not punching in all the numbers.

Here in a semi-rural county in Maryland, Verizon couldn't even get a reliable dial tone to my girlfriend's house. Even when they did, literally less than half the time, the line was so noisy as to be close to useless. Verizon never did find out what was wrong or how to fix the problem. More than half of everyone in her building went wireless by necessity (the others kept on suffering).

Once again, if you like land lines that's fine! Use what you like best, there is no absolute answer. The original statement I replied to was "[I] never saw any purpose for them [cell phones] worth the price." I pointed out that, for me and a growing number of others, "I no longer see any purpose for land lines worth the price." To each his own.

FWIW, most youngsters in my college classes do not know what a greenhouse is. In another decade or so, I bet the notion of a telephone attached to a wire will be treated as quaint history. We will see!

[mn shutterbug]

I've been living in the same house for close to 30 years, and have never had a problem with my landline phone, other than the wiring going bad to one of the extensions. I've had a cell phone for probably 15 years, and have experienced 1 or 2 days a year, when I can't get a signal due to a switch problem or an upgrade. It's that one or 2 days a year when I realize how important it is to have the old wired phone. Neither one of my kids have a landline and there always seems to be a rare occasion when they can't use their cell phone. I still insist that for many people, it's important to have both. There are no guarantees with anything.