Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@usc-eclc) (12/06/83)
TELECOM Digest Tuesday, 6 Dec 1983 Volume 3 : Issue 113
Today's Topics:
Hotel Charges
Porta-with-headset query
One final gripe...
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Date: 5 Dec 1983 0118-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: Hotel Charges
I believe I pointed this out to the readers of the digest about a year
ago:
Last time I stayed in the Disneyland Hotel in Anaheim, they claimed to
be charging the phone company rate +$1. In fact, this was not true,
they were charging significantly more.
I complained to the hotel's Comptroller, who said that he would
contact the company which did their billing system (which simply times
the call beginning some 20 seconds after you finish dialling until you
hang up, regardless of when the called party answers and then computes
some absurd rate, totally unrelated to any telephone company rate) and
get back to me.
He never did, though I called him several times.
If the average guest was overcharged $3/call (as I was and as it
appeared the average was from the other DECUS attendees I talked to)
and the average guest made three calls a week (pretty low, actually)
in a hotel with 1000 rooms, they would be pulling in almost $10,000 a
week in phone overcharges.
Not bad.
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Date: 4 Dec 83 23:03:07 PST (Sunday)
Subject: Porta-with-headset query
From: Bruce Hamilton <Hamilton.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA>
Reply-to: Hamilton.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA
I'm looking for a portable with belt clip and headset, hopefully well
under $100. DAK (sort of like JS&A) is selling one for $99, but it
doesn't have switchable pulse AND tone dialing, or auto redial. I
require (at least) those two features. Thanks for any info. (Why is
ANYBODY making ANY phone that doesn't have switchable pulse AND tone,
given that (a) not everybody wants to pay for (or even has available)
tone, but (b) all the alternate long-distance services REQUIRE tone!?)
Portables: ultimately, you shouldn't even need the hand unit. I can't
think of any good reason why you can't put a calculator-watch style
keypad and associated controls on the earpiece of the headset.
More generally, WHY ARE PHONES SO PRIMITIVE AND EXPENSIVE, compared to
calculators and watches?
WHEN IS THE WORLD GOING TO GET SMART AND DEMAND HEADSETS??? I could
trivially design a head set that could also be used as a handset for
2-second conversations or dyed-in-the-wool antiquarians, and I'm not
even a designer.
It boggles the mind to REALLY stop and think how people accept
primitive, uncomfortable technologies because of "tradition". Like,
why is anyone still buying upright "safety" bicycles, when recumbents
are so much safer, comfortable, and efficient? Because Huffy,
Schwinn, etc. won't get off their collective rumps and try to promote
anything different...
Flamed out for now,
--Bruce
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Date: 4 Dec 83 23:08:22 PST (Sunday)
Subject: One final gripe...
From: Bruce Hamilton <Hamilton.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA>
Reply-to: Hamilton.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA
...and by the way, who are the clowns who designed the GTE flip-phone
series, with NO LETTERS on the keys??? I mean, it's bad enough that
GTE designers seem to be a bunch of elves who build half-width keys
even into their pay-phones, but it really freaks me out that they
don't seem to read, listen to radio, or watch TV, where you're
constantly bombarded with ads that ONLY give phone numbers of the form
"dial 1-800-YOU-JERK" or similar mnemonic cutesiness.
--Bruce
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End of TELECOM Digest
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