Landline and TV cord cuttin' ...

[DominicB]

I never could have imagined I would be thinking this, but I am.  It looks like everyone dropped their landlines in the last five years in huge numbers, and now I'm going to be left holding the bag.

Now, cord cutters are cutting cable TV.  They ruined the music business.  Is Rogers their next target?  Eventually all that will be left is internet and cellular.  Notice how quiet the home phone board is.  I heard that almost 50,000 landlines are disconnected every month?

Millennials must have issues.  They are actually AFRAID to use the phone.  They TEXT.  They say a phone call is INVASIVE, INTRUSIVE.  They're afraid of the spontaneity of it.  Well, if you call someone, they can always say, "I'm busy now, can I call you back?"  Or, "can you call me back in 1/2 hour?".  How do they communicate with businesses?  They would rather stream than own the DVD or Blu-Ray that's tangible.  Same with music.  Does not compute.  Are they that broke?

Why TEXT?  It's more work than just talking.  I'm 47 and I keep up, but I don't get this.  These younger ones are socially inept somehow, but narcissistic -- broadcasting their lives on Facebook.  Like, who cares you're in restaurant x eating y at time z.

What's the point in having Rogers Home Phone when 20 years ago, landlines had way more features on them?  I still had a rotary Contempra phone.  That won't work.  We used to have voice dialing on landlines ... gone.  Call Waiting Options ... gone.  Call Intercept ... gone.  Verbal announce so you knew who was calling without looking at the screen.  My cell can't do that 20 years later.

All that stuff I was given is now going to wind up in the trash.  What a sin.  I saw a Galaxy S8+ and I said, holy cow, a cell phone where the mic reaches my mouth and doesn't sit on my cheek.  $1,100! ... for a phone!  It was nice though, although I don't think I could sit down with that in my pocket.

This is nuts.  No wonder cell plans are so expensive if that cost has to be spread out over 2 years.  Non-removable batteries.  Oops, need a new phone!  If we had to pay a grand for a new landline phone every two years, well ... nobody would do it.  They'd think you were nuts.  

I got this cool phone that can deliver a different greeting to callers based on their caller ID.  So, if I know people who bug me, I can record a greeting like "Get Lost" and the phone will hang up and not take a message (ANNC ONLY).  That phone is 20 years old!

Or, my PBX that can take a telemarketer's call and without him or her knowing it, route them outward on Line 2 to the CRTC's main phone #.  The satisfaction you get from that is incalculable.

Ah, I just gave myself an idea.  Since the CRTC loves VoIP so much and sees it as equivalent (to talking under water), I'm going to send all the telemarketers to their switchboard and present them with their own number as caller ID, since they don't get it that VoIP caller ID is easily spoofable.

Text to 911.  I guess they never called 911.  You'd be too panicked.  It's not a leisure call ya know.  Or sending video to 911 dispatchers.  Work on locating the person first gentlemen, which you can't do unless you put antennas everywhere.  Are their technical advisors asleep?

It's too bad DMS isn't around anymore.  Random Make Busy on a phone line (ie. theirs) would be very nice.

[RogersZia]

Hi @DominicB,

You're right, there's definitely been a significant transition away from TV and Home Phone's traditional usage. I would say the usage directly co relates to needs and viewing habits. 

I'm sure many in the Community would agree with you and many might have an opposite view.

Thank you for the insight and keeping the Community a pleasant place to be.

RogersZia

[DominicB]

I kid around a lot.  I don't think a lot of people realize that it's not a good idea to call 911 from a cell when you're home because the Automatic Location Identification system on wireline doesn't exist on wireless.  They can get your GPS but that can't pinpoint your exact location unless three cell towers can triangulate on you also, or a comparison is done against the coordinates of your billing address.  They just don't do it.  If you're 9 floors up, good luck.  

That's why I tell people, keep your Rogers landline.  Don't cut your cable.  Let's face it -- there was no reason an Android landline phone couldn't have been built with a large screen.  Sometimes you don't want to be accessible.  If you have one cell and it dies, you can't even find a payphone to call and report it.

Streaming video puts an incredible load on the internet that simply was not designed for it.  I just think we're heading in the wrong direction.

Long distance went to 0, but cellular data is highway robbery, wore than the $5/min Sunday rates for calls to Mars in the 1970s.

[Meowmix]

Hello @Domenic10

As much as i want to agree with you, I will also disagree. My parents have had a home phone service for well over 25 years. (I am 27 btw). We are getting tired of getting 5-10 calls a day about duck cleaning and calls that are either trash or waste of time. At this point as a family we have decided to cancel our home phone service as we all communicate via phone or text on our cell phones. The hospital for my father calls his cellphone or my mother's if needed ( cartioligisted). What's the point of having a home phone service when our cellphones do the exact same thing and more. I rather not get repeated harassment calls about duck cleaning services and calls which are about telemarketing and waste of time. I remember when I was a kid I would hog the phone at home to talk and never once did we get those duck cleaning calls like we do today. Also remember, if you have a cellphone, many do not want a home phone as that's a extra charge which isn't needed.

Cable TV? Thats another story. If you are paying well over for unlimited high speed internet, might as well watch streaming shows. Why? Because you get to see many different shows / movies you do not see on regular cable tv. On cable tv I have seen the same old shows repeated countless times to which I rather cut cable and just stream. My parents have cable due to watching the Greek Channel and I have cable with them because of the 4K terminals and 4K channels ( big fan of 4K with Rogers).. To be honest if I am not watching CP24 or the 4K channels, I am either on Kodi or Netflix on my Sony Android TV. I get to watch more and newer shows that are exclusive to Netflix which u won't see on cable tv. It seems in order to keeping cable tv, they either need to give more channels and lower the pricing or something as the pricing is also a factor in this. I rather not pay $100+ for cable and a box if I will be watching the same old shoes or movies. The reason some get cable is for the sports channels and they get ripped off to be honest. My parents pay $150 for cable. VIP Package ( grandfathered plan which is $79), WWE Channel, 3 Greek channels, 4K PVR box for my self and another channel I believe. Add the digital fee and other taxes and boom. It's expensive and many rather pay a small fee to watch everything on Kodi or Netflix like my self ( I cut my own cable when I moved our from my own place before coming back to my parents home.) if you have a home phone service, high speed internet ( unlimited), cable and a cellphone, the bill will rank up and remember now its not cheap to my groceries or pay bills. It's expensive.

Again this is different for everyone but not everyone likes getting duck cleaning harassment calls which you can't flag every hour or watch the same old shoes countless times without wanting to shut your tv off. Lol.

[DominicB]

I don't have the exact stats but I can tell you lots of people died because what often happens is you'll have a stroke, dial 911, and start slurring your words and can't clearly speak your address.  If you're inside a tall building, and not near a window, they won't get your GPS.  If you're alone, the party is over.

Or, you might pass out before you can tell them.  Happened to me.  A wireline will flash your address on their screen right away.  With us, the call is routed over dedicated circuits to 911.  They can seize your circuit and hold it.  Even if you hang up, they're still there.  If you drop the phone and pass out, they can send receiver off hook treatment in an attempt to alert somebody nearby who might hear.  That's that loud on/off buzz that can wake the dead when you leave your phone off the hook.  On some phones, we had AAB, where not only could 911 call you back, but the phone would answer by itself and go on speakerphone.  I asked for that and was told where to go by a certain company that rhymes with "Yell".

Saving the cost of a landline cost some people their life.  Ask them if it was worth it.  Cellular has saved countless lives where landlines wouldn't have been accessible even when they and payphones were everywhere in the 1990s.  On the road.  They are invaluable.  Both have their place.  But an Android phone is a Google surveillance device.  Do you know how much they gather and track?

Both wireline and wireless complement each other.  We had simring -- meaning they both rang on one number, and you could answer on either, which we did for a while before GSM.  While they say the risk is zero and the numbers show that, I'm not convinced.  The frequencies are high, and using a cell all the time could have biological effects -- not cancer, but changes in the blood-brain barrier for example.

There are still unknown risks from long term cell use which we still don't know.  The risk is very small, but not zero.  Some people could be susceptible.  It's also altered communication in a bad way (texting).  Psychiatrists will tell you this.

As for cable TV, do what you want.  Most of the programming is junk and the prices are kinda high, but there's not much you can get off the air.  If you start cutting the cord on cable, that cost will shift to higher internet rates, because without that revenue, a company like Rogers could find themselves in financial trouble.  That was their core business.  I doubt they have many Home Phone subscribers.  They have the edge on internet because Bell can't roll out fiber everywhere.  It's too expensive.  I heard $2500 a home.

Using a cell, for me, is uncomfortable.  I prefer a desk phone at home, and a cell when I'm out (as a safety device).  Cells can't have extensions.  I don't like carrying it with me all the time when I'm home, and I prefer to talk to people, not send mini telegrams.

When I got an invitation to Christmas by TEXT, I was actually offended.  How impersonal can you get?  But to them, it was normal.  Now, with these silly Arris modems, none of my stuff will work -- it looks for a wink which they don't do and they don't put out enough juice to ring certain phones.  They don't fake a landline well enough to fool the phone -- not the ones Northern Tel. made.  They were fussy buggers.  I want what I had, and I like cell phones, but don't take away what I had, which was better.

Who's Calling would take care of your duct cleaners.  DMS would answer and say, "Please identify yourself".  Then it would put the duct cleaner on hold and call you, play back their recording and then say, press 1 to accept, 2 to boot, 3 to forward to VM, and 4 to permanently block.  *11 -- I wish Rogers had that.

I like Rogers, a lot, but they don't even know what Disconnect Supervision is -- and neither does Bell anymore.  I had FIBE.  I actually had a fiberoptic cable running into my house.  That could carry 10,000 phone calls simultaneously.  I needed THREE to test a PBX -- they could only provide 2.  It was VoIP.  Is this VoIP?  No.  What is it then?  Fiber.  Just fiber.  Metamucil or circuit-switched?

People say I sound funny on it.  When I was downtown in a condo, we were Rogers only.  Rogers Home Phone was so bad, it sounded like my friend was gargling mouthwash and trying to talk at the same time when I called him.  Now Bell uses the same kind of packet technology.  Sometimes, it would sound like a tape recording sped up, and there's always a hiss.  Calls would drop ... on a landline?  Never saw that in 30 years.

When the installer put it in, and I said, hmm, the red light didn't come on when the phone rang.  Do you mind if I plug something in.  Not at all he says.  Mr. Bell, you're 50 volts short.  This thing is shooting out 40v.  Standard is 90.  Rogers does 65 I think.  Still not enough.  Once I plugged a $500 phone into Bell VoIP and the display read "TELL ME A STORY MOMMY".  It would get confused.  A friend of mine had two of those on Rogers and he fried both of them with a ring booster.  $1000 ... down the drain.  Ouch.

VoIP ... forget it.  Not reliable enough.

Now Bell can't do fiber and compete against Rogers.  Rogers has a nice fat coaxial cable.  To run fiber everywhere, well, it ain't gonna happen.  Fios failed, and Google Fiber is slowing down.  Millennials want gigawatts of gigabytes.  It's almost like a status symbol.  Are you running a data center that you need that much?  Kinda funny.  At first they're showing off the speed tests and everyone's going "oooooh and aaaaahhh".  After 3 days, nobody cares.  One guy downloaded 18 terabytes off them -- that's 18,000 GIG, in one month!  I was laughing so hard I couldn't stop.  He must have downloaded the Library of Congress or something.

Finally, if I said to my professors in university when I was learning internet protocol in its gory details and I said that IPTV was better than the way Rogers delivers TV, they'd have kicked my face in.  I won't go into the gory details as to why, but IP is bad at streaming unless you throw a big pipe at it because there's a lot of overhead.  It's dumb, and service providers are cannibalizing their own services by offering higher speeds and making it possible to stream video like that.

VoIP is trash and always will be -- it's like taking a shower and hoping nobody will flush the toilet until you're done.  I've never seen any implementation of it where there was enough bandwidth (or water pressure) to not notice.  Got burned so many times I just said, "It's okay, I'll just send smoke signals from my roof".  This wasn't with Rogers.

I did get Rogers wireless home phone, and the busy signal ... what is THAT?  Nortel phone displays, "Martian busy signal detected.  Press Y or 9 to confirm".

[DominicB]

@Meowmix  I understand what you're saying.  There are lots of OTA channels in the US I wish I could get and some people stream them out and people in Canada get them via Kodi, but it's kinda illegal or in legal gray zone.  They're paying for a bootleg stream, or using a VPN.  I get it.  You're paying for all these channels and you only watch a few.  That's because the programming sucks.  If there's stuff I like, I would just buy it on DVD or Blu Ray, and it's mine, forever.  My favorite movies, shows, etc.  TV got boring for me because all the new shows were the same, so I kinda watch the shows I grew up with.

I'm saying that streaming and using IP for TV and phone is a bad way of transmitting it -- it's like washing your colors with your whites, and it overloads the frequencies on the cable dedicated for internet while the portion reserved for video is there and fewer people are looking at it ... and that's going to waste.  The content on cable TV has to change, but people make a living off this .  A lot of stations will go under.  Look at what happened to the music business.  To survive they have to tour, because record sales are 0.

But paying 1,000 a new cell every year or two years is OK.  Cable used to be about $40/month, and phone was $30 -- total of $70.  Then comes internet and cell -- that could be an extra $175 right there.

If I wanna watch CNN live, I can't get it of the air, I can't stream it, how am I gonna get it?  Now, millennials want that data off cell towers.  That won't come cheap.

There used to be a joke on the Flintstones that in the future there would only be one channel playing one show 24 hours a day 7 days a week.

[Pauly]

Here is my take on it, I agree Land Line (PSTN) home phone is indeed declining in record numbers.

However, Everything has to balance itself out and for that to happen you can ask anyone around you, when they cancel their landline service, they normally switch to a different service, so in the case of some people I know, they cancelled their landline but they either SIGNED UP for a NEW cellular service to REPLACE their landline, OR, if they had existing Cellular service, they CHANGED their package to accommodate their calling patterns that they would normally use for their landline, for example, my dad makes long distance/international calling on the household landline phone and if he cancels his landline, he would have to modify his CURRENT cellular package and add a comparable long distance calling option.

Usually when people cancel their land line home phone, they don't really save anything because the majority of people, especially millennials are paying monthly cellular phone bills in excess of $120 dollars per month.  Someone like my parents are paying $20-40 per month on cellphone bills so they tend to see some kind of savings, or if anything not really savings they are just moving the money they normally pay for their landline to their wireless bill.

As for TV, don't believe everything you hear about how great cord cutting is. I know LOTS of people who cut the cord for months and years, and they "Claim" they are happy and all, but when ever they come over and I put on a show or news they start to sobber and say "OMG I miss that show, I don't get it any more ever since I cancelled and switched to NetFlicks" and that's where I tell them Netflix is NICE but there will always be someTV shows you have watched that will NEVER be available on any other platform such as net flicks etc and that is the thing that Netflix and other streaming tv providers will NEVER tell you.

[BS]

An intriguing discussion, may I relabel it as "the way we were".  The reality is whether it is better or not, whether there are the risks of the 911 call or not, whether you cut the cable, go IPTV, or digital antenna, or disks, the reality is the old models are almost completely dead and I don't see them coming back.  Too much invested in the new models.

I do agree that the big push by the providers for more and more internet is due to IPTV - it does have large overhead, and in neighbourhoods like my own, there has been low acquisition of Bell's IPTV model, but it is slowly growing, in particular replacing the satellite dishes in the area.  If I look at the mushroom for Rogers on my lawn when it is unlocked, I find that only 1/2 of the outlets are in use going to 4 houses.  The others had satellites.

As long as there were only a few connections in the area coming onto Bell Fibe IPTV, both because of the low speed they started with at 25 Mbs, but as they added more, they have moved to putting new junction boxes in that is allowing them to provide up to 150 in our area now as they put each new box in (big, brown ones).  I heard two messages when I contacted Bell - one people wanted more speed - true, and two, they need more speed as more people come on line - surprise, they have the same issue of sharing as Rogers and now that more are coming on, they need to provide more speed - so they are going another route - new technology to boost capability on copper, coming down from the Fibe switch at the end of the street for the area (theoretically - don't know the costs - copper can push up to 1GB with changes in between the fibre and the house. In other areas, they are running fibre off the poles into homes, replacing the copper line).

So all an interesting subject, but I think you are not of the norm of users - PBX testing in your home - I get it why you are thinking Nortel switches, and Nortel phones, but the reality is that most people have their phones cheap as they can get them, made in China and probably wireless.

So in the same way as when I was coding, I hated when they put graphical GUI's for simplifying the building of code modules, I wanted my old text box and let me type my loops, what if's, etc as it was faster for me to just type.  My daughter is 30 and she still programs in a shell, and when a new software build comes out that others have done with their GUI tools, she opens up a shell and looks at the code line by line and asks them, so what was this supposed to achieve - won't work, she rewrites it and educates them that one module is not always one size fits all.

You, I and others have too much knowledge and can debunk the marketed benefits - I don't look to millenials (what ever they are - I always think of people as people, not defined groups), as the issue, I look to technology and providers trying to squeeze every penny out of us as possible, and if a technology isn't being taken on, or not making them enough money, they dump it.

So for me, I say, time to move on and figure out what I can pay for and I have to worry about 911, but when it comes time, I will have a medic alert button for when I fall or can't talk - it is a real issue for me, and I know the limitations of the Rogers home phone model and VOIP and cell.  And the other reality is I am never alone anymore for that very reason.

So great discussion, but like I said, "the way it was", and I just try to figure out what I need, versus like to have, versus what I can afford and have to give up - meds with no drug plan trumps cable and feature sets everyday for me.

Bruce

[DominicB]

@BS  And people died because of it.

I just wanted to make sure people knew the consequences of their actions just to save $30 a month.  Perhaps some day GPS and cellular triangulation will be able to locate someone with pinpoint accuracy.  I had suggested that cell phones emit an emergency beacon to help paramedics home in when they get to your general area, as GPS can locate you to about a few hundred feet.  The system is driven solely by profit now.

I was told an estimated 10,000 people died last year because they called 911 from a cell, and help arrived later than it would have if wireline had been used.  70% of all calls 911 get are from cells now.  The number of pocket misdials they get clog the system.  That's why we created the 911 misdial prevention feature.

I can't recommend that anyone use the FTTH service provided by a certain competitor, because it is "fiber on the cheap".  Systems that use DWDM are superior if each subscriber gets his own wavelength.  That results in a symmetric service, but is expensive and requires equipment with tunable lasers.  That's what we wanted, and a certain ILEC that rhymes with "well" extended their middle finger in response to such a proposal.  That was in 2001.

Rogers and that other ILEC are highly asymmetric at gigabit.   It's the upload speed that tells you how much pipe there really is.  The systems are overbooked like flights because not everyone is on at the same time flooring it, but it can happen.

OTA does not use IP and never will.  Sanity prevails.  Why is this happening?  Because service providers are easily bamboozled by vendors, and so is the public.  Northern had to tell the other one what to buy.

Rogers may go that route to create one bucket along the wire and eliminate frequency division multiplexing.  That's what FTTH GPON is -- bandwidth that is not dedicated to you and which is usable by others when you're not using it.  It's a party line.  Welcome to the 1950s.

I always say, God did not create TCP/IP or UDP/IP.  A few eggheads who were hatched, not born, did back in the early 80s.  The whole internet is a hack job of retrofits.  Look at ipv6.  Where is it?  And, how cryptic can you get?

I'm not saying NT were a bunch of latter day Einsteins, but they'd throw rotten tomatoes and watermelon rinds at ipv6.  Talk about overkill.  It is a 32 digit hex address that translates to:

340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 possible addresses.  How do you say that?

340- undecillion
282- decillion
366- nonillion
920- octillion
938- septillion
463- sextillion
463- quintillion
374- quadrillion
607- trillion
431- billion
768- million
211- thousand
and 456

Don't forget the 456.

The IP community is in dire need of psychiatric treatment.  Next week's lotto jackpot is estimated at 100 decillion dollars.  Buy your tickets now.

[BS]

Yes, I know people have died, but reality as you have presented it, can we get full 911 identification from any service provider.  How do we know if we have a traditional POTS copper connection with full 911 identification.

Of is it a reality that we now live with.

My health is such that the issue of 911 is important to me - I won't go into all my health issues and disabilities that could require me to call 911 in response to an episode of health, but the reality is that it is there.

I appreciate your educating us, but I will be honest, you have filled your descriptions with so much technical information, that I am lost.

Simple question - what type of service provides 911 an open line connection that allows them to know the exact street address, or even say the exact floor of a high rise as you suggested in an earlier post.

I know the limitations of VOIP and also the new mandates that CRTC has put in place,  but can you be of assistance as to what we can expect if I cannot talk (this is a possibility, I cannot type, and I also don't have the cognitive ability at the time to follow instructions, such as push 4 for yes, 5 for now, tap on the phone, etc.  If others know of how to deal with this and other types of scenarios, please let me know.

At this time, the reality is my options are as follows - I am home most of time, and my Rogers home phone is registered and if I dial 911, and I can't talk, they will come to my registered address.  If in a car, it is always with someone, as I cannot drive, so they will handle the call, or they will have to work from GPS and cell phone triangulation.  I keep these turned on at all times.

If I am out for a walk, I take my phone, but I tell people my walking path.

So, as you can see, I have planned out as many options as possible, and the bottom line is I have the services I have, and my support services, and family and emergency contacts know my safety and emergency plans.

The only exception that I haven't dealt with setting up is I do fall at times, and fortunately  to date, I have not had a full concussion, or stroke (but I have been sent to hospital for follow-up - the EMS has my details on file, along with Medic Alert. but I should probably consider one of those alerts with fall detection as a next step.

I and I am sure others appreciate hearing the limitations - many never think about emergencies, I have no choice and your notes have made me thing about how best to deal with all these changes in 911 and technology.  Before cell phones, if in an accident, I had to rely on a good samaritan, a police officer, a call to 911 from someone's home and so forth.

I know the CRTC is constantly working with the providers to improve the response systems, and at the moment, that is the best I can ask for.

I can't afford a Bell copper connected land line at the rates they are charging these days, and I refuse to purchase their services, as I am downgrading all services to minimal or none.

Oh yeh, my neighbours all know me and check on me regularly, as I do them.

This thread has certainly been wandering all over the place, but certainly important things to consider.  Thanks, Bruce

[BS]

@DominicB  You have lost me completely on most of this - you are into much too much technical detail, and I have a pretty high degree of technical knowledge in many areas, but switching protocols, different models of Fibre versus copper, are way too beyond me - I was a buyer and managed staff who did the work, so I just needed the basic.

This level of technical knowledge and terms has my head spinning, but don't bother explaining - not interested.

For me, I have got my needs from the discussion - thought about changing up my safety plans related to emergency supports, and how I respond when in need and technologies.  Since I am cutting costs so far, it makes sense to think about what is best for my safety - it is like I said today on a call about cell phones - gee, the plan is now 30.00 more than two days ago, but life got in the way, and "woopee", I get 1GB free data (when I never use data anyway and have never had it on my plans), in my world, 30.00 pays for 1/2 my medications as I have no health benefits at this time - so when framing any of these services now, I just say, this is what I can afford, what is the bare minimum I can afford, so low end Cell (they almost had me switched up to a good deal on data, but they lost me now that the deal is not there)  - so I dump shared plans and go individual, or elsewhere, and pick up low end phones on no tab when I need to relace.

So the discussion, excluding all the technical, has allowed me to consider my needs, prices, the bottom line of living on far less money, and what do I need for safety and to live comfortably, and still have some enjoyment.

It has provided me a slightly different framework for assessing where to go next, that I hadn't considered before - but I still don't know how to best cover a 911 given the reality of where our current phone system model has gone.

Thanks, Bruce

[DominicB]

Bruce, both Rogers and Bell will convey your address on their wireline services, so you needn't worry.

The difference is backup battery.  Rogers fails here, I'm afraid.  DMS can run for 24 hours on battery and then for days on generator power.  During Katrina, DMS ran for 5 days.  If a medical emergency occurs during an extended outage like that ice storm that knocked out power for a week, you would be at increased risk.  The FCC in the US requires 24 hours of backup.  Neither Bell nor Rogers is anywhere near that on packet based services -- 4 -5 hours if you're lucky and the battery is fresh.

Line seizure ... Rogers is VoPI (voice over private internet).  There is no actual circuit.  Without a p-phone (Centrex) or a Nortel Unistim phone behind a PBX, capabilities are limited.  If I dial 911 from a Nortel IP phone, all other functions on that phone are DISABLED by the phone itself.

When you dial 911 from a copper wireline into a DMS-100 using a corded analog phone, your telephone wire goes all the way back to the central office as analog.  It is private.  It is not shared with anyone else.  Rogers is a shared infrastructure and there is no resource locked for your call.  Your signal is digitized on traditional wireline as it enters the switch and is routed to a dedicated trunk to the 911 dispatch center that serves your area.  Your telephone number is received by them as Automatic Number Identification.  This is not the Caller ID you see.  That number calls a database which pulls up your address.

911 was "bestowed" with special capabilities to hold your line open for example -- the connection simply cannot drop.  You and that dispatcher are in a circuit.  They control your line until help arrives.  Packet cable can't do this.

If you were unable to dial 911, and had voice dialing, a special NFA trunk would attach to your line and listen.  If you say help and had recorded that earlier as 911, a special intelligent peripheral device would convert your speech to the digits 9 1 1 and send those back to DMS.  DMS would then dial on your behalf as if you had pressed the buttons yourself.

These feature were designed to protect the public by engineers who were very passionate.  They were not legislated to do this.  The company felt that a landline was a lifeline.  The machine was designed for 99.999% uptime.  Is your RHP up 99.999% of the time? -- that means it is down no more than 5 minutes per year.

5E-XC achieved 99.9999% uptime -- it was down less than 1 minute per year.  5E was designed by Lucent in the United States.

[BS]

Thank you, that is all helpful - I have my phone ATA, router and all other electrical equipment tied into a central surge protection system, and a 48 hour UPS - I have to replace the batteries once every few years and do test it.

Will that make up for the deficiency.

The idea of the peripheral for dialing 911 is a good one, I will pursue that and I will also check with my local MS society, stroke society for suggestions.  I don't have MS, but I do have seizure like events that prevent my ability to speak or dial, but a programmed panic button, and fall detector could handle that for me.

I appreciate the options for alternatives for my challenges - may I never have to deal with it, but better to be prepared.  The challenges of chronic illness and aging.  We never know when our functioning can suddenly become limited.

I appreciate hearing that there are now built i limitations to the new technologies that were handled well under older technology.  Hopefully, kind generous engineers like you mentioned will come up with solutions.

In general, I don't count on companies to do the accommodations for my limitations, I often have quote AODA legislation, and even my nephew confined to a wheel chair and needing safe grab bars in washrooms, he has to advocate for his rights.  Some places do it because they care - my daugher's wedding location for next year, when asked about the small dip from the building to the patio said they didn't even think that one through and are not just going to put a ramp in, but are bringing an engineer in and do it permanently and fully safely and asked for my nephew and daughter to look at how well it meets their needs.

Other places, you have to fight them tooth and nail.  Imagine a neurologist who has an office on the second floor, no elevator - the last person you would think you had to file a claim about accomodations to - he is being literally forced to move to a new building - you would think a neurologist would have known better, but people just don't think.

That is my rant on accommodations - I have to say I had a CSR do a great job of understanding my concentration and memory issues and worked very well with me today after I described how he had to slow down, repeat so I could type, and I had to read back and him confirm.

Thanks Bruce 

[gary1953]

All I know is I miss the good old days. OTA TV, real phones, Leafs winning the cup lol   and big business content with REASONABLE PROFIT!

[LordDrakkon]

Over-the-Air TV still exists. If you live within 60 miles of the US border, you can get OTA TV that has better picture and audio quality than heavily compressed cable. The Leafs haven't won a cup in my lifetime and probably never will. 😛 Corporate greed has always exusted.
It has just gotten more greedy with time. Dumbphones still exist, although they are harder to find in Canada. Why anyone would want to only have a phone that works in their home makes no sense to me.