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The Swedish Number – Talk with a Random Swede
- coldcode 10y agoI can't image the US ever doing this.
- nxzero 10y agoImagine it quickly being turned off due to abuse.
- hartator 10y agoI've troubled imagining how you can abuse this though.
- balls187 10y ago"Is your refrigerator running?"
- dceddia 10y agoWell yeah, why?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- nxzero 10y ago"Is your refrigerator running?" "Yes." "Well, you’d better go catch it!" (Click.)
- MalcolmDiggs 10y ago"Yes it is, are your doors unlocked?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSxP3sUYjU4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSxP3sUYjU4
- maaku 10y agoNever heard of a prank call?
- return0 10y agoit says "talk about anything". How could you prank that ?
- cmdrfred 10y agoMen furiously masterbating on the other end of the line might ruin the experience for a few people.
- jsmthrowaway 10y agoDepends on the people, doesn't it?
- arethuza 10y agoMaybe do it at the state level? If nothing else it would be good to hear the different accents :-)
- Zikes 10y agoSimilarly, the @Sweden Twitter account is given to a different random Swede every week.
- draugadrotten 10y agoThe abuse of the @Sweden Twitter account is obvious -- just look at the lebanese immigrant Elias Kreidy who wrote “I’m the immigrant fking your daughter while you’re trying to sleep ignoring her moans calling me ‘daddy'”. Now imagine this guy answering a phone line as an ambassador for the country! NSFW article about the tweet: http://www.infowars.com/im-the-immigrant-fking-your-daughter/ http://www.infowars.com/im-the-immigrant-fking-your-daughter...
- andybak 10y agoGot a link to an article by anyone who doesn't think the moon landings are fake or that the US government was behind 9/11 and the Oklahoma City bombing? I've no idea if that article is factual or not but let's not uncritically link to infowars.net, eh? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_(radio_host)#Religious https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_(radio_host)#Religi...
- reitanqild 10y agohttps://mobile.twitter.com/sweden/tweets https://mobile.twitter.com/sweden/tweets Primary source, but I haven't checked what it says.
- zo1 10y agoDon't you think it'd be highly likely that the offending tweets were deleted by the account?
- distances 10y agoThis site seems to be run by a conspiracy theorist [1]. Next time a more reasonable source would probably be in order. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_%28radio_host%29 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_%28radio_host%29
- lpbonenfant 10y agoDo swedes get to opt out of this?
- Zikes 10y agoFrom what I can gather from the FAQ, it's entirely opt-in. Swedes sign up to be cultural ambassadors.
- hartator 10y agoYou have to actually opt in, as an ambassador.
- svantana 10y agoIt's opt in. In a radio segment the other day they said 6k people have volunteered. Which makes it very much non-random, but still, cute concept.
- roywiggins 10y agoprobably a good thing, you wouldn't want most of the calls to be answered by people very unhappy to be cold-called by some random foreigner...
- JshWright 10y agoThe fact that they are volunteers doesn't change the fact that it's random, it just changes the set from which the random values are selected.
- OJFord 10y agoThis was featured on BBC R1 last week - the presenters calling random Swedes via the number looking for a 'Freida'.. it's as bizarre as it sounds.
- TransAm 10y agoDialed 3 times, twice got an answer in - Arabic. 0.87$ in Skype fees well spent...
- interfixus 10y agoSweden today is probably the most arabized country in Europe.
- hk__2 10y agoDo you have some numbers on that?
- interfixus 10y agoYes, and so do you. Sweden actually does have a statistics bureau. And they do make statistics. They just wrap them up real discreet. Native swedes are becoming a minority in Malmø, the third largest city in Sweden, and apparently home turf for one of the Brussels bombers.
- anteht 10y agoPlease provide links to the data and numbers in that case.
- T-A 10y agoOfficial Swedish statistics: http://www.statistikdatabasen.scb.se/pxweb/en/ssd/START__BE__BE0101__BE0101E/UtrikesFoddaTotNK/?rxid=4c1437f3-0ae2-4028-af30-4f6285298f7a http://www.statistikdatabasen.scb.se/pxweb/en/ssd/START__BE_...
- vkou 10y agoMalmö Foreign born persons | Population 102,047 | 322,574 Foreign background | Swedish background 139 240 | 183 334 Seems pretty normal for a cosmopolitan city. Doesn't look like Atilla the Hun is at the gates, either. The equivalent for New York City[1] is: Foreign born persons | Population 3,136,592 | ~8,344,000 [1] http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/nycdata/population-geography/foreign-birthcountry.htm http://www.baruch.cuny.edu/nycdata/population-geography/fore... Toronto [2], on the other hand is ~49% foreign-born. Vancouver is 45%. [2] http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2007/12/05/a_city_of_unmatched_diversity.html http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2007/12/05/a_city_of_unmatch...
- raitom 10y agoCan't wait to see what /b/ will do with that.
- lukas099 10y agoThere were actually postings on 4chan's /pol/ about this. Mostly anons asking Swedes what they thought of Muslim refugees raping women in their country (in the rudest way possible) and Swedes politely denying that claim. Would have been interesting if the anons weren't so hostile; instead it was just aggravating as 4chan always is.
- brobinson 10y agoFrom what I've heard from actual Swedes, any non-leftist opinion (or one that isn't leftist enough) will quickly result in the media turning on you and labeling you as a racist, Islamophobe, etc. It'd make you a social pariah and probably end your career. It's apparently not even kosher to suggest decreasing the number of immigrants coming in each year. I wonder what their responses to that question would be if they weren't afraid of being identified (by their voice, information they provided on the call, etc.).
- maus42 10y agoDo you read Swedish media? I don't say there haven't been a blind spot regarding immigration, but lately the government ministers have acknowledged the current refugee crisis is a problem. Anyway, portraying the whole immigration issue only in terms of a rightist / leftist divide isn't very truthful. Moderaterna are not exactly a leftist party.
- jdmoreira 10y agoI'm not Swedish but I'm living in Sweden. This past weekend, my girlfriend, who is Swedish, wanted to participate in this phone number thing. I told her it was a terrible idea and I had to show her /b/ to convince her.
- 10y ago
- exabrial 10y agoAnyone try this yet? I've always wondered what Swedes think about IKEA in America...
- exabrial 10y agoOk, I'm not sure why I was downvoted for a simple question, but thanks HN! Way to encourage open discussion.
- ape4 10y agoAsk a random Swede.
- nissehulth 10y agoThey probably just think it is fair that the joy of furniture assembly is shared with Americans. :)
- vhab 10y ago
- known 10y agoIngenious; Will also reduce suicides;
- JensRantil 10y agoLet's clear this up once and for all; That Sweden has a high suicide rate is a rumour and not true. Sweden's suicide rate is below the average of the OECD countries. Feel free to read up on it here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_in_Sweden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suicide_in_Sweden
- cel1ne 10y agoOT: i submitted this 3'days ago, I wonder how this got resubmitted.
- Numberwang 10y agoMe too. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11449020 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11449020 :)
- cel1ne 10y agoI thought you can't post the same link twice?
- nadu 10y agoCarl from Sweden who actually received calls, recollects his experience here - https://medium.com/@carlheath/stories-from-the-swedish-number-50ca1a2d11a2#.plh1f75f6 https://medium.com/@carlheath/stories-from-the-swedish-numbe...
- jamesblonde 10y agoLike nearly all other Swedes, you can google 'carl heath' and find a page with his phone number, home address, birthday, and a button 'send him flowers': http://personer.eniro.se/resultat/Carl+Heath http://personer.eniro.se/resultat/Carl+Heath
- alekseypo 10y agohaha yes! I used interflora
- jamesblonde 10y agoOops, just found out he's a colleague :)
- carlheath 10y agoAnd we can also use google to find stories on ourselves too, in Sweden. Havent seen any flowers yet, though. ;)
- cm3 10y agoDid people sign up for this or was it involuntarily and anyone, including those who don't want to be bothered, will get calls?
- yincrash 10y agoPeople sign up. There is also a http://twitter.com/sweden http://twitter.com/sweden that is also run by citizens who sign up (it rotates every week).
- cm3 10y agoHow does that twitter profile switching work technically. Is there actual shadow account support available to Pro Twitter accounts?
- Ambroos 10y ago"Here you go, the password is bfGeAgwRHU5bwMNd." Some technical problems don't need technical solutions.
- alkonaut 10y agoSo there is some kind of 2fa that prevents whover has the account that week from changing the password and email?
- Ambroos 10y agoThey don't just give the account to random people. It's always people with already some kind of social media presence, and stealing an account as well known as @Sweden is not something someone like that would just do.
- captn3m0 10y agotweetdeck (now owned by twitter) officially supports team access to twitter accounts. So you can add someone to the team account and let them tweet using the handle, and revoke the access a week later easily. However, because tweetdeck isn't available on mobile devices, most of these rotated accounts end up using password sharing.
- sheraz 10y agoThere is an American living in Sweden that is answering calls. He's got some interesting perspectives on life in Sweden. Not sure if he is still taking calls or not.
- praptak 10y agoDoes the Swede in question get notified beforehand about the source of the call?
- JensRantil 10y agoNo. They simply get a call where the caller ID is the "Sweden number". However, they can hang up at any time if getting abuse calls.
- lvs 10y agoCisco Web Reputation is blocking this domain for malware.
- kuschku 10y agoAnother case of malware blocking gone wrong. Well, it’s not malware, but if you don’t trust it, you can probably use the archive.org version of the site.
- theworstshill 10y agoWonderful idea. Now I can finally take my lessons on Islam cheaply by phone (calling Sweden is sure cheaper than Saudi Arabia). Do they have any professional privilege checkers on the line? I might need one of those as well.
- dang 10y agoWe've banned this account for repeatedly violating the HN guidelines, despite several warnings and requests to stop.
- mengyalan 10y agoAhh the new SaaS(Swede as a Service).
- clamprecht 10y agoSwede-roulette
- b123400 10y agoI wonder how long will it last until it is filled with junk calls
- jkot 10y agoSkype has something similar back in 2005. You could ring random person and have a chat. I dont understand obsession about Sweden. It is expensive country in decline with high crime. There are better places in Europe.
- ntlve 10y agoAny sources on that?
- jkot 10y agoNo, I tried to find some screenshots, but its 11 years ago. Current skype does not have this feature.
- TorKlingberg 10y agoIt's not the part about Skype that needs sources...
- JensRantil 10y agoSee https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11474253 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11474253.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
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- tma-1 10y agoLived there in 2012 for 6 months. What an amazing country, probably the best place in Europe to have a family. Stockholm is one of the most beautiful and safest capitals in the world.
- 10y ago
- malditojavi 10y agoWe had a similar initiative but with other purpose here in Brussels after the November terrorist attacks on Paris https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/01/09/in-order-to-win-back-tourists-this-european-capital-wants-visitors-to-dial-up-random-locals/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/01/09...
- nodesocket 10y agoHej Hej! I spent 4 months (in the dead of winter) consulting in Stockholm Sweden and it has a special place in my heart. I meet some great people... Some from just posting in reddit /stockholm. Highly recommend visiting, if you can, go during June (end) for midsummer. I was there Dec - March, it was damn cold.
- ioab 10y agoI can only praise the idea and wish it to be an initiative that others follow. It sure helps connect people around the globe.
- VLM 10y agoNobody has mentioned the language issue yet? Unfortunately what I've seen implies they talk in English. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But my son has been taking French language class in school and this provides the obvious extension to their idea of "talk to a random French-speaking person" or whatever other language someone wants to learn. Something like that probably already exists anyway. I suppose there would be the predictable issues with most foreign language learners being minors.
- Drup 10y agoIn practice, all swedes are bilingual english (yes, including young kids).
- ascorbic 10y agoI've visited Sweden quite a few times and have travelled around quite a bit. I didn't meet a single person who couldn't speak English to some extent. I didn't meet a single person under about 50 who wasn't completely fluent.
- 7373737373 10y agoThis reminds me of https://mapc.am/ https://mapc.am/, a browser based variant.
- james-watson 10y agoSweden is the rape capital of Europe, which is likely what the parent is referring to. It is probably due to their extreme xenophillic foreign policy, which believes that all people are Swedes in different shapes and forms. Pathological altruism really is a fascinating mass delusion.
- pepyn 10y agoAlso quite likely, it is due to the fact that Swedish rape law is quite different from many other countries in 2 aspects that have significant effect on statistics: a) Every form of sex without consent is classified as rape, including "too drunk/asleep to say no" and sex within a marriage b) Every incident is recorded separately So if a person is raped 5 times by his/her spouse, this would lead to 5 rapes in the Swedish statistics, as opposed to zero times (b/c within marriage) or 1 time (b/c same offender and victim) in many other places. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_Sweden https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_in_Sweden
- dang 10y agoWe detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11474210 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11474210 and marked it off-topic.
- trondeh80 10y agoI am from Norway, and decided to call. Ended up talking 30 mins with an extremely nice lady in the south of sweden. 10/10 would recommend - Swedes are awesome
- GBond 10y agoInteresting but not surprising website. I visited Stockholm for the first time recently and I was impressed with the usage of tech to increase everyday efficiencies. Things like: app for the rail station tickets/yellow cabs/buses, electric/hybrid vehicles commonplace, free wifi in abundance...
- return0 10y agoLow tech chatroulette.
- vit05 10y agoI'm working on an application, submitted to fellowship, that will allow people to confess about something and others will be able to comment on this confession. This topic makes clear that I need really good, and fast, moderation tools
- osfa 10y agohttps://vimeo.com/162594920 https://vimeo.com/162594920 though
- sneak 10y agoReminder: A trumped-up Swedish arrest warrant is the reason that Julian Assange has been trapped for years inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London and denied his right to asylum... all for journalism that made the US government look bad. Don't travel to Sweden. Don't support the Swedish government in any way. They are cooperating in a large-scale effort to censor the types of things you can read about in the newspaper.
- tilt_error 10y agoThe prime minister answering the call :) http://youtu.be/S087OHdCG8I http://youtu.be/S087OHdCG8I
- carlheath 10y agoWatch the Swedish Prime Minister answer The Swedish Number. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S087OHdCG8I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S087OHdCG8I