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I'm already there wanting to stop using phone numbers. So. Much. There. I haven't had a "land line" in multiple-decades. My short list of "the next thing" re
by sj4nz 7y ago
I'm already there wanting to stop using phone numbers. So. Much. There.
I haven't had a "land line" in multiple-decades. My short list of "the next thing" requires:
- Ability to install on a mobile device without any connection to a "phone number." Phone numbers in my mind are dead.
- Skip the synchronous social convention of calling. Everything should be async by default. You don't ever cause someone's device to interrupt them. This is already culturally "accepted" with SMS. Unopened messages are deleted after some number of days.
- With permission, these asynchronous messages should be forwardable. You give permission in advance of course, and then you can avoid having to repeat yourself again and again.
- TMDA style whitelisting for unknown public keys wishing for contact. Addresses need some kind of seniority (older than 30-days) and some reasonable integration into the network at large (vouching connections between other people with "skin in the game", akin to a shared reputation--If I could remember the name of that early social network that tried to do this, avogato.org? Something like that.)
- Mesh networking forever. Decentralize it all.
This is not something that I think can be a "startup," because this needs to be a protocol, not tied to any firm. If anyone's software works with the protocol, then let the "best installable" win. The closest thing to this right now is Scuttlebutt protocol and if someone could re-introduce contact sharing via "bumping" (using the accelerometer and GPS location and time together) devices together to exchange public keys, that particular bit of UX could go a long way to making it easier to adopt. However, the worst part of Scuttlebutt's capabilities has been the storage consumption for very popular identities that often consumes all the available memory on smaller devices. It needs data-storage hygenics--some way for the end-user to state what kind of data they want to keep and what they wish to ignore.
- droithomme 7y ago> I haven't had a "land line" in multiple-decades. I'd love to have a land line but it completely stopped working decades ago. After deregulation, no one was responsible. Countless attempts to get anyone to fix it were in vain. This year I saw a thick line completely knocked down by a fallen tree. I called the power company. They said it was a telephone line not a power line. And that there wasn't anyone left for them to contact to get it fixed. Asking around I found it actually didn't matter. No one was actually using it. No one has land lines any more. The technology is obsolete, irrelevant, and should be removed.
- syshum 7y agoThe technology is also more reliable than modern wireless I remember many times where everything else was out of service except the good old POTS line...
- droithomme 7y agoThat's great for you in whatever treeless desert area you live in. It's not the case for many others of us and it's kinda pretentious that you know oh so much better.
- usrusr 7y agoIt's funny how some regions insist on not burying their communication lines. Or maybe funny how others insist on burying. Because like so many things it's a tradeoff, what you win in reliability nines you loose in bandwidth trailing zeros. Upgrading underground infrastructure is so damn expensive.
- jjeaff 7y agoI grew up in a very wooded area myself. And it was also my experience that when the electricity was out, the phone lines would still tend to work.
- Aloha 7y agoUntil I moved to my current locale, I had pretty reliable landline service from century link and frontier, I've not tried to order a land line from AT&T yet, but it's theoretically possible.
- BenjiWiebe 7y agoI live in Central Kansas. In our house there's next to no cell service. We could switch providers, but then we'd be in a dead area every time we drove a few miles. No carrier has good coverage in our area. Without a landline we would even have trouble calling 911. Thankfully POTS is still alive here at least.