6 ms·

PhilTel is looking to install free payphones in Philadelphia

92 points by colinprince 4y ago

Scoundreller 4y ago
What are they using as their VoIP provider? Anything cheaper than voip.ms ?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
bagels 4y ago
The page doesn't say why they want to do this. Payphones died a death of natural causes. My best guess is nostalgia? It can't be to build a business out of it, can it?
- TeaBrain 4y ago
  Their "payphones" are described as free to use. "Payphone" was probably just used as the moniker due to the association that "payphone" has as an installed public telephone.
  - Aloha 4y ago
    Public Telephone is a better word. Though the death of the pay station was accelerated by the drug crisis, a reduction in pay stations lead to an acceleration in mobile phone adoption here in the states.
    - xattt 4y ago
      What is a pay station?
      - Aloha 4y ago
        a telephone, generally in a public place, where you deposit payment for phone calls, usually in the form of coins.
        xattt 4y ago
        So a pay phone? I took it to be some sort of transaction place.
- culi 4y ago
  There's plenty of reasons you might want something like this. They can play an important role in public safety Also just general accessibility. Houseless people exist and every business is increasingly hostile towards letting them charge their phones. Most people who haven't had to experience houselessness aren't aware about this but next time you go to some bougie upscale shopping district try to acknowledge how many outdoor, easily accessible outlets there are. Now do the same thing in some inner city/poorer area or anywhere with a decent amount of houseless folks Or they're gonna find away to put ads in the service lol
  - b112 4y ago
    Why is everyone suddenly calling homeless, houseless? It's homeless people, not houseless. If there is some bizarre attempt to reframe things, fine, but what does owning a house have to do with anything? A condo is not a house. An apartment is not a house. So it is: (house|apartment|townome|condo|cabin)lessness?? A home is any of the above. A house is not.
    - culi 4y ago
      idk who "everyone" is. Maybe you came across another comment of mine where I also used the term houseless I use it because of a conversation I had with someone who is houseless. She didn't like being called "homeless" because the city she was sleeping in WAS her "home". She grew up there. Her parents grew up there. She went to school, knew the community there, etc. Eventually due to gentrification she couldn't afford to live in a house anymore. When the term "homeless" is used I think it often has the effect of painting those who are labelled it as not part of the community. Indeed an off-duty cop later harassed us after the talk w her and some other houseless folk and told me "we don't want them in our community". The cop had an out-of-state license plate... Whether it's a house or an apartment, the point imo is to draw attention to how our definitions of who does and doesn't have the right to claim membership of a community has been degraded to purely material means. This person who's not even from this state gets to say he doesn't want HER in "our community"
      - b112 4y ago
- fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
  It sounds like a public art installation. If a company is doing that with branding, it’s kind of advertising.
- newaccount74 4y ago
  They say they are inspired by futel.net, who have a detailed about page on their website. The first sentence explains the motivation succintly: > At Futel, we believe in the preservation of public telephone hardware as a means of providing access to the agora for everybody, and toward that goal we are privileged to provide free telephone calls, voicemail, and telephone-mediated services.
janci 4y ago
Free payphone is a nice oxymoron.
- quickthrower2 4y ago
  Like a tethered mobile?
lioeters 4y ago
It's a fascinating project, a labor of love and good old hackery, with roots in the phone "phreaking" subculture. In addition to free calls, they have some creative ideas for the payphones, such as connecting strangers. Pay Phones Are Coming Back in Philadelphia Thanks to Linux - https://www.makeuseof.com/payphones-are-coming-back-in-philadelphia-thanks-to-linux/ https://www.makeuseof.com/payphones-are-coming-back-in-phila... How open source is revitalizing the payphone - https://opensource.com/article/22/11/open-source-payphone-philtel https://opensource.com/article/22/11/open-source-payphone-ph...
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
weberer 4y ago
I hope it works out better than Wireless Philadelphia. https://technical.ly/project/wireless-philadelphia https://technical.ly/project/wireless-philadelphia
- Q6T46nT668w6i3m 4y ago
  It failed but Wireless Philadelphia provided the foundation used by many other municipal programs. The New America study that you linked has become essential reading for anyone interested in municipal ISPs.
evolve2k 4y ago
All public “payphones” in Australia were made free to use for everyone nation wide back in August last year (2021). https://exchange.telstra.com.au/why-were-making-payphones-free-for-calls-around-australia/ https://exchange.telstra.com.au/why-were-making-payphones-fr...
- ace2358 4y ago
  I’ve actually started using them a bit since I noticed they were free. I take the time to quickly call my mum or something I also noticed you can call the number back (from your phone) and the pay phone rings!! So cool haha
  - buran77 4y ago
    Does Australia have KYC laws for mobile operators? Can you get SIMs without showing ID? If so how does it work with essentially anonymous terminals like a public phone? Same question goes for the philtel case. BTW, are they still payphones if you don't have to pay? :)
    - nine_k 4y ago
      With a voice-only phone fixed on a street one can do less that with a mobile communication terminal. These phones are likely watched by CCTV cameras, too. So KYC is not necessary.
      - zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
        Last time I was in Adelaide the payphones were wifi hotspots. This was in 2016
        nine_k 4y ago
        I wonder if connecting to wifi from a phone somehow identifies it, or requires to receive an SMS that links the session to a known phone, and thus piggybacks on its KYC.
mthwl 4y ago
Maybe of note that Philadelphia also has a small, independent, wireless ISP: https://phillywisper.net/ https://phillywisper.net/
- VoidWhisperer 4y ago
  This is actually pretty interesting, especially given comcast is headquartered in Philly
vuln 4y ago
I was recently in Oahu, Hawaii for vacation a noticed quite a few maybe a dozen pay phones still free standing. Most were broken, defaced, and dilapidated, but it reminded me of another time. I found 1 pay phone that had a dial tone when I picked it up. Unfortunately I didn't have any change on me to make a teat call.
tsol 4y ago
I think this is a cool idea. But I immediately think about privacy and monetization. How do I know my conversations aren't being listened to? I also don't see anything about how they are funded, and that naturally leads me to wonder if data selling is part of that.

92 points by colinprince 4y ago

Scoundreller 4y ago

What are they using as their VoIP provider? Anything cheaper than voip.ms ?

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

bagels 4y ago

The page doesn't say why they want to do this. Payphones died a death of natural causes. My best guess is nostalgia? It can't be to build a business out of it, can it?

TeaBrain 4y ago
Their "payphones" are described as free to use. "Payphone" was probably just used as the moniker due to the association that "payphone" has as an installed public telephone.
- Aloha 4y ago
  Public Telephone is a better word. Though the death of the pay station was accelerated by the drug crisis, a reduction in pay stations lead to an acceleration in mobile phone adoption here in the states.
  - xattt 4y ago
    What is a pay station?
    - Aloha 4y ago
      a telephone, generally in a public place, where you deposit payment for phone calls, usually in the form of coins.
      - xattt 4y ago
        So a pay phone? I took it to be some sort of transaction place.
culi 4y ago
There's plenty of reasons you might want something like this. They can play an important role in public safety Also just general accessibility. Houseless people exist and every business is increasingly hostile towards letting them charge their phones. Most people who haven't had to experience houselessness aren't aware about this but next time you go to some bougie upscale shopping district try to acknowledge how many outdoor, easily accessible outlets there are. Now do the same thing in some inner city/poorer area or anywhere with a decent amount of houseless folks Or they're gonna find away to put ads in the service lol
- b112 4y ago
  Why is everyone suddenly calling homeless, houseless? It's homeless people, not houseless. If there is some bizarre attempt to reframe things, fine, but what does owning a house have to do with anything? A condo is not a house. An apartment is not a house. So it is: (house|apartment|townome|condo|cabin)lessness?? A home is any of the above. A house is not.
  - culi 4y ago
    idk who "everyone" is. Maybe you came across another comment of mine where I also used the term houseless I use it because of a conversation I had with someone who is houseless. She didn't like being called "homeless" because the city she was sleeping in WAS her "home". She grew up there. Her parents grew up there. She went to school, knew the community there, etc. Eventually due to gentrification she couldn't afford to live in a house anymore. When the term "homeless" is used I think it often has the effect of painting those who are labelled it as not part of the community. Indeed an off-duty cop later harassed us after the talk w her and some other houseless folk and told me "we don't want them in our community". The cop had an out-of-state license plate... Whether it's a house or an apartment, the point imo is to draw attention to how our definitions of who does and doesn't have the right to claim membership of a community has been degraded to purely material means. This person who's not even from this state gets to say he doesn't want HER in "our community"
    - b112 4y ago
fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
It sounds like a public art installation. If a company is doing that with branding, it’s kind of advertising.
newaccount74 4y ago
They say they are inspired by futel.net, who have a detailed about page on their website. The first sentence explains the motivation succintly: > At Futel, we believe in the preservation of public telephone hardware as a means of providing access to the agora for everybody, and toward that goal we are privileged to provide free telephone calls, voicemail, and telephone-mediated services.

janci 4y ago

Free payphone is a nice oxymoron.

quickthrower2 4y ago
Like a tethered mobile?

lioeters 4y ago

It's a fascinating project, a labor of love and good old hackery, with roots in the phone "phreaking" subculture. In addition to free calls, they have some creative ideas for the payphones, such as connecting strangers. Pay Phones Are Coming Back in Philadelphia Thanks to Linux - https://www.makeuseof.com/payphones-are-coming-back-in-philadelphia-thanks-to-linux/ https://www.makeuseof.com/payphones-are-coming-back-in-phila... How open source is revitalizing the payphone - https://opensource.com/article/22/11/open-source-payphone-philtel https://opensource.com/article/22/11/open-source-payphone-ph...

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

weberer 4y ago

I hope it works out better than Wireless Philadelphia. https://technical.ly/project/wireless-philadelphia https://technical.ly/project/wireless-philadelphia

Q6T46nT668w6i3m 4y ago
It failed but Wireless Philadelphia provided the foundation used by many other municipal programs. The New America study that you linked has become essential reading for anyone interested in municipal ISPs.

evolve2k 4y ago

All public “payphones” in Australia were made free to use for everyone nation wide back in August last year (2021). https://exchange.telstra.com.au/why-were-making-payphones-free-for-calls-around-australia/ https://exchange.telstra.com.au/why-were-making-payphones-fr...

ace2358 4y ago
I’ve actually started using them a bit since I noticed they were free. I take the time to quickly call my mum or something I also noticed you can call the number back (from your phone) and the pay phone rings!! So cool haha
- buran77 4y ago
  Does Australia have KYC laws for mobile operators? Can you get SIMs without showing ID? If so how does it work with essentially anonymous terminals like a public phone? Same question goes for the philtel case. BTW, are they still payphones if you don't have to pay? :)
  - nine_k 4y ago
    With a voice-only phone fixed on a street one can do less that with a mobile communication terminal. These phones are likely watched by CCTV cameras, too. So KYC is not necessary.
    - zoklet-enjoyer 4y ago
      Last time I was in Adelaide the payphones were wifi hotspots. This was in 2016
      - nine_k 4y ago
        I wonder if connecting to wifi from a phone somehow identifies it, or requires to receive an SMS that links the session to a known phone, and thus piggybacks on its KYC.

mthwl 4y ago

Maybe of note that Philadelphia also has a small, independent, wireless ISP: https://phillywisper.net/ https://phillywisper.net/

VoidWhisperer 4y ago
This is actually pretty interesting, especially given comcast is headquartered in Philly

vuln 4y ago

I was recently in Oahu, Hawaii for vacation a noticed quite a few maybe a dozen pay phones still free standing. Most were broken, defaced, and dilapidated, but it reminded me of another time. I found 1 pay phone that had a dial tone when I picked it up. Unfortunately I didn't have any change on me to make a teat call.

tsol 4y ago

I think this is a cool idea. But I immediately think about privacy and monetization. How do I know my conversations aren't being listened to? I also don't see anything about how they are funded, and that naturally leads me to wonder if data selling is part of that.