From: csmith@plains.NoDak.edu (Carl Smith)
Subject: Re: Caller ID block?
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 20:09:49 GMT
Organization: North Dakota Higher Education Computing Network

In article <BzEty1.A40@acsu.buffalo.edu> v067rcyf@ubvmsd.cc.buffalo.edu (AARDVARK) writes:
>In article <BzD8s8.E0n@ns1.nodak.edu>, csmith@plains.NoDak.edu (Carl Smith) writes...
>>Here's a similar scenario.  Suppose my doorbell rings.  I can look though
>>the peep hole and see who it is.  If the person on the other side is
>>carrying a case that says "Handy Dandy Brush Sales," or I just don't like
>>their looks, I can choose to not open the door.  Also, if you knocked on
>>the door and someone said "Who's there?" and you refused to answer, could
>>you actually expect them to open the door?
>
>nope nope nope nope
>what you fail to recognize is this isn't a door into your house,
>only an audio representation of what might be happening at your domicile

It is an "audio door" into my house, so the above example still applies
when your deciding if you wish to talk to someone on the other end of
the phone line, or if you wish to talk to someone on the other side of
your door. (The door on my house is solid oak, you can't talk through it.)

>>This all parallels caller id quite nicely.  If I don't recognize your number
>>I won't answer the phone, just like I won't answer the door if I don't like
>>the looks of the person on the other side.  And if you call with your ID
>>blocked, I wouldn't even consider answering the phone, just like it would
>>be totally out of the question to open the door to someone who refused to
>>answer when I said "Who's there?"
>
>the other thing is, while a person at the door may be able to physically
>harm you or force its way into your house, there is _absolutely_ no
>danger of that over the phone... you can just hang up and they can't
>touch you

I should have stated that I was not considering threats of physical
violence from the person on the other side of the door, just if I wanted
to talk to them or not.

While they can't physically force their way though the phone line into
my house (like in cartoons?) like they could through my front door, they
can still "force" their way into talking to me simply by calling.  Without
caller id I HAVE to answer ALL calls if I don't want to take the chance of
missing an important caller.  With caller id I can look at the id and decide
if I want to talk to that person without even answering.

When I got an undesireable caller on the other end of the line I used 
to try to end the conversation politely (usually telemarketers).  But
that all ended when MCI started calling me twice a week to NAG NAG NAG 
me about switching to MCI.  After listening to their sales pitch I'd 
tell them I was not interested.  After a bunch of calls I asked them to
take my number out of their list, which they they agreed to do.  When
they persisted calling I asked for supervisors, and was usually hung up
on.  Finally after months of this I realized that it is MY phone, and MY
time, and I did not OWE it to them to listen to them.  So now if I pick
up the phone and hear the letters MCI the person on the other end hears
"click."  And any other caller that I don't wish to talk to gets hung
up on.  (Except people I know, of course.)

All this could be avoided if I had caller ID.  I could have put MCI's
telemarketing number into a "KILL" list in my caller ID device, and
when MCI called the phone wouldn't even ring...

>really people, it's just a phone
>if people survived without knowing who was calling for the
>past few generations and stayed sane,
>i suspect our generation could do it too...
>unless we're getting too soft.

This argument doesn't hold water.  Thousands of years ago people survived
without ANY of the modern conveniences we have today.  That does not mean
that our modern convieniences should never have been invented because we
could have lived without them...

This reminds me of the old story where a grandfather is telling his
grandson, "Why, when I was your age I didn't ride a bus to school,
I walked 15 miles in the snow, uphill, both ways..."  Just because
grandpa lived without a school bus doesn't mean that the kid should...

In my opinion, caller ID should have existed ever since the phone was 
first invented.  After all, if your calling me, you know my number, so
it is only fair that I know your number.  The only reason that caller id
didn't exist is that it was not techonologically possible to implement with
a reasonable cost.  Now that it is possible, it should be available to all...