Comments on: The robot comes calling...

The robot comes calling...

ph00dz — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:06:21 -0800

The robot comes calling... When web services attack! NotifyPhoneBasic will call any phone number in the US/Canada and read your message to that phone number. You can even set the caller id information.

By: monju_bosatsu

monju_bosatsu — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:22:31 -0800

That is awesome.

By: melt away

melt away — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:24:53 -0800

IE only?

By: michaelonfs

michaelonfs — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:25:58 -0800

Does anyone else get the feeling that this thing is going to be a BIG annoyance? I tried voice ID 3 and it was barely decernable. Bleh!

By: jonson

jonson — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:28:58 -0800

The greatest thing ever.

By: jonson

jonson — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:33:14 -0800

It seems to cut out after a while, and plays a sales message. Maybe that's what the "license key" field is for.

By: killdevil

killdevil — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:37:53 -0800

That is too much fun.

By: CynicalKnight

CynicalKnight — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:48:46 -0800

Every tech-novice in my address book is about to get a "verbal virus" attack. chortle!

By: mecran01

mecran01 — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:49:56 -0800

It kept telling me that the phone number and caller id didn't match, even though they did. pshaw!

By: foot

foot — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:52:12 -0800

Naw, they can't match. I ran into the same thing.. robot toys are destroying my productivity.

By: StickyCarpet

StickyCarpet — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:55:37 -0800

ring! ring! "this is a test service. please purchase a full key to remove this message"

By: foot

foot — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 09:58:32 -0800

I am a Spanish robot and I am currently stuck in a well. Please bring rope and emergency services.

By: Hubajube

Hubajube — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:01:41 -0800

Wow, that QueueID number is incrementing quickly.

By: Sangermaine

Sangermaine — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:02:20 -0800

Wait a second.....CDyne....Cyberdyne? It's beginning....

By: fungible

fungible — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:06:37 -0800

Very neato. In a War Games/1980 sort of way.

By: gravelshoes

gravelshoes — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:08:25 -0800

I want this in the UK - anyone?

By: Imperfect

Imperfect — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:18:07 -0800

Now it's just hanging up before delivering the message. So screwy.

By: Plutor

Plutor — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:18:11 -0800

The stupid robot just keeps hanging up on me. Say something funny, damnit!

By: CynicalKnight

CynicalKnight — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:19:11 -0800

I think we MeFi'd it.

By: kika

kika — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:20:25 -0800

The phone rang (of course I tried this with my own number) but when i picked up there was no robot voice, just silence. Did I break it? Or is this a new way of harvesting phone numbers of nerds?

By: poppo

poppo — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:22:51 -0800

oh man there was something just like this in 99 or 00, i cannot for the life of me remember the name of it, but it was fun! you could call anyone for free and a robotic male or robotic female voice would speak your message. so much time wasted crank calling people

By: Hanover Phist

Hanover Phist — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:22:59 -0800

I get the phone to ring, but I haven't heard the message read aloud yet... bug or am I doing something wrong...

By: Hanover Phist

Hanover Phist — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:23:00 -0800

I get the phone to ring, but I haven't heard the message read aloud yet... bug or am I doing something wrong...

By: poppo

poppo — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:23:25 -0800

rewind, i would say in fact it was more like 97

By: Hanover Phist

Hanover Phist — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:23:31 -0800

(ah, crap.. sorry for the double)

By: fenriq

fenriq — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:31:57 -0800

This could be fun, it only it worked for me. kika, maybe you got the shy robot?

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:51:30 -0800

The queue seems too long...

By: hal9k

hal9k — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 10:59:43 -0800

Worked fine for me: Mac, Tiger, Firefox, IQ >30, full pot of coffee, SOCKS <2days old

By: kika

kika — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 11:01:45 -0800

It worked now and I bugged my SO (working for a phone company) with it. This has so much possibility for abuse it's not funny anymore. Anonymous terrorist threats anyone?

By: Derive the Hamiltonian of...

Derive the Hamiltonian of... — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 11:24:48 -0800

ph00dz, you just turned an entire dorm floor into a coordinated phone prank unit. It works for all of us, but you have to answer right away because the message starts playing as soon as it starts ringing, so you'll likely hear the sales pitch if you aren't a quick draw. Fortunately, the text field accepts ridiculously long strings, so if you want to type in a minute's worth of SATAN SATAN SATAN SATAN or just have your witty message repeat a few times, you can. Yeah, please play nicely with your anonymity and computerized pranking...

By: rubin

rubin — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 11:26:55 -0800

I think you have to say something and then be quiet so it knows you answered the phone. "Hello" worked for me.

By: mrgrimm

mrgrimm — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 11:53:06 -0800

oh man there was something just like this in 99 or 00 yeah, i had a deja vu feeling too. it was even earlier, however.

By: StickyCarpet

StickyCarpet — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 12:35:34 -0800

It worked earlier. Doesn't now. Saying "hello" isn't helping.

By: blue_beetle

blue_beetle — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 12:50:19 -0800

Someone just unwittingly stumbled upon a massive scam to obtain valid unlisted phone numbers via the internet. Kudos.

By: Skot

Skot — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 12:52:59 -0800

By: Ogre Lawless

Ogre Lawless — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 12:54:39 -0800

Other Creepy CDYNE services

By: Smart Dalek

Smart Dalek — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 13:24:21 -0800

I LIKE THIS TELEMARKETING RESOURCE DU JOUR. IT IS A VERY NICE TELEMARKETING RESOURCE DU JOUR.

By: spazzm

spazzm — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 14:00:54 -0800

"Yields falsehood when preceeded with its own quotation" yields falsehood when preceeded with its own quotation!

By: sonofsamiam

sonofsamiam — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 14:07:19 -0800

Not with that exclamation point there at the end.

By: beth

beth — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 15:48:43 -0800

This reminds me of iPing. They have a free test drive feature. You don't get to pick the message, but the annoyance factor is still there.

By: papakwanz

papakwanz — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 16:51:29 -0800

all i get is silence and a hangup :(

By: ambrosia

ambrosia — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 17:12:58 -0800

Heh. I just got a call from my dog, saying he'd figured out how to make the computer call me and tell me how much he wants to go run up and down along the fence and bark at the doberman next door. Clearly, my husband got to metafilter earlier than I did today.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 18:37:51 -0800

it goes: "yields falsehood when appended to its quotation." yields falsehood when appended to its quotation. (oh, and: This sentence has exactly threee erors.) this is great! right up there with the soundboards of ahnold and napoleon. and the spaceship/boston album prank is that much better when it sounds like a robot!

By: spazzm

spazzm — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 20:01:19 -0800

Nope, it's "preceded", not "appended". Unless you've got another source than me.

By: carsonb

carsonb — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 23:41:01 -0800

my source is the article "On Self-Referential Sentences" (from the collection Metamagical Themas pg. 8) by Douglas R. Hofstadter, quoting Willard Van Orman Quine. What is a question that can serve as it's own answer? I want phone robots to ask that every time. then we send the phone spiders!!!! *cackle*

By: klangklangston

klangklangston — Wed, 14 Sep 2005 06:17:46 -0800

Heh. Because of the queue, I didn't get my call until 2:50 am. Serves me right for pranking myself, I guess...