The dial in the base comes to you!. The Ericofon.
posted by pieoverdone on Apr 16, 2004 - 12 comments

A collective "I told you so" from all the layed-off American tech workers. Dell to Stop Using Indian Call Center for Corporate Customers. Apparently, there was a high volume of complaints about thick accents and scripted responses. You don't say? You mean explaining complex technical issues to end users over a phone are further complicated by mixing in large dialect and enunciation differences?
posted by Espoo2 on Nov 24, 2003 - 40 comments

Phonebox cam 24/7 webcam pointed at a phonebox somewhere in UK, dial 01926 424110 or 0044 1926 424110 to see for yourself who answers the phone (I guess a videophone) (it's night in UK right now so you won't see much)
posted by bureaustyle on May 3, 2003 - 9 comments

Communications operator : "Hello police"
Caller: "My wife's left me two salmon sandwiches which was left over from last night... and I'm a sat in the chair here and she's out there decorating. She won't put any food on or anything for anybody, I don't know what...."
Communications operator: "I'm sorry but I really can't take this. It's not an emergency because your wife won't give you anything to eat."
posted by Mwongozi on May 3, 2003 - 15 comments

U.S. claims Canada's greatest invention. Congress awards creation of telephone to Italian inventor living in New York. Uh oh. Canada's inferiority complex takes another blow.

"Bell was either a thief, a fraud, or extraordinarily lucky."
posted by percine on Jun 22, 2002 - 15 comments

Imagine you are moving between apartments. Check out this Verizon "How do I..." page. Over 40 questions are answered, but the 2nd most obvious question one might have is strangely absent. Then try to order a basic cable service from Time Warner Cable. Do you have other examples of corporate sites that are less than helpful when what you want is less than what they would like to sell - or when you want to cancel?
posted by edlundart on May 20, 2002 - 15 comments

Dial a CEO: Every month, Working Assets Long Distance, a phone plan managed by a progressive San Francisco-based citizen-action group dedicated to environmental and social-justice issues, highlights on its customers' phone bill two issues currently under debate (violence against women, gun control, road-building in national parks, etc.), plus the telephone numbers of the top corporate or political people involved in the issue, whose cage you can rattle at no charge. Targets have included senators, congressmen and the US president, as well as CEOs like Exxon/Mobil's Lee Raymond and Home Depot's Arthur Blank. "It's important to target the CEOs directly because they have ultimate responsibility for these issues," says Working Assets citizen action director Janet Nudelman. "They don't like it when they receive four or five thousand calls, but it certainly gets their attention"
posted by palegirl on Jul 2, 2000 - 4 comments