We circumvented the telemarketers currently. We never got a land line for our house and use a cell. The main reason we went for one was when I was trying to get a job. I had resumes out on places like monster and headhunter and directly with certain companies. When I started getting good leads, I was loathed to leave the phone, but I hated have my foot tied down. I didn’t trust the other people in the house to take a message, more “yeah, he’s not here… whatever. <click>” and I’m wondering why that dream job never called me back. So I guarded that phone. Now we have a cell and if one of us needs to go somewhere fine, take the phone. Plus the number is unlisted so we’ve yet to get a telemarketer, a friend received one on his cell though…

I’m slightly worried that if the DNC is killed, then they’ll start demanding/buying cell numbers so that they can ‘continue to exercise their free speech.’ I have a set number of minutes, each call is a minimum of 1 minute, so even if I hang up instantly, I’m still out a minute and that can add up over a month.

That’s definitely more that exercising free speech if they cause me to start paying excess minute fees.

Although I'm still fuzzy on how this can be strewn as a free speech issue in the first place.
Hmm, counter lawsuit: they're voilating my free speech rights by forcing me to talk to them. After all, don't I have the free speech right to NOT talk?

Yep, but its long-distance to call. :P
Plus there's only 60,000 people on the island so if you call locally the residents will find you eventually. 8-[

Another way would be to charge telemarketers for calling you. It shouldn't be too hard for the phone companies to set it up.

You would get to set an amount you wish to be paid for receiving calls and can optionally set up a code number to give to friends to be used to bypass the charge. When someone calls you, the phone company gives the caller a computer generated message containing the amount of the charge and how to agree to pay it. For example:

"This call costs 25¢ to complete. If you wish to pay the 25¢ press star one or enter the bypass code."

If the caller agrees to pay then your phone bill is reduced by 25¢ and the caller pays 25¢ more. Your friends who have the code would enter it and ring your phone without paying. Your old high school buddy who wants to get in touch with you would agree to pay and be connected. Then you give him your code number so he can call you again for free. Maybe there could be a way to cancel the charge, so if you press star nine during the conversation the 25¢ would not be charged.

If a telemarketer agrees to pay the fee then everything is fine. You get 25¢ and the satisfaction of knowing that some twit just paid a quarter for the privilege of having you hang up on him. If he wants to call back to complain about your rudeness he can pay again.

This can have other applications too. If you don't want anyone but your friends to call you, you just set the fee a lot higher. If you want to dispense information for a fee you could use this instead of trying to charge peoples' credit cards or getting a 900 number.

The phone company could probably set this up with computer programming alone without needing more hardware.

__________________
Life is like a box of chocolates. All of your choices are bad for you.

Texas has a state do not call list. It is not affected by the national flap. It costs $2.25 to get listed. The state levies a $1000 fine per violation. =D> To bad they don't share it with the victims. 8)

__________________
Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

I live in an apartment and I have had calls from companies wanting to clean my carpets (which the apartment complex does for free), roof work, siding, and refinancing my house morgage, despite the fact that I do not own a house.

I just screen my calls, if I accidentially pick up the phone I just say "no thanks" politely and hang up. Why politely--because my mom raised me to be nice. When she hears me be nice she gives me a hard time about that--go figure.

__________________
Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.

--Niels Bohr, Danish Physicist.

Actually, I don't have a problem with telemarketers. If I am at home, I am either online or asleep (the phone is not in the bedroom). It is easy to delete unwanted messages from my machine.

__________________
Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

Everyone's suggested solutions might work for them but they don't for me.

I have always had an unlisted number, that doesn't stop you from getting on a list when you have to give your number to book a hotel room or buy a car. And, the auto dial machines have your name and number even though it isn't listed. I'm certain the phone companies sell the numbers, unlisted or not. Half the calls I get are from phone companies or credit card peddlers.

And, we have the rule that when you tell them to take you off their list they are supposed to. I have done that many many times. The number of calls has continually increased anyway.

I'm also certain my neighborhood is in a million 'target markets'. That's why some of you get less calls. It may not be the state you are in, it may be the neighborhood. Also, I have a home office. I am in and out but am often home during the day. If you work, you may not realize you are getting half the number of sales calls while you aren't there. They rarely leave messages.

Anyone with kids cannot unplug their phone. And, since my son occasionally calls with problems at school, I can't exactly let the answering machine get the call because there would be no way to call him back. And, we have a two story house. I am not always in the room the machine is in. If I have to run to hear the machine, I might as well just pick up the phone.

I can't use the tele zapper because I get auto dialed faxes from the public health every time they need to alert providers to outbreaks in the area. My fax has its own number but it is on the regular line with only a different ring.

We could PAY for caller ID and I will probably compromise my principles and get it. It doesn't seem right to pay the phone company to stop the phone company from calling you.

I just want to explain that these calls are worse for some of us. It's easy to think the problem is minor and easily solved if you aren't the one getting sales calls several times almost every single day.

Anyway, I know most of you are sympathetic. I'd just hate to be seen as a whiner because that isn't the case. This telemarketing thing, with their new dialing technology is really getting intrusive.

__________________
The real news, including science news corporations may not allow on stations they own. http://www.democracynow.org/

I have two strategies( admittedly both require me to answer the phone, but I do`nt mind that).
1. answer phone then leave them hanging, e.g. whoops I have to do something!
2. I keep a whistle by the phone. If I`m feelin really horrible, or they have made a second call, guess what?

__________________
Pull ye other one, it doth have bell`s on!

Caller ID will not help. Many of the telemarketers are not located in your state. the caller ID will say that the call is from out of the area, and will no give specific information as to who is calling. It could be a telemarketer, or it might Aunt/Uncle whoever, trying to pass on important information. Either way, you won't know until you answer.

In a totally non-related area, it was mentioned on C2C last night that the Denver Judge that ruled the no-call list unconstitutional is, himself, on that list. He apparently signed up before all of this nonsense came to a head. Go figure #-o

__________________
Those who repeat History are doomed to learn it.

Beskeptical. I agree 100% with your feelings on your "Venting" post on the previous page. And thanks, I wasn't aware that all those calls where you pick up and nobody is there are telemarketing calls with no operator available.

I subscribe to the "better be quick" approach: If I don't hear an immediate response from the person on the other end I hang up. Most of the time the telemarketers are too slow. About once or twice a month I end up hanging up on a friend or relative, but they always call right back.

The other night my wife got into a fight with a telemarketer because he called for me, but then would not say who he was. The patronizing lecture she gave the idiot who was playing these games was pretty funny.

One of my favorite things to do is to stop them in the middle of their spiel, and ask a question about something in the first or second sentence of their script, and then listen. Most of the time, they will get so confused, because they lost their place in the script (some will even start over) that they will have no idea what to do, and hang up. This is a good way to separate the true salesman from someone who is doing this because they are too old to stay in Kindergarten.

__________________
Those who repeat History are doomed to learn it.

Thanks, it's nice just to know someone listened to you vent . The hang up calls are even described in the front of the phone book as being auto dialed. Guess who uses the autodialers? :roll:

My son likes to say funny things to them also. They almost never say why they are calling when he asks.

But be careful, if you make them mad sometimes they call back to get even. The other day my son did the ol' cou..loser..gh and hung up. The guy called right back and tried to tell me about my rude child as if I would care. He still wouldn't say what company he was calling from. Anyway, I reminded my son that passive-agressive works best. Give 'em a hard time but don't let 'em know for sure. BTW, I like the question routine.

I know, I know, some of you feel for the working stiff. But they took the job, no one made them. I politely ask them to hold and wait till they hang up. At least I can waste their time like they waste mine.

__________________
The real news, including science news corporations may not allow on stations they own. http://www.democracynow.org/

As usual, beskeptical (among others) raises some valid points. My wife also raised a few (she works from home and intercepts most of the calls). Therefore...I get internally confilcted, a normal condition. There are practical and legal issues.

The autodial banks are definitely annoying. I don't LIKE getting such calls. One practical (if imperfect) solution is to allow the phone to ring for a while. Most of the autodialers seem to stop after 3-5 rings. Getting call screening or somesuch is also an option; granted it costs more, but technology seems to do that. I have to buy a new computer every so often just so I can run the newer software. Heck, I can't buy a new printer for my 166 because they need either speed or ports it doesn't have.

Question: there are laws limiting commercial solicitation (e.g., banning door-to door sales). Are these applicable to other forms of marketing?

I also wonder if this is so annoying because it is still relatively new, and we haven't learned to either cope with it or put it down in the background. Anyone watching mass media is inundated with commercial solicitation, yet many of us have learned to tune it out (commercial=bathroom break).

It's just that I don't see this going away. The same technology and market philosophy that has given us the truly amazing telecomminications we enjoy has also brought the marketing home. Look at the Internet and how advertising has moved into the available niches there (ah, evolution in action again). Is this quite literally the price we pay for our toys?

To paraphrase Bob Heinlein, we are going to have to learn to live with this horror.

__________________
The Devil offered me power. I told him I preferred aperture.

I think that charging callers for calling you would solve the problem. See my post above on the 27th. Telephone solicitors are unlikely to pay to talk to people since most won't buy anything. They'd lose money in the long run. A friend who calls you for the first time shouldn't mind having to pay a one time token fee which you could refund if you wanted to. It would probably become customary to refund it if the caller had any legitimate business with you at all. The best part about it is that the government is not involved so no one's first amendment rights would be violated. I own my phone and if I want to charge others for using it, that's my business. If I want to hire the phone company as my agent to collect the fees, that's between me and the phone company. The telemarketers won't like it, but there's nothing illegal or questionable about it.

Other than that, I suppose would could have machines that intercept our calls and ask for a password. If the caller enters the password then your phone rings. If the caller doesn't then he has five seconds to leave a recorded message. That's enough to leave a name and phone number but not enough for any kind of sales pitch.

__________________
Life is like a box of chocolates. All of your choices are bad for you.

I'm not sure what the solution is, but I sure hope there is one! I've gotten then same mess of calls from home-repair joints, but I've only ever rented houses. *grumble*

But since we are swapping stories, here's my best one: Last year we had a dedicated ISDN line to JPL for mission critical calls and video-conferencing. This line was unlisted, no local service, no long distance (dedicated line!) and supposedly only incoming calls from JPL were allowed. Some phone company kept calling it asking if we wanted long distance service! I was the first person to get such a call and it confused the heck out of me, since they shouldn't have been able to call in the first place!

I don't remember what the end resolution of this was, but I do know that said phone company got several irate calls from both my supervisor and the person in charge of the line at JPL. Makes me wish they really did have black helicopters, to put the smack down on such people... Hmmm... that sounds like a good use of those government conspiracy teams: cracking the heads of telemarketers.

__________________
"What do you care what other people think?" -- Richard Feynman
"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled." -- Feynman, at the conclusion of his Challenger report

Although my favorite is the local company that calls at regular intervals asking if we have any cracked windsheilds that need repairing. I kep looking out the window to see if someone is out there with a rock.

"Do you need me now? Good!"

__________________
The Devil offered me power. I told him I preferred aperture.

My fax picks up when I don't answer the double ring. If I put the answering machine on more rings before answering, it would be annoying and some folks would think the fax was turned off. We already have 3 numbers and a cell phone. Another line for the fax would be costly.

A small community here tried to outlaw door to door soliciters and I think they got shut down on similar grounds.

I can tune out commercials but I also turn the TV on in the first place and get programs for the cost of the commercial intrusions. I don't get anything for the sales calls except irritable. :wink:

Well, I just got a call interrupting this post. Gee, what a coincidence. :roll: I could tell from the background noise and time of day it was a sales call so I answered but didn't say anything. The guy burped a gross burp. I wasn't sure if it was accidental or not. After a minute he said, "hello", which confirmed I didn't know the person. Then he hung up. Well, that's a silent call back at 'em. I'm satisfied. Maybe I'll try a new technique of letting them answer first. :-k This could be interesting.

__________________
The real news, including science news corporations may not allow on stations they own. http://www.democracynow.org/

Yeah, everything seems imperfect. The multiple ring wait on an autodialer only means that someone picked up before you did. The tiger ate the slowest guy.

As I said, I'm conflicted on this. Part is that the telephone is, so far, a fairly unique device. Anyone of a certain age who hears the phone ring at 11:30 PM knows what I mean. Unlike television, which actually can be turned off without undue effects, the telephone is a signalling device as well as a communications or advertising device. The problem (unlike, say, email) is that it is much harder to differentiate between something important (Mom had a stroke) vs. blather (Need your windshield fixed?).

But I personally don't like the blanket-banning approach, either.

Is a technological fix possible? Commercial calls are required to have a different ring pattern? Easily detected, easily disconnected, yet preserving the openness. Yes, it would mean buying a new phone. But phones are just a chip with a handset nowadays, and are pretty cheap.

__________________
The Devil offered me power. I told him I preferred aperture.