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Originally Posted by brightspot01
.....If my next door neighbor needed to call me...s/he would have to pay long distance charges.
I couldn't do that to my friends!
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I guess it's simply a matter of cost-benefit. Paying Embarq $30-50 a month so that my friends don't (only if they also have Embarq) pay Embarq another couple bucks a month is a personal choice.
As we are seeing, the land-line phone as a stand-alone item is becoming a technology that is fading. There was a time when cellphones were rare and expensive - now every kid over 10 seems to have one. Television antennas were everywhere - now cable and satellite have replaced those antennas almost everywhere. Even the cable companies have bypassed the land-line phone network with their own systems.
Remember: party-lines, when phone numbers were a word followed by 5 numbers, you had to call the LD operator for an out-of-area call (and the cost was unbelievably high), when we didn't know there were such things as area codes, crank and rotary-dial phones?
In my house we also gave thought to the need for a 352 area code and decided it was not a necessity, as long as the phone service (as required by law) linked into the 911 network. I honestly don't know who among my "circle" may pay a per-minute rate for long-distance, but I know many who don't, as we are either using the same cell-provider or they too have an unlimited calling set-up.
As I head toward "fixed income," I'm very conscious of my recurring household costs and am looking at every way possible to limit those costs. I'm sure my "circle" is doing or has done the same. If the competitors to the Embarqs of the world can provide alternatives to the traditional "Ma Bell" sock-it-to-them phone company approach, they will get a shot for my business.