Comments on: Missed calls and a travel tip

By: Tom Hume

Tom Hume — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 22:00:57 +0000

When my sister was at boarding school (late 1980s/early 1990s) she was able to dial home from a payphone without entering any coins and get about 1/4s of speech in (shouting “call back”) before getting cut off.

By: kirsty

kirsty — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 10:24:43 +0000

We still use three rings to let my non-mobile owning grandmother know that we’re home. The rest of us use texts these days but you feel you have to say something, however inane, about the day/event/journey that way and I miss the mindlessness of the three rings.

By: rita maria

rita maria — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 08:39:56 +0000

In Portugal we say “dar um toque”, which just means “give a ring”. But one of the main networks has also started a service called “Kolmi” (for “Call me”) a couple of years ago, which sends out a text to any number on that network, saying number X asks them to call back and which is completely free of charge (therefore also working if you don’t have any credit at all). I miss those!

By: Meg (intergalactic)

Meg (intergalactic) — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 08:17:30 +0000

My family call them ‘drop calls’ – i.e. “I’ll drop-call you when I’m near” or when I was a particularly broke student, I’d drop call my parents if I wanted to talk to them and they’d call me back. (we’re south african but 90% of our mobile usage has been in the UK.)

By: B

Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:51:49 +0000

when i was a kid, my mum was a supply teacher, and she would often get calls at 8am when we were about to leave for school. family members used to call, let it ring twice, hang up, then call back if they wanted a reply. it’s still code for ‘honestly, pick up the phone’ in our family to this day.

interesting to see how these things evolve.