This is pure evil, and I hope those doing it end up living under a bridge.
Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
191–200 of 227 posts
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#192Earlier quoted context omitted.
Obligatory xkcd https://xkcd.com/1357/ Also the mouse over text applies very well to this situation as well.
This comic is really pernicious because it frames free speech as just a quirky law that restrains the government. That's like saying honesty is just about not breaking perjury laws in court. In reality, free speech and free inquiry are social virtues that, like honesty, should be applied and upheld at every level of society, public and private, commercial, academic, and personal. Because free speech is a key mechanis…
Except when we're talking about other entities, they also have their own rights to free speech/free association. It's nice to say that free speech is a social virtue, but would you be willing to hold a Klan rally/BLM rally in your front yard?
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#193Earlier quoted context omitted.
I get about 4 "Card Services" or "Google Marketing" or some such robocalls a day, too. The Verizon customer service rep suggested "just blocking the number" after expressing shock and awe that robocalls happen, and he had never heard of such a thing! I suggest at least leaving the robocall running until it hangs up. Any given organization has to have a finite number of outgoing lines, and IVR/VRU's, so keeping them o…
> I suggest at least leaving the robocall running until it hangs up. It only lasts for maybe 15 seconds. If you want to hurt them more, press 1 (or whatever) to talk to the operator, and string them along. But the downside - if you care - is that the person working a job in some hellish call center probably gets dinged, performance wise, for spending 15 minutes on a go-nowhere call with you. But on the gripping hand,…
They took an evil job. I'm fine with them getting a poor performance review.
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#194>They have been hearing from ringless voice mail providers and pro-business groups, which argue that these messages should not qualify as calls and, therefore, should be exempt from consumer protection laws that ban similar types of telephone marketing. There's no limit to how low pro-business thinking can go.
There is no "low" in business thinking. Capital is amoral.
People aren't. And unless we have business robots, there are still people involved.
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#195Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is fascinating. It never occurred to me until now that there might be a window in the call process between "line is flagged as busy" and "phone rings." I assume we're talking about a very narrow window here, right? How narrow? Is it something that has always existed, or something that crept in because of the transition from phone-as-mechanical-device to phone-as-software?
I hear the crackling of my PC speakers a few seconds before the call rings on my mobile; similarly on our landline the phone lights up and shows the caller ID a second or so before it rings. Also if you ring a phone in the same room as you [we have kids!] you'll often find you get a ring tone long before the callee's phone rings.
> on our landline the phone lights up and shows the caller ID a second or so before it rings
Not sure about the US, but in Australia this is a phone specific feature. The Caller ID comes between the first and second ring, so if you want a call blocking feature that is completely silent, you need to silence the first ring of every call. Some phones will do this automatically, others (like my Panasonic landline) make it an option you can turn on & off. The Panasonic FAQ has some info:
http://eng.faq.panasonic.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/26547/~...
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#196The article doesn't describe how the technology works. Due to the slow speed (100 voicemail/min) its likely what they are doing is initiating a call far enough for the phone system to busy out your phone, then very quickly placing a second call that the phone system sends straight to voicemail as your phone is busy. Once this call starts to hit voicemail, the original call is dropped. I doubt phone companies let peop…
That's exactly how it works. While I was at Twilio, we figured out how to do it - mostly from a customer abusing the system - and shut them down at the time. The problem was that it wasn't complicated enough that it would take long for others to figure out. The problem I noted at the time is that since we only charged for minutes during the call, the first call - which was dialed and immediately dropped - would never…
If there are enough short duration calls, the phone company will ask for more money. The every four years political calls, for example, often have to pay a little bit more due to their short call duration.
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#197Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the first call would ring then.
No, the two calls are dialled concurrently with a skew such that call A finishes dialling moments before call B. Call B immediately goes to voicemail because the line is locked setting up call A. Call A disconnects before the phone starts to ring, but after the network has routed call B to voicemail. Edit: clarified.
this can then be easily fixed by the networks. Delay the second call request until the first call actually rings.
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#198Earlier quoted context omitted.
I get about 4 "Card Services" or "Google Marketing" or some such robocalls a day, too. The Verizon customer service rep suggested "just blocking the number" after expressing shock and awe that robocalls happen, and he had never heard of such a thing! I suggest at least leaving the robocall running until it hangs up. Any given organization has to have a finite number of outgoing lines, and IVR/VRU's, so keeping them o…
These orgs don't necessarily have a finite number of outbound lines - they'd be using SIP and just buy more channels from the myriad providers out there for a few bucks a month. You can also get "unlimited channels"-SIP trunk providers too - in which case you're limited only by the number of simultaneous virtual channels your Asterisk setup can handle. So no, "keeping them busy" is not a viable solution.
They will have to still pay for it. If the RoI on these kind of campaigns become low enough, due to combination of higher cost and lower conversion, they will abandon it. You could develop a dialer app to autoroute, and perhaps even generate auto responses ( inverse robo call ?) to make it more frustrating
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#199Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wholeheartedly agree with all your points (and that is exactly what I meant with accessible). But it being voice is also a major issue of its own. You can't check voice messages in many situations where you can read and possibly respond to a text. Also, if you listen to music/podcasts/whatever there will be an annoying interrupt.
I get an interrupt when I receive text messages too. I want it; it lets me know that someone sent me a message.
Of course, but there is a huge difference. Read the text and then continue - total time is less than 5 seconds. Often you don't even miss a beat doing what you are doing anyway.
Rather than having to stop what you are doing, check voice mail, and then continue. And in many situations you can't even do it (meeting, lecture, noisy environment etc.).
Re: Ringless voice mails from telemarketers
#200Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have had several friends and colleagues get new numbers and immediately be hounded by collection agencies looking for the old owner of the number. Some of these collection agencies also stared sending postal mail to their homes based on the linking this new number with their addresses.
It's against the law for collection agencies to call you if you tell them not to.
Oh! If it's against the law, surely that will stop annoying phone calls! How did we not think of that easy solution to the problem!?