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Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

tincan.kids

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Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#71

Post by ocdtrekkie »

gerdesj wrote: post #62
J_McQuade wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kinda get why they think they don't want to enable this, but when I was a kid I once called 999 (in the UK) as a joke and let me tell you it was only once. My friends and I were there in the room watching films that we shouldn't and the uniformed and kitted-out Constables turned up and gave us an incredibly stern dressing-down about 30 minutes later. Luckily, I am in the UK where a bunch of 12 year olds who've just…

What is bloody annoying is that you can't even test 999. When you set up a PBX it would be nice to know that it would work via the obvious way of actually calling it. Surely it would be possible to create a test version which gets terminated by a computer instead of hassling an operator - you could send DTMF codes or something similar to indicate a test. I suspect that there is a little more to your story. Probably t…

I would be surprised if you got in trouble for occasionally calling emergency services to clearly communicate you were testing if it works. During normal operations they should have extra capacity and they presumably also would like you to be confident you can reach emergency services in an emergency.

EDIT: I should specify a great way to be sure this is okay is call the non-emergency number for your local law enforcement and ask them if you can place a test emergency call. In a lot of cases, you will end up speaking to the same people who answer emergency calls, and they can tell you if now would be a good time or not.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#72

Post by jonah-archive »

Huh, I was just thinking about something sort of like this after camping with some friends and our kids this weekend -- we brought FRS walkie-talkies for all of them (cannot recommend this enough!) and on the drive home my four-year-old was asking if he could call his friends on the radio -- rather than getting him a Technician's I was thinking about finding or making some push-to-talk cell/wifi devices for them. It seems like a few of these things exist but they're marketed toward the enterprise (in at least some cases, with a family-style product unfortunately but unsurprisingly being discontinued: https://relaypro.com/families/ ), but it doesn't seem like it would be a hard build aside from making a durable/kid-friendly enclosure for it.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#73

Post by eszed »

tiagod wrote: post #48
sugarpimpdorsey wrote: post #17

Is this just an ad for a VoIP service? Your residential internet provider will probably already sell you VoIP that you can plug a real phone into. Put that old hamburger phone to good use.

And Dropbox is just rsync. The value is in the app for the parents. I would pay $10 not to deal with shitty VoIP interfaces.

I've set up voip instances, and not liked it, but would be willing to do it again for my kid. I'd not be willing to set them up (and be tech support!) for all of his friends' families. That's the value proposition here, for me.

We've got a group of parents around us who'd likewise like to delay their kids' smartphone access for as long as possible - but if a smartphone (or even a dumbphone with no meaningful parental controls) is the only way for kiddo to make calls, then I know some of them will defect. Selling them all on this kit (or something like it) would keep the agreement intact for a while longer.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#74

Post by wizzwizz4 »

turnsout wrote: post #51
subhro wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, get a trunk from someone like BulkVS, SignalWire and run your own freeswitch or asterix. You can set up arbitrary “allowed” lists. Hell you can even get fancy with lookups and decide on the fly to allow a call or not. There are other comments about providers, but my way is way cheaper and you can run you EPBAX on a pi or even get a pre made VM from Azure, Amazon, etc. Damn I hate paying rent.

Whoa, love this. Do you have any recommended resources if I wanted to try this out? Any comments about FreeSWITCH vs Asterisk, or BulkVS vs Signalwire for a simple setup like this?

Asterisk has better voice lines, like if-rotary-phone.wav, tt-somethingwrong.wav, shiny-brass-lamp.wav, you-sound-cute.wav, and tt-monkeysintro.wav.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#75

Post by mattbee »

gerdesj wrote: post #62
J_McQuade wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kinda get why they think they don't want to enable this, but when I was a kid I once called 999 (in the UK) as a joke and let me tell you it was only once. My friends and I were there in the room watching films that we shouldn't and the uniformed and kitted-out Constables turned up and gave us an incredibly stern dressing-down about 30 minutes later. Luckily, I am in the UK where a bunch of 12 year olds who've just…

What is bloody annoying is that you can't even test 999. When you set up a PBX it would be nice to know that it would work via the obvious way of actually calling it. Surely it would be possible to create a test version which gets terminated by a computer instead of hassling an operator - you could send DTMF codes or something similar to indicate a test. I suspect that there is a little more to your story. Probably t…

You can definitely test 999 for your own VoIP without getting into trouble. I did it a couple of times in the 2010s after moving offices. You just say you're testing, there's no emergency, thank you, and hang up.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#76

Post by TMWNN »

TimTheTinker wrote: post #65

There's a cheaper alternative, if you don't mind some manual setup: - buy an ethernet -> phone adapter (Grandstream, Cisco, and Poly sell these) and a cheap analog phone. - get an inexpensive VoIP number[0] and set up the phone adapter to log into the service you set up. - set up a Google Voice[1] number if you haven't already. When you want to make an outgoing call, use the Google Voice app to initiate a call to you…

[flagged]

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#77

Post by TMWNN »

wffurr wrote: post #39
bja wrote: post #24

This just seems like another VOIP service wrapped in nostalgia. There are MANY cheaper and better options. I say this because I recently added a VOIP line for exactly this reason to give my kids a way to call their friends without a smart phone. Here are many good options https://www.ooma.com/blog/home-phone/best-voip-service-for-h...

How easy is it to manage the calling allowlist for those providers? That seems to be the key value proposition here; the parent app that controls the allowlist.

[flagged]

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#79

Post by spicybright »

ortusdux wrote: post #41
floren wrote: post #5

Highly, highly, highly recommend you enable 911 calls by default on all plans -- let parents disable it if they want. Cell phones do this, even without a SIM card. Don't gate safety for $9.99/mo. Edit: "The FCC requires that providers of interconnected VoIP telephone services using the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) meet Enhanced 911 (E911) obligations." https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/voip-and-911-ser…

I vaguely recall that there was a time when cellphone companies were required to provide free 911 access. People that only wanted a phone for emergencies were advised to get one and not pay for service because it could still dial 911.

It's still the case now for sure on cell networks that are still active that your phone can reach. At least in the US.

Re: Tin Can – The landline, reinvented for kids

#80

Post by usmanity »

jonah-archive wrote: post #72

Huh, I was just thinking about something sort of like this after camping with some friends and our kids this weekend -- we brought FRS walkie-talkies for all of them (cannot recommend this enough!) and on the drive home my four-year-old was asking if he could call his friends on the radio -- rather than getting him a Technician's I was thinking about finding or making some push-to-talk cell/wifi devices for them. It…

you could try GMRS over FRS which ends up having more range and only costs $35 for a 10 year license (no test / certification needed). I was recently trying both types of handheld walkie talkies and the FRS range was almost 1/5th the range that GMRS was able to do
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