3 in 10 Get All or Most Calls on Cell Phones

[Pete Paxton]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080514/ap_on_hi_te/cell_phones_only;_ylt=AhuYzN1KHVDEGBhfUcn11ghI2ocA' target='_blank'>http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080514...BhfUcn11ghI2ocA</a><br /><br /></div>For nearly three in 10 households, don't even bother trying to call them on a landline phone. They either only have a cell phone or seldom if ever take calls on their traditional phone. The federal figures, released Wednesday, showed that reliance on cells is continuing to rise at the expense of wired telephones. In the second half of last year, 16 percent of households only had cell phones, while 13 percent also had landlines but got all or nearly all their calls on their cells.<br /><br /><img width="272" height="259" border="1" src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/spt/auto/1210815770.usr11642.jpg" alt="" /><br /><br />I shouldn't be shocked by this. I knew this was happening but I didn't realize that three out of ten households perhaps don't even have a landline. We have both at my my place. We do use our landline but that's because I can't get reception in this little pocket neighborhood I live in. How about you? Has a cell phone replaced your landline all together? If not, why?&nbsp; If you do strictly use a cell phone, do you ever miss a landline or is mobile the way to go?

[jngold_me]

I'll keep my landline for two very important reasons: 1) call quality is just so much better on a landline, and 2) reliability of landline far outpaces that of cell phones.

[rlobrecht]

We also have a landline, which gets used almost every day (mostly by my wife.) Besides reliability, call quality, and cost, the other reason to have a landline is E911 and kids. Assuming your kids can remember your address in a crisis situation is not a good assumption. Assuming they can remember to dial 911 or hit the cross, fire, or police badge button on the phone is a pretty good bet. E911 doesn't work on cell phones.

[Oleander]

I'm kind of underwelmed. ;-)

Where I live the number of cell phones subsciptions outnumbers the landline ditto 2 to 1, having surpassed them more than 6 years ago. Actually, there are 1½ times as many cell phones subscriptions as there are citizens here.

The number of people under 30 without a landline is 70% - it would be higher if the phone companies didnt demand a landline required for ADSL.

Landlines are a dying breed here - especially after a new initiative by the combined power companies to place fiber optic cables next to every powercable connecting households with 100 mbps connections (TV and ip-phone included). Mine is scheduled next year.

According to the police, the benefits of having such a high number of phones in emergencies, far outweighs the difficulties in finding the place of the caller. Besides it wasnt that difficult teaching my daughter to dial 112 (EU emergency) on her mobile when she was 7.

[shaun0207]

When I last lived with my parents (2yrs ago) we all only had cell phones. I had 3 at the time, my brother 4 and my mom & dad each had 1. There was no use for the landline, because long distance calls were free on the cell phones and night and evenings started at 7pm. Now that I'm married we mainly use our cellphones (I have 2, my wife has 2, and each of our 4 children have one). We do have a landline becasue my wife grandmother lived with us. We just got the number changes yesterday, so we could start using he house phone, but I dont think it it will happen anytime soon.

[webguy248]

With free mobile to mobile calling, free nights and weekends, rollover minutes, there's no reason not to call me on my cell rather than the house. the house phone is for emergencies (babysitter, 911, etc). We used to have all the toys and add-ons to the house phone. Now, it's caller id. no VM, call waiting, call forwarding, etc. People I like or need to talk to get the cell. everyone else gets the house.

We get calls on the house phone, but rarely make them. All of my phone numbers are transferred from Outlook to my PDA. same for my wife. my oldest 2 share a phone (for now), and only call us (for now).

[Jason Lee]

The only reason i have a landline is because my DSL provider requires it. Well, actually they just added a plan where you can pay them $50 per month to not have an $11 per month land line..... Yeah.. So we have a landline with no features, no long distance, no caller id.. nothing. We don't even have a phone plugged into the line.. Only the DSL modem. :)

[Eriq Cook]

For the sake of running a business out of home I keep my Vonage landline (a little less reliable than ma bell but rarely acts up) active. Between my T-Mobile Wing and actual cell phone service I have a 60% chance of using my cell phone reliably with no issues.

[Rob Alexander]

We keep the land line because that's the one we don't have to answer. Businesses, charities and various irritating people all get that number and only a select few get our mobile numbers. We freely ignore the ringing on the land line, and are ruthless in screening with the caller ID, but we always answer our mobiles. I would probably get rid of the land line altogether except then I would have no number to give to stores and businesses except for my mobile and I don't want to do that. I am playing around with Google Grand Central, though, and once it settles in and is out of beta, I'll consider using it as our main number and getting rid of the land line.

[macattack]

Where we live AT&T coverage is excellent and I very, very seldom get dropped calls. I also buy top-notch phones, so voice quality is also quite good. I successfully convinced my wife about 2.5 years ago to get rid of our land-line. We were taking almost all of our personal calls on the mobile phones. The only time our land-line rang, was telemarketers. We almost never picked up the land-line phone because we used an answering machine to screen calls. I asked myself why we were paying for both but only using one. I haven't had any problems at all getting by without a land-line.

[Eriq Cook]

We keep the land line because that's the one we don't have to answer. Businesses, charities and various irritating people all get that number and only a select few get our mobile numbers. We freely ignore the ringing on the land line, and are ruthless in screening with the caller ID, but we always answer our mobiles. I would probably get rid of the land line altogether except then I would have no number to give to stores and businesses except for my mobile and I don't want to do that. I am playing around with Google Grand Central, though, and once it settles in and is out of beta, I'll consider using it as our main number and getting rid of the land line.

Google Grand Central??? Sounds interesting. I'll have to look into it....

[Rocco Augusto]

We also have a landline, which gets used almost every day (mostly by my wife.) Besides reliability, call quality, and cost, the other reason to have a landline is E911 and kids. Assuming your kids can remember your address in a crisis situation is not a good assumption. Assuming they can remember to dial 911 or hit the cross, fire, or police badge button on the phone is a pretty good bet. E911 doesn't work on cell phones.

we only use cellphones in my house but we keep a couple of my old cellphones around and charged in case of an emergency. we also wrote our address on the back of them and taught my daughter how to spell it out for an operator if need be if there was an emergency. :)