Call Someone – Without Having To Talk To Them

waderoush writes "After a long beta period, Boston-based MobileSphere launched a 'straight-to-voicemail' service yesterday called Slydial. If you call 267-SLY-DIAL and listen to a short ad, you can then be connected to the voicemail inbox of any US mobile phone subscriber, without causing their phone to ring. Sounds kinda useful — but incredibly, MobileSphere is pitching the service as a way to avoid actually communicating with all those difficult, boring people in your life. In reply to suggestions that Slydial erodes and cheapens genuine human interaction, a MobileSphere exec says the company is just combating technology with technology, by helping people take control of whether and when to talk with their friends, family, and coworkers."

Pound?

Typically, can't you just hit # on most systems and go straight to the voicemail? It worked that way on two of my previous mobiles.

Re:Pound?

Sure you can hit # to get right ion to voice mail, but you have to be fast otherwise you might have to talk to an actual person and we can't have that now, can we?

Re:Pound?

Their phone would ring too. This service is supposed to avoid that.

This feature would probably be most useful if you know the person can't be disturbed (ie. they're in a meeting). You could just slydial them and leave a nice descriptive message.

meetings? silence your phone

Seriously, if they are in a meeting - or elsewhere where a ringing phone is frowned upon - have them silence the thing.

But I'm sure the marketing people will love this. Now they can 'call' you while circumventing a ton of provisions, including telling them to stop calling you right in the very phone call. .. not to mention kids and pranksters.

I'd check my contract on the services rendered by my provider to see if this can be blocked.

Re:Pound?

It would be great for those awkward next day calls. "No baby I called you. Check your voicemail! Your phone was probably in a blackout zone."

Re:No pound needed.

I'm sure they call the provider's "check your voicemail remotely" number.

For example, with Sprint, you can dial the area-code, and exchange followed by 6245 (mail), and then proceed to enter a mailbox number to check (with password) or send (without password) a message to.

Other providers have a similar number.

So instead telling people this, these guys are having you listen to an advertisement and dialing the number for you.

Re:Pound?

Sure you can hit # to get right ion to voice mail, but you have to be fast otherwise you might have to talk to an actual person and we can't have that now, can we?

If I don't want to talk to someone, I call them and let it ring and let them pick up. Then I just start screaming "I'm gonna cut off your head and shit down your neck!" over and over until they hang up, and then I never have to worry about talking to them again. Sometimes I have to talk to the police, but hey, who ever said you could reach never-talking-to-anyone nirvana without a price?

Verizon

Actually, this can already be done on Verizon Wireless to Verizon Wireless calls, and maybe AT&T as well.

Dial your OWN voicemail, then once you get to the main menu, hit option 2 to send a message. It then asks you for the 10 digit mailbox number (which is the subscriber's phone number with area code), it says their recorded name, and allows you to leave a voicemail.

I've used this to try to determine who called me if they don't leave a message - the system will play their recorded clip of them reading their name.

Re:Verizon

I've used this to try to determine who called me if they don't leave a message - the system will play their recorded clip of them reading their name.

Ooo...very nice tip. Thanks for the heads up.

On a side (but related) note, I really hate when someone calls me back when I dial a wrong number. Conversation goes something like this.

Me: [calls wrong number]
Me: Oh crap! [hang up]
My Phone: [ring, ring]
Me: Hello?
Random Person: Who is this?
Me: Ummm...who is this?
RP: You just called my phone a second ago. Who are you?
Me: I did? No...I don't think so. I was looking at pr0n a minute ago. I definitely wasn't calling your phone.
RP: [silence]
Me: [hangs up]

I get it..

Send email to xyz: "Dood, wanna join the party? It's, like, gonna be awesome!!!"

Send SMS to xyz: "Hey, chk ur email"

Then send the vmail to xyz: "Have your checked your SMS?"

Not exactly correct.

Send email to xyz: "Dood, wanna join the party? It's, like, gonna be awesome!!!"

Yep.

Send SMS to xyz: "Hey, chk ur email"

Yep.

Then send the vmail to xyz: "Have your checked your SMS?"

Nope. More like:
"uhh hh hhh uh dood? I uh hh huh h mmmmmmm wanted to callyouabouttheparty and uh uh uh uh the party is ...."

Repeat for about 10 minutes.

I HATE voice-mail because almost no one knows how to leave a message CORRECTLY.

Correct method:
"Hi! This is *name* at *call back number* and I wanted to talk to you about *subject*. Once again, this is *name* at *call back number* calling about *subject*. Bye!"

Incorrect method 1:
"Hi! This is *name*. Call me."
Unless you are the girlfriend/boyfriend. Then it is allowable.

Incorrect method 2:
"Hi! About the thing that blah blah blah blah blah *ten minutes pass* blah blah blah bl" Cut off by message limit timer.

I prefer email and text because it takes MORE effort to type in excess material than voice-mail does.

Text text text text text...

Voice mail is worse than talking to those boring people. I hate voice mail.

If I want to communicate with someone without calling them, I'll take text any day.

Voice Messaging

Voice messaging is a lot easier and less dangerous than text messaging, and we do that all the time. I see nothing wrong with this, and in fact was just talking about this idea with some friends a few months ago. What with the iPhone's visual voice mail, I think this is good for the times when you want to quickly leave a person a message without wanting to disturb them, instead of sending them a text message. Now more phones need an easy interface for picking which voice messages you want to listen to.

you say that

. In reply to suggestions that Slydial erodes and cheapens genuine human interaction,

You say that as if it's a bad thing :-)

You can then be connected to the voicemail inbox..

And therefore guaranteed to never receive a response!
I don't think I -ever- check my voicemail unless I've accidentally missed a call I know is important, and almost nobody I know checks theirs on their personal cell either.
Text messaging has replaced leaving voicemail for reminders and invitations, as it's much easier and more convenient.
I think this is a service far past its time. Maybe it would have been useful in the 90s.
Work is different, but this isn't exactly targeted at businesspeople.

Re:You can then be connected to the voicemail inbo

I don't think I -ever- check my voicemail unless I've accidentally missed a call I know is important, and almost nobody I know checks theirs on their personal cell either.

Seriously? Whenever I see the little voicemail icon lit up, I check it. You really just ignore the messages until they get auto-deleted unless you think there's something especially good in there?

At last!

Finally! A way to call my mother so that she'll stop bitching about me never calling and at the same time avoiding making it last 50 minutes everytime. A win-win situation!

Yes, I do call my mother sometimes, it's just more convenient than yelling from the bottom of the basement for food.

It's not necessarily antisocial, just practical

It's another tool in the handbag of communication and ettiquette.

Visits being the highest priority and inconvenience.
Phonecalls being the next step down in priority and inconvenience.
Voicemail.
E-mail.
IM.

Use the appropriate tool for the level of urgency. Bothering everybody with a visit on your timetable is extremely disruptive to THEIR timetable, so it should only be done when it's called for.

Rest of my Friends

Cool, now I don't have to talk to the remaining friends that I have.

Great idea!

I'm sure anyone in IT can relate to the concept of someone you'd rather not talk to, but have to leave a message for. I have several people like this that I need to work with. Having a conversation with them is like root canal therapy sometimes. Being able to leave them messages and not actually speak to them would definitely lower my daily stress levels.

Call me anti-social, but these people could drive anyone nuts.

Erodes and cheapens?

Slydial erodes and cheapens genuine human interaction . . .

No, what erodes and cheapens genuine human interaction is being so boring that your friends would rather talk to your voicemail than to you.

Re:What's the point?

"Hey boss! Sorry I'm leaving ANOTHER message! Working from home today as usual. Are you out of town? I've called three times today but you must be in an area without coverage. I really need to talk with you about some implementation specifics before I can start coding." (goes back to sleep)

Re:What's the point?

Hey employee! Talk to bob about the implementation issues. And I'm gonna have to ask you to work at the weekend again.

Re:What's the point?

That reminds me of the Dilbert where he's at home in the early hours of the morning and he calls his boss (to make it look like he's working) and says something like "It's 3 am and I'm here in my underwear thinking of you" then he says "Crap" and pushes a button and says "Crap" again. Dogbert asks "Did you just send a dirty voicemail to your boss?" and Dilbert says "No, I think I pressed the group code" :-)

Re:i despise talking on the phone

Grrrrr. I'm antisocial. GRRRRRR.