IMS_Blog

I had occasion to buy a new landline telephone recently. Is it me, or this an area of consumer electronics that basically hasn’t moved in, what, twenty years? I looked at the ranges at a few places, and everything seems to be a) the same b) completely uninspiring. You seem to get a choice between with or without answer phone, and that’s it (don’t need an answer phone, BT have voicemail covered). “Higher-end” seems to consist of simply increasing the number of recent calls/phonebook/etc numbers, or adding more universally horrible ringtones. Given the state of mobile phones this is amazing—I don’t seem to be a landline much above the functionality my first mobile had back in, er, 2001 I think. I know these things are cheaply mass produced (in a million almost identical varieties it seems) but is there really no room for innovation? I really can’t have a polyphonic ringtone (let alone mp3 playback)? Phone memory is an issue. Christ, surely I should be able to get a memory card slot and bit of software for the PC to transfer contacts etc. And don’t get me started on two tone, one line displays!

Really it does seem that its an area in complete stagnation. I’d have paid a bit more for something a little bit cooler (despite how little I use the landline for actual telephony) but I wasn’t given the chance.

Full disclosure: Amazon did turn up this Binatone thing (which reviews suggested was way under powered) and a quick google just now found this from Archos, which looks a bit nicer. Really though, I don’t necessarily want something on the scale of Android, just something better than what is out there.