Subject: [NEXTEL-1] Walkie-Talkie Phones Share Too Much Info

From: [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2003 11:06:34 -0400

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Walkie-talkie phones share too much info
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The Baltimore Sun
Kevin Cowherd
September 11, 2003

JUST WHEN you think things can't possibly get any more annoying in Cell
Phone Hell, they find a way to stoke the flames a little higher. 

Case in point: the walkie-talkie feature. 

The walkie-talkie feature, of course, raises the question: What's worse
than listening to someone having a loud, boring cell phone conversation
in public? 

And the answer is: listening to both ends of that loud, boring cell phone
conversation. 

Yes, that's right, with the walkie-talkie feature, the level of pointless
cell phone chatter we're exposed to every day is rising dramatically. 

A man walking down the bread aisle of his local supermarket can now, at
the push of a button, consult his wife about whether to bring home a loaf
of rye or whole wheat. 

Great. And all the other shoppers around him will have to endure this
wonderful conversation, as the wife says "And make sure you don't bring
home pumpernickel. You bought pumpernickel last time, and you know what
that does to me." 

Oh, this is great, great progress. 

From what I understand, Nextel has had the walkie-talkie feature with its
Direct Connect program for quite a while, and now Verizon Wireless is
jumping on the bandwagon with its "Push to Talk" feature. 

Terrific. 

And you can bet the rest of the cell phone companies will be jumping into
the market if enough consumers actually want this stupid thing, which
they will, because this is the land of people throwing money at stupid
things. 

The walkie-talkie feature is, in a sense, the evil spawn of the speaker
phone. 

Let's face it, is there anything worse than being in an office with
someone who gets a call and puts it on the speaker phone, just to show
you what a big shot he is? 

And now you have to sit there and listen to both sides of some dopey
conversation that doesn't concern you in the slightest? 

The last time this happened to me, I was in a doctor's office getting a
prescription when the phone rang. 

The doctor answered, put it on speaker phone, and proceeded to have a
five-minute conversation with some lab technician about another patient's
spleen. 

Look, I wouldn't be interested if the conversation was about my own
spleen. So to sit there and listen to them talk about someone else's
spleen, well, it was pure torture. 

It caused me great pain and, on some level, I'm sure, that doctor was
violating the Hippocratic oath. 

Anecdotal evidence suggests the walkie-talkie feature appeals mainly to
guys, which is not exactly a stop-the-presses revelation. 

In fact, on its Web site, Verizon Wireless advertises its new feature
with a picture of a young, spiky-haired, nattily dressed executive
talking walkie-talkie style into his cell phone and smiling. 

And just to show that blue-collar guys go for this, too, there's another
picture of a construction worker with a hard hat who's barking into his
walkie-talkie phone, like maybe he's saying: "Hey, where's that load of
bricks? It was supposed to be here hours ago!" 

Oh, sure, they also threw in the obligatory picture of a woman using the
walkie-talkie feature. Only her picture is an inset, about one-quarter
the size of the guys' pictures. 

Plus, from the expression on her face, it doesn't really look like she's
into the whole walkie-talkie thing. 

It almost looks like she's pressing the little button and thinking: God,
this is so stupid! Why can't we just use it like any other cell phone?! 

Whereas the guys - even the hassled construction worker - look like
they're using the walkie-talkie and thinking: This is so cool! It's like
when we were kids and played Army guy! 

Which is exactly the point. 

It's the whole GI Joe thing again for guys when they use this. And now
they don't even have to slather boot-black under their eyes and go in the
woods and sneak behind trees and pretend to shoot each other. 

The other thing I've noticed about the walkie-talkie feature is that it
has a heavy appeal for guys who wear the little holsters for their cell
phones. 

Why, some guys even wear dual holsters now for their cell phones and
pagers, making them look like modern-day gunslingers in Dockers slacks. 

When these multi-holster guys walk around with their ear-buds, the little
wires that allow you to talk on your cell phone without using your hands,
they always remind me of a Secret Service detail sweeping into a building
ahead of the president. 

Anyway, Verizon Wireless now promises coast-to-coast coverage with its
walkie-talkie feature, which means you can be in Baltimore and, with the
push of a button, you can be annoying someone in, say, California. 

And annoying everyone within hearing distance of that person, too. 

Particularly if the conversation turns to a stranger's spleen. 

Copyright (c) 2003, The Baltimore Sun

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