Overlooked cell phone feature? Novel idea?

[piperpete]

(hope this is the right place).

I was thinking, what novel idea could Apple incorporate in an Apple-branded phone, that no other have?

I don't know if this is technologically feasible, but I can't see why not:

Aliases. No, not when sending mails from your cell phone, but on the number itself.

Imagine having, say, five phone numbers on your cell phone – one for your family/kids, one for your work, one for your customers/sources (I'm a journalist), one for your friends, and one for the casual encounters.

Each should be programmable with its own ringtone, and have individual profiles - so one could be pointed to the answering machine, one could be pointed to another phone, yet another could be made to "knock" and yet another could simply just ring.


Now, before anyone goes "but a lot of phones can have several ringtones, depending on who is calling", I have to say that that is different, because that way you need to have the caller id of the person ringing.

"my" way it doesn't matter if I have the caller's ID, it only matter what phone number I gave him.

So, what do you guys think?

Technologically feasible?

Would you find it as useful as I would?

 

[PlaceofDis]

why would people want to share one phone?

 

[iMeowbot]

Yeah it's feasible, I have that from Nextel. I don't know how many numbers they can support, I only have two.

why would people want to share one phone?

Beats me But it's nice to have separate personal and business numbers.

 

[piperpete]

why would people want to share one phone?

Hehe, they wouldn't - it would be yours alone - so you could give out different numbers to different people.

Yeah it's feasible, I have that from Nextel. I don't know how many numbers they can support, I only have two.

Nice, I hope that will spread. But are you paying for individual numbers? I mean, is it aliases, or "real" numbers?

 

[iMeowbot]

Nice, I hope that will spread. But are you paying for individual numbers? I mean, is it aliases, or "real" numbers?

A phone number is a phone number, so yeah, there's a real charge. Apple would be in the same boat. It's cheaper than a primary line, though. I also get separate bills to make bookkeeping easier, but that's optional.

 

[whooleytoo]

Hehe, they wouldn't - it would be yours alone - so you could give out different numbers to different people.

Exactly - so you can filter incoming calls and process them differently.

 

[thedude110]

Meh.

I just don't give anyone my phone number.

Best. Filtering. Ever.

 

[PlaceofDis]

totally misunderstood at first.

i would imagine a setup like this isn't cheap though, and a novelty.


don't see much point of it in the end though.

 

[CorvusCamenarum]

(hope this is the right place).

I was thinking, what novel idea could Apple incorporate in an Apple-branded phone, that no other have?

I don't know if this is technologically feasible, but I can't see why not:

Aliases. No, not when sending mails from your cell phone, but on the number itself.

Imagine having, say, five phone numbers on your cell phone – one for your family/kids, one for your work, one for your customers/sources (I'm a journalist), one for your friends, and one for the casual encounters.

Each should be programmable with its own ringtone, and have individual profiles - so one could be pointed to the answering machine, one could be pointed to another phone, yet another could be made to "knock" and yet another could simply just ring.


Now, before anyone goes "but a lot of phones can have several ringtones, depending on who is calling", I have to say that that is different, because that way you need to have the caller id of the person ringing.

"my" way it doesn't matter if I have the caller's ID, it only matter what phone number I gave him.

So, what do you guys think?

Technologically feasible?

Would you find it as useful as I would?

Didn't the regular phone company have this years ago? They gave you an alias phone number that made the phone ring differently based on which number was dialed, like 555-5555 was the normal line which rang normally and 555-5556 was the kids' line that rang in 2 short bursts? I think it was before CID too.

 

[piperpete]

Didn't the regular phone company have this years ago? They gave you an alias phone number that made the phone ring differently based on which number was dialed, like 555-5555 was the normal line which rang normally and 555-5556 was the kids' line that rang in 2 short bursts? I think it was before CID too.

Oh, yeah - I had completely forgotten about that!!

Heh, it should be like that with cell phones as well. Pay a nominal fee to get that. I believe it was around 10$ (the equivalent of that) to get the extra number, and that was that. No extra after that (at least it was like that here).

To the bloke that doesn't give out phonenumbers, well, I kind of have to. As it is, I am carrying two phones, one for private calls, family and the like plus for sources (which sucks, they sometimes call me at 1 in the morning), and one for business, which I shut off after I'm "off".

 

[ejb190]

Between work and personal, I juggle two land lines (my office is in my house), two cell phones, and a fax machine.

Yah, I could see the advantage to merging both cell accounts into a single phone, but there are some issues here. First, at the end of the day I like to turn off the work phone. Period. Work's over. If I am still carrying my work phone, I would probably answer it. Second, my phones are on two different carriers. Not sure if the networks would play nice with each other. Besides, If I really need to make that call, I can usually get a signal on one of them if the other is dead.

Putting both on the same phone would take away a bit of that redundancy, both for better and worse...

 

[piperpete]

Between work and personal, I juggle two land lines (my office is in my house), two cell phones, and a fax machine.

Yah, I could see the advantage to merging both cell accounts into a single phone, but there are some issues here. First, at the end of the day I like to turn off the work phone. Period. Work's over. If I am still carrying my work phone, I would probably answer it. Second, my phones are on two different carriers. Not sure if the networks would play nice with each other. Besides, If I really need to make that call, I can usually get a signal on one of them if the other is dead.

Putting both on the same phone would take away a bit of that redundancy, both for better and worse...

True. I carry my bit of technology with me (I do radio), so I'd like to get rid of some.

The thing is, if something like this would hit the market place, of course one should be able to "disconnect" each of the aliases. One by one, or all. Meaning, it should be possible to "not receive" calls on each/any of them.

 

[dsnort]

I don't see that as a feature that would have very broad appeal. Now, a cell phone with a 60gig full screen video iPod built in? Running Mac OS X Mobile allowing for full integration with AddressBook and iCal? Wireless web browsing? Utilizing a Newton like touch screen interface? Sweeeeet!

 

[piperpete]

I don't see that as a feature that would have very broad appeal. Now, a cell phone with a 60gig full screen video iPod built in? Running Mac OS X Mobile allowing for full integration with AddressBook and iCal? Wireless web browsing? Utilizing a Newton like touch screen interface? Sweeeeet!

Hehe, with two of these:

NAND

Seriously, though, how many people have said that 60 gigs in an iPod was unnecessary and that noone would use it?

Btw, I'm with you, but I dislike big phones (which it would have to be to be able to do all that you ask). In that case, I'd prefer the OQO with OS X on it instead. That way I would be able to get rid of my 15-incher.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Yes, this already exists. With GSM cell phones (ones that require a SIM chip,) I don't believe it's possible. But I know my old CDMA phone supported being registered as two phone numbers at once.

 

[OutThere]

My SLVR has spaces for 4 'lines' though I only have one in use, if that means anything.

 

[iMeowbot]

My SLVR has spaces for 4 'lines' though I only have one in use, if that means anything.

Are those the numbers that you, the end user can enter? Those wouldn't really affect this except as an informational thing.

On UMTS systems, more than one number can be assigned to a SIM. I know that Orange started to offer this not long ago, but it's a per-provider thing. And as mentioned, the Moto iDEN systems (which also use SIM cards) can also be assigned more than one line.