Caller ID Abuse

Originally posted 2005-03-15 18:01:55

You’ve done it before: you’ve picked up the telephone and dialed the wrong number. Sometimes, you’ve realized immediately, and hung up. Other times, you haven’t realized your mistake until the answering machine answers, and the name on the machine doesn’t match the one in your little black book. Still others, you’ve gotten a live person at the other end of your call who says, \”Hello?\” or some approximation, and you don’t recognize the voice so you slam down the receiver. The foreign voice hasn’t always tripped you, though, and sometimes you’ve gone so far to ask, \”Hello? Is Bill there?\” only to be rebuffed by the response, \”I’m sorry, you have the wrong number.\”

In times past, you could just slap yourself on the forehead, recheck the number in your address book, redial with a little more precision, and forget the incident. Now, however, you must wait for the inevitable callback. \”Hello? Did someone just try to call me?\” Sometimes, the misdialed misfit even calls you by name, which they’ve oh-so-cleverly plucked off Caller ID: \”Hello? Rob Warner? Did you just try to call me?\”

Note to all you people who receive calls from some number you don’t recognize: we erred. We don’t want to talk to you. If we did, we’d have left you a message. DON’T CALL BACK!!!!

If you can’t abide by this, get rid of Caller ID.