As I've had time I've been reading back issues of this newsgroup. It
> still amazes me how far we've come in such a short time span.
>
> I came across a posting from 1993 (sorry, I can't find it on Google
> Groups) about a college without phones in the dorm rooms and how the
> local telco was balking about the free phones (to call the campus
> exchange only) competing with the pay phones.
>
> I went to college in the late 1980's. Phones in the students' dorm
> rooms was still a recent event. There was a blank spot on the walls
> where the free and pay phones used to be located. I also remember the
> campus having to do away with the free phones in other buildings that
> called the two campus exchanges only because they were competing with
> the then Southern Bell payphones. I figured out that the call boxes
> across campus could be used to dial off-campus. It was like using a
> speaker phone, but I once even used my AT&T calling card to place a
> long distance call on one just to show it could be done.
>
> I got to be thinking. Today almost all college students have cell
> phones. I visited a local college campus recently and was amazed to
> see no one was speaking to another human being. They were yacking
> into cell phones. Do colleges still need to have land lines in the
> dorm rooms? Sure, there's going to be that odd student here and there
> without a cell phone.
>
> Just thinking today... :-)
>
> John
> --
> John Mayson
> Austin, Texas, USA
Ha,very interesting.
But you could not imagin how is it in China only in 1980's. If one wanted to call your parents in another city,You should walk to the telephone house,and hang up the phone,then dial "114",the operator would ask you: "where?" you told her the no. of your hometown city, then the operator there would pick up your calling after about 30 minutes,then you would be transfered to your father's office after 10 minutes.........
of course, it is history. Now,even kids got their cell phone. but how about the trends and the future? No one konws.