2. Some humans send all their faxes manually, and don't hit the
> "start" button until they hear the receiving fax answer and start
> squawking at them. So they try again and again, and leave hangup
> voicemail instead of sending the fax. Sometimes they can be convinced
> to change their ways, sometimes they can't.
In this case, instead of playing a fake ring tone, the box can just display a voice message to the ilk of "If you wish to send us a fax manually, please hit the Start button; If you wish to talk to someone, please wait 5 seconds before we forward your call". Meanwhile, the box listens for an incoming fax tone, and forwards the call after 5 seconds with no fax activity. What d'ya think?
One client in particular has been sending faxes this way since they
> got their first machine in the 1970s, and they've trained the entire
> office to always send faxes on manual dial, so I get to talk to them
> more often than I otherwise would!
It's always a good thing to keep in touch with customers ;-)
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: To respond to Mr. Doe's question about why messages and subsequent replies are not displayed in a 'tree' or heirarchal format, it is because mail is first processed in a Digest format, _then_ the (TELECOM) Digest output is forwarded on to Usenet for processing in comp.dcom.telecom. PAT]