The route an Obie/Google Voice call takes
Lateralg:
Correction:
Count me in ... maybe.
Reminds me of Red Green's man's prayer:
I'm a man.
But I can change
If I have to ...
I guess.
oldtimercurt:
Vulcan Tourist
I have similar set up. Don't put too much stock in availability of internet phone. Had massive power failure couple weeks ago. Came into the office and the old modem was blinking away trying to sync up. Whoops, no cable. Ergo, no internet phone, even though all MY network stuff was working. Had to fall back to that plug-in POTS. IT WORKED.
OTC
lavarock7@gmail.com:
I have read many of the questions and responses in this thread and have some comments. I may be way off, but here is my take.
Although these may be very active seniors, I would not get very technical with them. My Mom still tells me she wants to keep the phone call short so she does not run up my phone bill. Something about going through the Depression I guess. At least she doesn't cover the wall outlets to keep the electricity from leaking out.
I would give them a simple diagram of how VOIP works, the pros and cons and compare a couple of services. I have 30 and 40 year old neighbors that still cannot grasp the difference of VOIP and cellphone and WiFi services. Some of these people are pretty internet savy.
At a major computer company I had to adjust an under desk UPS. The secretary, who was somewhat technically inclined, had the computer plugged into the filtered outlets and the electric stapler in the UPS outlets.
I have a young neighbor who has his own ecommerce site. He connects to it from home and when he cannot connect he calls me and says "the website is down". I ask him if he can get to any other websites? He says no. I ask him if his cable TV has any channels working. He says no. I sigh.
Giving people (whether technical or not) too many options may confuse them. To prove this, try walking into a cellphone store and ask what a cellphone will cost you per month. Try to get a single, simple cost.
My friend used to program ESS phone switches, yet it took an extended discussion on how I was able to take a free UK inbound number connected to an OBI and then route a call out GoogleVoice so he could make local US calls when he was in London.
You may overload these people with too much data. If they want lots of info, there are internet sites :-)
If I was trying to save seniors money, I would limit the discussion to a couple charts and real-life examples. Do they have a landline (POTS) and will they keep it for 911? Some cities may allow them a dialtone and 911 calling after stopping service but there are cases where it can be deleted from their line. Do they need to keep their existing number? Most seniors will want that as they still write their friends numbers in the address books in pen.
I see this as an additional service for seniors with them keeping their landline and perhaps changing to a metered service on it.
Lateralg:
Thanks Lavarock. Good info.
"I would give them a simple diagram of how VOIP works, the pros and cons and compare a couple of services. ..." I would value your expanded input on these points.
"I see this as an additional service for seniors with them keeping their landline and perhaps changing to a metered service on it." 80%-90% of my audience will fit this description. The remaining 10%-20% can be as geeky as a techi-teenager. I'll be ready to inoffensively deflect their questions and "challenges".
"You may overload these people with too much data. If they want lots of info, there are internet sites :-)"
Yep. I'll have list of: Issue/question -> URL.
If you have more to add, I welcome hearing from you.
coolclay:
I remember growing up on a farm and when the power went out, the phone still usually worked.
I do have a cell phone which may or will probably work during a power outage.
The power outage thing and phones depends on allot of factors, where you live what kind of power loss, where the phone company gets their power, etc.
On the farm, we sometimes could have power and no phone too.
Of course things have changed allot and in some ways not at all.
If power goes out, the provider may still have power. My internet comes in on my phone line so nothing has changed there, but the internet would be down because the modem needs electricity.. easy solution. Provide
your own power with a battery back up (UPS). You have the same odds as with the old technology because you are still using the same company and lines and much of the same technology.
In my city, I have maybe had power outage 3 times in the last ten years. Who did I want to phone? The power company "like all my neighbors".
As far as voip providers, some are more reliable than others which is a related but separate issue.
Tel cos do generally provide good service.
Not sure if loss of phone service is a reason to loose your head though some people seem to think it's the end of the world. I on occasion leave home without my cell phone. I know its insane!
As far as the learning thing goes, nobody can know everything and what you do learn is directly related to effort. Some older people have different priorities, then again some younger people do too.
I know I learn things a little at a time. Also up until recently knew nothing about voip.
Someone asked about provider experiences and someone talked about their experience of vonage over ooma.
The big difference in quality most people have with vonage over other voip services is vonage equipment has built in qos. If you do a proper voip setup, with proper qos, any voip provider should give you identical quality.
When I first started, the qos and bandwidth issues were a challenge for me, however I have since tried multiple voip providers with similar results and and I actually get better quality now than my brother who has vonage.
One extra note on this issue, low latency is required for voip, some locations cannot get the low latency necessary and proximity to servers, connections and all that stuff plays a part.
I started with a magic jack plus and it was good "after conquering my aforementioned issues".
My problem with magic jack was that my calls would drop. Whether this was a firmware issue or company policy, I do not know. They have released a new firmware update that is supposed to help with dropped calls.
Google voice also drops calls, but usually only on very long calls. Quality with them is pretty decent. My latency to their servers could be better. I still use google voice.
Voip buster was also decent, but, I like the freephoneline/google voice option.
Free phoneline has been quite good for me. No dropped calls. Good service, decent long distance prices.
Reliability for service being up is not as good for this service, but has not been an issue yet for me. Also even if they are down, I still have other options with other voip services.
For presentations, demonstrations can be a good way to go.
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