Who invented 411

Your phone belonged to the phone company and you paid rental on it. A person-to-person call is an operator-assisted call in which the calling party requests to speak to a specific party and not simply to anyone who answers. The caller is not charged for the call unless the requested party is reached. Short answer: yes. The job just looks much different than it used to. Call if you have a life-threatening emergency. Read How can I get help in an emergency? If you are having problems making a call, you can contact the UK Operator on , or the International Operator on In particular, telephone technology has rapidly evolved in a relatively short period.

RTimages — stock. To explain, hanging up a call used to mean hanging the handheld receiver onto the wall-mounted phone body to disconnect the call. The closest thing that we have to that today is with a DP1 wireless home business desk phone where you can end a call by placing the receiver back in the cradle.

The phrase dates back to the dials that were on rotary phones. This technology predated the touch-tone system, and it functioned because the rotary dial generated electrical pulses that were recognized by the network. To put it in context, check out how painful it is to watch two teens try to dial a number on a rotary phone. Previously, the first step of making a call was to pick up the receiver and check for a dial tone. This monotone sound was how users knew the phone line was working. The phrase has been around since the s, following the automation of phone networks to no longer rely upon human telephone operators.

In a time before Google, you needed a phone book to look up a phone number. However, there was a separate phone book for each geographical region. This meant that phone numbers were harder to locate. Since the s, dialing has been a way to call information and get a phone number or other directory assistance.

In each telephone book, the white pages contained an alphabetical directory of all the households in the city along with their landline phone numbers. Another reference to the phone book, this slogan was part of the advertising campaign of the Yellow Pages. The Yellow Pages portion of the phone book was a directory of businesses listed by category, such as plumbers or museums. It inspired classic TV commercials such as this one from a classic jingle. This would prevent any incoming calls from connecting.

As the Stones explained in their song Off the Hook, taking the phone off the hook is an old-fashioned version of ghosting. Save Word. Definition of Synonyms for Synonyms advice s , gen [ chiefly British ], info , information , intelligence , item , news , story , tidings , uncos [ chiefly Scottish ], word Visit the Thesaurus for More. Examples of in a Sentence received a call from their daughter, who excitedly gave them the on all that had happened to her since arriving on campus a guide that will give you the on what's hot and what's not.

First Known Use of , in the meaning defined above. History and Etymology for from the telephone number used to reach directory assistance. Learn More About Time Traveler for The first known use of was in See more words from the same year. From the Editors at Merriam-Webster. Statistics for Look-up Popularity.