Technology

Back in the day (ow my back) carriers let you control how calls are diverted by dialling one of those * 123*12345# type numbers.

I believe if you use a service like Google Voice you actually can block numbers. You can even set filters and play specific messages for different numbers (I sent "unknown" numbers to a recording that told them they need to unblock caller ID)

Because America is a third world country with shiny veneers

It's actually pretty big problem in Spain. I have to keep blocking spam numbers. I think it's the same in Poland. EU is not regulating this, it's up to individual governments and some are not handling it well.

We have a government agency the FCC that's fucking worthless because it's full of people who get money from big telecom companies.

Don't you know that you're not free? You'd only be free if something like this went unpunished/s

In US here. I do not remember last time I heard a robocall. A years ago? I did get one robocall message couple months back though.

Here in the UK, I get one a year. I used to get more, but then I answered a couple and was deliberately obstinate in a way that seems to have gotten me added to a blacklist.

"No, you called me, so you have to prove that you are who you say you are. We'll start with your company registration number, registered office, and FCA registration number." No threats or profanity or abuse, just firm demands that they prove their identity. They always hang up, stop calling, and tell their fellow scammers not to bother with me.

I definitely don't trust the government to regulate properly, but I do trust the scammers to recognise that pestering me wastes their time and gets them nothing. While it may seem like the 2-3 minutes per year spent stubbornly refusing to give any personal information until I've done "due diligence checks" is a waste of my time, I consider it an investment, since I don't have to deal with any calls in the future.

The Pampers app does this well. First I tried Luvs and Huggies but they were trash.

The alternative would be a non-standard diaper app that, rather than hiding the incoming call, would pick it up and drop it. I don’t know if such software exists.

I assume you meant dialer app 😆 . But anyway, for some Android phones you can use call screening.

But why does it work like that? You could just as easily make the phone silently pick up and silently hang up.

No, most blocking these days is done on the device level.

It used to be that your provider was the one who would manage individual number blocks, but now that smartphones can do that trivially easily, calling up your provider to ask to block a number will end up with the rep telling you how to block the number from your device. Granted, you still can do carrier-level blocking, but most carriers are moving away from it because the user isn't in control of those settings. Carriers are mostly hands-off with blocks, unless you're blocking specific types of numbers (like 5-digit shortcode numbers or toll lines).

So yes, this is 100% a failure of the OS in this case.

You leave a voicemail by calling someone.

Exactly. Maybe I can disable it altogether...?

2002 called but it got voicemail.

Okay I see this sentiment everywhere and I'm genuinely curious how people are living their lives that they have no use for voice mail.

Everytime I'm working with a job recruiter, a doctor's office, or a financial institution, when it comes to notifying me of a need to talk over the phone or in person, or just give me a brief update, phone/voicemail is usually the go-to. Email is usually reserved for more "important" communications, and banks, especially, aren't normally going to text you anything beyond their standard notifications/ questionaires. And in the case of recruiters, specifically, if you don't have a voicemail, there's no message to them confirming your number is yours, and they may just assume your information is incorrect, or determine you're too much of a hassle to get in contact with.

It's not like I don't have issues with it. 90% of my messages are unsolicited garbage I end up deleting anyway, but I would find it incredibly stressful if I'm waiting to hear back from somebody important and think the reason the comms aren't going smoothly is because I don't have voicemail.

Given voicemails start with a call, OP probably expected that voicemails would be blocked since you have to perform a blocked call in order to leave one.

What do you do for contractors, Doctors, etc?