Norphone

[Liv Simondsen]

Hello! I just got a Norphone and had nice phone calls with my friends! 
 

Would you like to exchange numbers ?? 
 

My number is (800)500-1025

[Eowyn Southmoor]

If you set up your number to be visible, it will appear in the Norphone Phonebook, found here: https://northbridgesys.com/phonebook/

[animats]

Aw.

It's too bad that system never really caught on. Apparently it was used more around 2009 or so.

There's a lot behind it. There's a whole range of Norphones for home and office, with all the standard phone features. There are in-world GenTek Telecom central office buildings for the phone system in Hyperion and SYZM. There were once operator positions, where avatars answered 911 and operator calls from special consoles and referred them to in-world roleplay police, fire, and coast guard units. There are phone booths.

These actually work. Outgoing calls only.

[Trinity Heartsong]

52 minutes ago, animats said:

Aw.

It's too bad that system never really caught on.

 

Agree! I think it's an awesome concept and have always included them in homes or offices I've had over the past few years, just hoping that perhaps someone might think to "call". 

[animats]

For a while, there was a thing for realistic modern roleplay in SL. NTBI, the parent of Gentek Telecom, has all the props for that. Someone could have an auto accident, and the vehicles would stop working. They'd find a phone, and call 911. The dispatcher would contact roleplay groups to send police cars, fire trucks, and a tow truck. All the roleplay groups would handle the incident, and the car would be put on a flatbed and taken to a garage for repair.

Much of this comes from the SL era before teleporting became easy.

[colleen Criss]

I never even heard of it. Good, bad? Secure? Explain please.

[animats]

All the Norphone system really does is send text messages as IMs. But it's very flexible. They have all the phone features. You can forward calls, have answering machines, have phones ring at multiple points, and so forth.

A Gentek Telecom central office in-world. This looks like a Nortel DMS-100 from maybe 1990, if you're into telephone central office equipment. The whole Gentek system is modeled after AT&T equipment from 1980s-1990.

There are two of those central offices that I know of. There are microwave relay towers in-world. There's a phone store. There's a network operations center. There are repair trucks. There's a corporate headquarters skyscraper. All beautifully detailed.

Gentek Telecom network operations center. Today, the lights are out and the big consoles are gone. Once, they were staffed.

They were very thorough about this. It's one of those in-world things, like Shergood helicopters, which are far better than they need to be.

 

[Rowan Amore]

18 minutes ago, animats said:

All the Norphone system really does is send text messages as IMs. But it's very flexible. They have all the phone features. You can forward calls, have answering machines, have phones ring at multiple points, and so forth.

A Gentek Telecom central office in-world. This looks like a Nortel DMS-100 from maybe 1990, if you're into telephone central office equipment. The whole Gentek system is modeled after AT&T equipment from 1980s-1990.

There are two of those central offices that I know of. There are microwave relay towers in-world. There's a phone store. There's a network operations center. There are repair trucks. There's a corporate headquarters skyscraper. All beautifully detailed.

Gentek Telecom network operations center. Today, the lights are out and the big consoles are gone. Once, they were staffed.

They were very thorough about this. It's one of those in-world things, like Shergood helicopters, which are far better than they need to be.

 

So texting but no actual talking?   Alrighty

[animats]

24 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

So texting but no actual talking?   Alrighty

The in-viewer browser isn't allowed microphone or camera access, so you can't do voice calls.

It would be neat, and useful, if you could make Zoom calls from in-world.

[Rabid Cheetah]

On 8/5/2021 at 5:06 PM, animats said:

It would be neat, and useful, if you could make Zoom calls from in-world.

Livestreaming from in-world to meatspace is fine, until the flying pen15es show up.  Just ask Anshe Chung.

Edited August 9, 2021 by Rabid Cheetah