> My telephone rang, I picked it up, and music played for about 10 seconds. Then it started ringing, as if I had called someone, even though I hadn't. Being the curious person that I am, I decided to wait it out. Five rings later, someone picked up the phone and a male voice said, "Hello?"
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Boy, the amazing advances in the technology of telemarketers. The auto-dialer has been around for quite some time now but with computers and the databases they can access, the salespeople who want so badly to speak to me have all sorts of information at their fingertips. While privacy advocates might cringe at the idea of how much information is in these databases, I actually enjoy the advances that have been made because it has made my life a bit easier.

Now, the computer on the telemarketer's end dials up for the random person who is lucky enough to get my name. As the computer dials and gets a connection, it is displaying my name on the screen of the telemarketer so they can sound like they know me. This gives me an advantage. When I answer the phone, there is usually a silence of about a second or two while the computer gets everything finished or something, allowing me to identify that the person is a telemarketer so I can hang up. Unfortunately, this doesn't get me off any lists and just allows them to call me back some other time so I can hang up on them again. We even have caller ID now so if it is a telemarketer, it usually comes up as, "Out Of Area," so I can be extra ready or just not answer and let the machine answer.

Sometimes, I answer knowing that it will be a sales call and wait for the person to come on before hanging up. You can always tell because of all the background noise on the other end but what gets me is how often *nobody* picks up. I should keep a tally but I bet that more than 50% of the time, nothing ever connects. I'm no statistician, but that's not real efficient.

The phone company even came up with a program for Caller ID users called Privacy Manager. It made it so unidentified calls had to reveal who they were before we answered. It was great because we got maybe two sales calls the during the two weeks we had it activated. Unfortunately, people we wanted to talk to had to jump through some hoops, too, and it wasn't worth annoying our friends and family for a little peace, so we cancelled the service.

My name is easy to pronounce. Friends of mine who have names with various pronunciation potential love getting calls from telemarketers because it allows them to "lie" without actually doing so. My friend, "Mr. Chuidian," has no problem saying, "No, he doesn't live here," when they ask for Mr. Chy-die-ann. For some reason, "Johnson," is usually pronounced appropriately. I suppose that "Mr. Johnson" could be my dad, though.

And how do I get on some of these lists? I don't own a house so I have no need to re-finance or install new windows. I know that by buying certain magazines or visiting certain web sites, I need to expect my name will get out there. I guess they are just aiming low for results and that is all they need.

Fer"have had one call like Ell's where I was put on hold right away"rick