Yes, they are annoying. Yes, people abuse the priviledge and use them in public place where it’s less than appropriate. But now it’s fashionable to chew out people should they forget that they’ve left it on and it, Og forbid!, goes off during the climactic scene of “yours, mine and ours”.
So now the theaters want to turn off the phones *for you * by blocking the signals? Fuck off! I can’t stand my cell phone. It’s there for my convenience and I turn it on when I need to make a call or absolutely must be reached. So if I’m in a theater enjoying a movie and my sitter needs to reach me because of an emergency concerning the kids, I’m fully capable of setting the thing on vibe and taking it outside before having a conversation. Block my signal and I’ll be shoving my phone up your ass so that you vibrate and ring every time someone needs to reach me. Fucking knee jerk reactionary twats. Get a fucking grip.
Sorry, I’m just tired of the whining about the evils of cell phone use.
Can you imagine that nightmare world people use to live in when they didn’t have a phone with them and couldn’t be reached in the theatre? My God, how did they ever survive? I love the idea of blocking cell phone signals in theatres. Just so long as they put up a sign and and let people know.
We have experimented with letting people turn their own phones to vibrate and it doesn’t work all that well. If theatres would actually escort people out of the movie/play once their phone goes off that would be one thing, but they just let it happen. So now if they block signals there is the down side that they will lose business from uptight asses who are too important to be out of touch for an hour and a half and the up side that I will not have to share a theatre with uptight asses who are too important to be out of touch for an hour and a half.
I like the idea of blocking cell phones in theatre, too. Don’t like it? Don’t go there anymore! Quickie, you may be responsible enough to put your phone on vibrate, but many people aren’t.
The other night I went to a three hour concert. It was clear that some concert-goers were unfamiliar with the venue. After the intermission, they had to be asked not to applaud after every single “song”, but to wait until the end. And as I left I overheard some people complain that “People were standing up during the Hallelujah Chorus – how rude!” In fact, fewer than half of the audience was so rude.
And yet, not one cell phone went off during the entire concert. In three hours, in a sold out hall of 1000, not a single one. And there were no signs requesting that people turn them off. Hallelujah!
So do I, but the concert hall I went to was very old and a historical landmark and run on a shoestring budget. How much would it cost to shield it, without destroying some of it? It just seems impractical.
Hmm… think they could somehow arrange for the theaters to zap the power of the cell phones (and other text message devices) so that I don’t have to be distracted by the glowing blue screens of the nitwits who insist on pulling their toys out to text message one another? I might pay extra for that.
Yes, but I can ignore the text messaging. Sure, it’s annoying sometimes, but I prefer that to the damn phone.
Seriously, what kind of asshole do you even have to be to answer your cell phone in a theatre and keep sitting there and talking on it? Damn!
And I am extremely patient most of the time. The only time I ever yelled at someone was during ROTK…I’d been waiting a *year * for that movie and some asshole wasn’t about to ruin my viewing of it. Scared him, too.
Feel free to move into the 21st century any time you like.
I think the OP has a valid complaint. If I want to be reached at all times it’s none of your damn business, so long as I’m polite enough to turn my phone to vibrate and leave the theater to take the call. Seems to me the problem is that the movie theaters are too lazy and cheap to hire people to remove the assholes who leave don’t turn them off or talk on them during the movie.
And I swear, if I hear the “you’re not important enough to need to be reached at all times” argument again, I’m going to puke. It’s not up to you to decide when I’m allowed to be contacted by my friends and family.
They don’t shield it. Nothing has to be destroyed, rebuilt or retrofitted. They install a small, short-range jammer which prevents signals from being being picked up by the phones. Antennas are placed at various points throughout the building to radiate the jamming signal, and are directed in such a way as to keep leakage of this signal outside the building to a minimum. As long as signs are placed to inform patrons of this, the FCC has no issue with it, AFAIK. And neither do I.
Works for me. The only question I have is whether such things would also block headset transmissions, often used by stage crews. If not, then I say jam those phones like they’re toast.
Probably not. AFAIK, those sorts of things are still used in the 170 MHz band–in a slice of the spectrum reserved for wireless mics and headsets, at least as of a few years ago. That being the case, they’ll likely be immune to such jamming.
More likely they’re too spineless to stand behind the position that sometimes the customer is actually wrong. Having an inanimate device do the dirty work takes the heat off.
You’re right, it is none of my business if you want to be constantly reachable. It sounds like pure hell to me, but whatever makes you happy. Alternatively, it’s none of your concern if a movie theater decides that it’s much more cost-effective to jam cell phone signals than it is too hire more ushers. You do, after all, have the option of not patronizing that theater.
Hiring more ushers doesn’t even really solve the problem anyway. Even if they did have sufficient staff to remove everyone whose cell phone rings, it’s too little, too late. The disruption has already happened, and the other patrons have already been inconvenienced.
In my world, where I Rule The Universe, when someone is talking on their cell phone, the movie goes on “pause” and the entire phone conversation is broadcast through the speakers while the screen displays stick figures being penetrated by packs of wild dogs.
I thought cellular phone jammers were illegal? And rightly so.
I hate the “people survived before…” argument more than I can possibly describe in words. People survived before the Polio vaccine (well, most people) and indoor plumbing too. This is not a valid reason to be against these things, and it is not a valid reason to be against cellular phones.
The issue here is people who are obnoxious and will recieve calls in a cinema. Being obnoxious was not invented at the same time as cellular phones. In fact, far more often see people being obnoxious by talking or wandering around than I see people talking on the phone. If the cinema likes the idea of retaining customers then it ought to strictly enforce a no-disturbance policy.
You’re right, I do have that option. And I exercise it regularly. I would never patronize an establishment that would block a service that I’m paying for.
I’ll take the word of the people posting above that cell phone jammers are illegal. I don’t see why, though, as long as the business doing the jamming clearly posts that this is happening.
Of course, cell phones are all, without exception, electronic devices. What would be cool is if we could establish a “quiet zone” signal. Places like theaters could transmit this signal and all phones in range would automatically switch to quiet or vibrate mode.
