Looking up the number in the phone book used to be a pretty common thing to do.
And you could actually see the address, too.
Soon, kids are going to say “Gee whiz, grandpa, that must have been cool back in the old days”
Is there a specific reason for cell phone companies not doing it?
In the USA anyways, users pay for incoming calls, so nobody WANTS their number published.
I don’t think anybody wants their number published at all nowadays.
If somebody knows my name but not my number, for every situation where I would want them to get it from a phone book I can envision ten thousand where I wouldn’t.
I’d imagine the turn-over for cell phone numbers has to be extremely high: people switching companies, moving, getting their phone service turned off for whatever reason . . . By the time the numbers were collected, organized and published (not to mention distribution) the information would already be out of date.
Plus, you’d have to find different ways of grouping the millions of cellphone numbers nationwide into hundreds or even thounsands of books. With landline telephones, this is easy: Each city (in rural regions, each geographically defined area) gets into one directory, so the directory essentially gives you the local numbers. With cellphones, the geographical location of the customer doesn’t matter. Of course, you could still group the subscribers based on their domicile in the cases in which the telephone company knows their customers’ addresses (which isn’t always the case, as with prepaid SIM cards). But this criterion wouldn’t make too much sense with cellphones, which, by definition, are mobile while a landline number isn’t.
I remember seeing telefax books for entire Germany in the early 1990s, listing every published telefax number in the country. I guess they became extinct when the number of telefax users grew (with faxes now being replaced by e-mail, these directories would probably experience a revival if it were not for the CD-ROM and online directories).
Just a guess, but doesn’t the revenue from regular phone books actually comes from the yellow pages in back? And I would bet companies aren’t going to pay to be listed in the yellow-cell-pages – if they had a cell# they wanted public, they’d just put it in an ad in the regular yellow pages. So maybe no one bothers the make cell-pages because there’s no profit in it?
Again, just a theory.
Phone books could be produced because until very recently, everyone in a region would get there service from one company. Creating the directory was just a matter of producing a customer list. Now, with multiple landline options in most areas, plus national carriers like vonage and a half dozen cellular providers, creating one city phone book is a much more complicated task.
You’re partly correct: companies who place ads have staffed offices with landlines (even if its the business-owners home with an answering machine “This is Mike’s Plumbing. I’m not at my desk, but if you…” ). The general attitude is that business cell numbers are given to those whom one has already established a (usually positive) relationship, whereas landlines are left for new customers, bill collectors, and the like.
However, the real reason is simple: directory size. How many books would it take to list all 51,900,000 individual numbers in the Sprint/Nextel network? I’m not at the office to get the latest info, but a database that was current in 2003 (that I have at home) shows that even the largest-circulation directories (SBC’s “West Houston” book at 1,954,000 copies) contains a “mere” 1.3-1.5 million listings at best.
You could take a cell phone subscriber list and break it down into more manageable areas of couse, but again as some have already mentioned, the issues of changing cell numbers, the general aversion to giving out ones cell number to “just anybody”, the fact that people pay for incoming calls, and that a “Sprint” directory would automatically eliminate everybody in the city that’s not Sprint… well, the challenges to overcome are daunting.
There are also regulatory issues that I could be unaware of, privacy restrictions, that sort of thing. Hell, the reason why you get a phone book is because it’s a standard requirement by each State’s PSC*'s that your local exchange carrier must publish a yearly paper directory of all the people in the local (toll-free) network.
These rules have been in place since the 1930’s, and, to me, the first real sign that “phone books are dying” will be when companies like SBC and Verizon start petitioning the states to make them stop publishing the things. However, since the average net margin on a directory is 40-60%, I wouldn’t expect them to start doing so tomorrow. 
As a matter of fact (since I’m digressing, I might as well go whole hog) it was announced this week that Windstream Publishing (formerly ALLTEL) is being taken private by an equity group that already has a controlling stake in RHD/Sprint and Qwest directories.
*“Public Service Commission” in Georgia, the agency that regulates telecommunication issues - your states acronym may vary.
Well, I for one don’t want to get spammed by either telemarketers or text messages, considering it costs me money when I get called or text messages.
Another reason why a cell phone phonebook would not be all that useful is that people put lots of numbers on their cell phone’s built in contact list.
Back in the olden days, if there was a person or place that I called every once in awhile, I would have to look it up each time in phonebook. Now, everyone I call, or anyone who calls me, I may add them to my phone contact list. The numbers of relatives, my top 3 pizza places, my wife’s office main line, my neighbor’s numbers, and semi-important business numbers are all now stored easily in my cell.
Damn, I feel old! In the old days, when someone gave you their number it was on a slip of paper. If you lost that paper then you would look in the phone book for their number. Now a days, it seems that most people carry cells everywhere. I immediately put people’s numbers in my phone and every once in a while stick them on my computer for back up. I never lose numbers anymore so there is no need to look them up and when I do want to look up numbers of old friends, I am simply use google. I also use google instead of the yellow pages. I’ve lived in my current location for three years now and have never used a phone book. If I want to find the plumbers now, I simply use the internet. I have friends who don’t even use the internet but call 411 every time they want to find the phone number of some place.
Do you mean that the law currently requires them to publish their directories? I never knew that. I always thought they did it voluntarily, for the advertising and publicity. For example, even if there is such a law, it certainly doesn’t require them to load up the first few dozen pages with maps and other sorts of free information.
For example, from the Ohio Administrative Code 4901:1-6-01, administered by the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio:
The law requires that the carrier with the local exchange monopoly (usually the “Baby Bells”, but not always) publish a directory of all the people within the network. (It’s a little more complicated than that, but the gist is correct). These laws are at the state level, not federal.
The maps and free information are placed in the phone books to attract advertisers: “See, our book is more useful than the other guys!”
Phone directory advertising was started as a response to the regulatory requirement: “Well, if we have to publish these things, let’s try to generate some revenue with them.”