Phone Numbers

One of marketing experts was aghast at the idea I would let a legacy number go. I had 512/209-2200 on business cards and as my professional voice mail and contact number for almost 20(1) years. Funny, to me, an inside joke, there’s a Dallas pager number linked to that same phone account.

Therein is the problem, too. Not the pager number, that was discontinued some years back, but the number, it is a pager, wireless number, and as I discovered, not a transferable number like a cell number. Or even portable home phone numbers.

The number is protected by legislation and, as such, can’t be transferred.

It is not a transferable number. I had one chance, back more than a decade ago, I could’ve transferred it to a phone number because the pager company was owned by Verizon — at the time. The pager company was sold off, though, and as such, the number is not available under current rules.

In the last year, I’ve gotten one paying, business call on that number. One. That was more than a year ago. Cost is roughly $50 per quarter, or $200 per annum, or $17 a month.

There’s a temp (burner) phone listed on the astrofish.net/contact page. I use that as a reading line, and not much else.

I hopped on a Magic Jack number at $60 for a 5 year plan, and to me, that is a disposable number.

“Cell” phones, mobile phone, digital phone, and other ways, like texting? Much more common, these days.

The one business call was a single reading at half an hour, once in the last year …

It’s not that I am so tied to that one number, not the case. The technology it is hooked through is dead end tech. I’m sure, just south of town in the boomtown of the Eagle Ford Shale economy, I’m sure there’s a place for two-way pagers. Still.

However, in my business? Change. Change is good, and letting go of both dead tech, and now, a dead phone number? Fitting end to the Mars and Mercury mayhem.

Not the biggest, but still the best — astrofish.net —

(1) Really, in retrospect, more than 20 years for that number. The account it was on, I’ve had that since 1991. Interesting only in terms of scalability.