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American `Cell Phone' = British `Mobile' = German `Handy'
(Ugh!)
Mobile(s) Sometimes Off Or Not Receiving !
MOBILE MAY BE OFF IN OWN OFFICE & AT HOME etc.
- I prefer you first use my normal terrestrial phone number or email.
- No point incurring un-necessary microwave radiation to
brain via mobile in own office.
- Avoiding mobiles allows a full size desk hand- set that
can jam between head & shoulder, leaving both hands
free for computer, or to be able to switch to desk head
set.
- Android smart phone may be
busy, not available for mere phone calls when in own
office.
- I don't want any SMSs !
Exception : After Payment For : Computer Consultancy
Business
Company & personal
policy is NO Mobile Numbers Until After First Payment Received (may be
advance partial payment on account). We've been in business long
enough to know offers of work, purchase orders, &
contracts may be nice, but only Money Talks !
MUNICH OFFICE BLOCKS : MOBILE PHONE, SMS & EMAIL
PROBLEMS
If your company is not in Munich & you have difficulty
contacting me or other of my
company's consultants, Please Realise:
Numerous newer Munich offices occupied by computer,
electronic & pharmaceutical industries etc, have thin
metal film on windows. It blocks or degrades mobile phone
usage, including SIMs on smart phones for email. It's
purposes /[intended?] effects might include:
- To block solar gain, reduce air conditioning
cost.
- Visual privacy: Obstruct industrial espionage eg
binoculars into conference rooms.
- Electronic privacy: block RF transmissions from
monitors (long supposedly a method of copying
screens).
- Block mobile phones, so employees don't chat on flat
rate to friends.
- Block mobile phones, so business calls can't be
monitored by competition with a base station.
- Block mobile phones, so business lines can be
monitored, including business calls from visiting
suppliers to competitors.
- Block mobile phone data links, to prevent disastrous
internet firewall back door avoidance.
- Look shiney/ modern to attract purchasers (office
block purchase is very cyclical, many stood empty in
2006, Muenchners are notoriously trendy).
Thus
- Mobile Phone & SMS
Communication may not work reliably or at all (depending
on single/dual band, location, provider).
- Internet by company internal WiFi base station
undoubtedly blocked by firewall etc.
- Internet by WiFi to external LAN base station won't
work unless perched by open window, & finding an
insecure external adjacent WiFi base station (fat
chance!).
- Internet via GPRS & SIM card (if equipped) may
not work reliably or at all (depending on single/dual
band, location, provider).
- Internet access for email
&/or via HTTP to remote server likely blocked by
company firewall.
- Don't be surprised if you find it difficult to
contact my company's
consultants visiting such buildings.
- If such a building belongs to your customer, & my company's mobile
consultants are visiting there on your behalf, if you
need to make urgent contact, do it through your contact
who is a registered permanent employee there, who has a
terrestrial phone line &/or firewall access for email.
- It's hard to contacts consultants if we're working
shifts & after an RF screened building after
midnight; we don't hang around outside on cold wet dark
nights to check for phone calls mails & SMS missed,
or answer incoming mobile calls driving in the dark, both
v. dangerous & illegal in Germany, & on arrival
home after midnight we're not trying to avoid answering
you, but merely about to Sleep.
- Sensible customers understand: If you send
consultants to work in 3rd party customer RF screened
buildings, with no cabled phone & internet access
while at work, business communication Will degrade.
- Do NOT phone me at 3 in the
morning ! :
A Canadian multi- national had management too aggressive
for such explanation, they repeatedly phoned at 3 in the
morning, then evaded payment for work done, & wrote
evil threats to evade debt brokers; We sued; They
paid.
DRIVING CARS
I NEVER answer mobile phones while driving a car.
-
It's long been a criminal offence in Britain & then
in Germany too. Punishable by
- (Initially ?) 60 Euro fine in Germany
(small>(probably gone up a lot since, many speeding
fines went up in 2021/2022).
- Points endorsed on driving licence in
Flensburg
- It doubtless counts as culpable for potentially
heavy liability damages if there's an accident.
- It's Dangerous & Immoral: I won't put pedestrians,
other drivers, my passengers, or myself at risk for benefit
of your business or pleasure.
- I've never used a mobile phone when driving, even
before it was a criminal offence.
- As passenger: I rarely am, (I'm usually a
driver), but keep it short, or talk at motorway stops/ car
parks: Mobiles in cars transmit at higher power to defeat
the partial Faraday Cage of the car. How long do I want to
irradiate my brain, & impose one sided phone chat on
others in a car ?
- City Driving: Reports suggest hands free kits
are distracting. I won't use one alone for city driving, It
might possibly be OK for light rural traffic, but then I
often have a passenger who can answer for me. My business
trips tend to be short distance in heavy & aggressive
Munich traffic, not safe for `hands free' verbal
distraction.
- Longer business trips: if driving my associates
have my mobile & can answer. Be aware a metal car is a
semi Faraday cage, mobiles automatically increase their
microwave transmission power. Localised warming of brain
cells occurs at normal power (to unknown effect). Not all
adjacent passengers or driver want to radiate their brain
faster than normal. Keep the call Short! If I want to call,
I often stop the car to stretch for a brief break.
- Petrol Stations: (American: Gas, German Benzin):
Use Illegal. RF (Radio Frequency) pulsed energy could
produce a spark. Leaving your phone powered up in trouser
pocket near fumes from the fuel nozzle during tanking seems
foolish, mobiles periodically poll for contact, & if
your trouser leg is leaning near the Faraday cage reflector
of the bodywork while you fill up ... ? Some petrol
stations & some countries ban mobiles Not because of RF
but because of the higher the risk of dropping them, &
battery causing a spark.
ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT
- Munich U-Bahn
(City underground railway) : Phone use illegal. SMS legal
- Munich S Bahn
(suburban trains traveling further: mobiles allowed.
- German National
Trains: legal.
- European Planes: Illegal to power on transmitter
device, thus no acoustic mobile phone , no SMS, (even powering up a dumb mobile
phone to consult eg a calendar or calculator app will be
illegal, as dumb phone will poll base stations. A smart
phone can be switched to flight mode, after which
calculator & other apps will be legal, so long as No
app disables flight mode, (& no normal users have
knowledge of their phone settings & permissions, unless
they have rooted their smart
phone))
PUBLIC VENUES
SPORTS TRIPS: Cycling, Skiing, Mountain & Flat Land
Walking, Wind Surfing
- I wont answer most of the time, unless by chance
sitting in a cafe, or on a mountain, stopped for a
break.
- Cycling: I never
answer a phone while cycling. It would be far too
dangerous. I go Fast. By the time I've found a safe place
to stop, & pulled phone out, you'll have hung up, I'll
have wasted energy, & you'll have made me late[r] than
maybe I already was, & I'll have become extremely hot
for lack of air cooling. So I won't answer!
- Skiing: Similar for
skiing, plus also there are some situations too perilous
for self &/or others to pull out a mobile from a
backpack even if stationary. Plenty of ski mountains I know where coverage doesn't
work half the time.
- Mountain
walking, it depends, sometimes not convenient/
safe.
- Flat land
group walking trips I can usually receive a call
most of time (but not phone you so easily, squinting at a
small screen in bright day light with no shadow is a great
way to trip over rocks, & maybe down a hill, else need
to stop & lose group ahead, or if leading a group,
inconvenience whole group by stopping just for you - guess
what ? I may not answer.
- Wind Surfing
Trips: Even when on dry land, mobile may already be
in locked car, car key buried in waterproof bag, in pocket
of swimming trunks, deep under wet suit that takes ages to
struggle into, zip up from the back, under trapeze &
buoyancy jacket. I don't have a half hour to de-rig, look
up who has long hung up, phone someone back, & re-rig
all the surf gear.
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