|
|
American `Cell Phone' = British `Mobile' = German `Handy'
(Ugh!)
Mobile Often OFF Or Not Receiving !
MOBILE OFF IN OWN OFFICE & AT HOME etc.
- I prefer people first use normal phone or email.
- I see no benefit to 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, both hands free for
computer, or to be able to switch to desk head set.
- I don't want any SMSs !
Exception : After Payment For : Computer Consultancy
Business
Company & personal
policy is to NOT require consultants to make mobile
numbers available, carry mobiles, leave on, accept calls,
or check for missed calls or SMS,
until ...
After Money Is Received
(advance deposit/ partial payment on account, whatever).
Sorry, but we've been in
business long enough to know offers of work, promises,
purchase orders, & contracts are nice, but 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 mobile consultants, Please note:
Numerous newer Munich offices occupied by computer,
electronic & pharmaceutical industries etc, have thin
metal film on windows. It blocks or degrades some mobile
phone usage. It's purposes /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 relatives.
- 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).
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.
- 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
terrestial phone line &/or firewall access for email.
DRIVING CARS
I do NOT 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
- 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, 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 much does one want to irradiate the brain just to
chat on the phone ?
- 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. Radio Frequency pulsed energy could produce a
spark Anyone who even leaves their phone powered up in
pocket near the fuel nozzle during tanking is foolish,
mobiles periodically pole for contact, & if your
trouser leg is leaning on the Faraday cage of the bodywork
while you fill up ... ?
ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT
- Munich U-Bahn
(City underground railway) : Phone use illegal. SMS legal
- Munich S Bahn
(suburban trains travelling further: mobiles allowed.
- German National
Trains: legal.
- European Planes: Illegal to power on transmitter
device, thus no acoustic mobile phone , no SMS, (even consulting eg calendar or
calculator illegal, as phone will poll base stations).
PUBLIC VENUES
SPORTS TRIPS: Cycling, Skiing, Mountain & Flat Land
Walking, Wind Surfing
- 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.
- 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 call out so easily,
squinting at small screen is a great way to trip over
rocks, else need to stop & lose group ahead, or if
leading a group, inconvenience them all by stopping for
you!
- Wind Surfing Trips: Even when on dry land,
mobile may be in locked car, car key buried under trapeze
under wet suit. Little chance!
| |
