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I gave my land line up 5 years ago and have never missed it.

It will be hard to use the landline in an earthquake when the wall falls on the phone itself.

since the Northeast Aug. 2003 black out, i have kept a landline phone.

Gave up my land line 9 years ago.
More likely to have an emergency that requires the use of a cell-phone than one that requires a land-line (since I'm rarely at home) and the excess money that would pay for a land line goes to other uses.

Land lines won't work after an earthquake if the lines are down. (I don't know about where you are, but around here, all the lines are mainly strung on poles, not underground.)

I'm just the opposite - I use a land line and rarely even remember to turn my cell phone on.

I had a painter doing a job at a client's apt. She (painter) didn't have a cell phone and my client didn't have a land line. There was no way to get in touch with the job unless I got on the subway and went down there. It was a drag.

I went from normal land line to VoiP which I liked, but everyone who knows both me and my husband call the cell phones anyway and no one ever called the house, so we finally cut to the chase and cut the VoiP also. However, canceling vonage is like trying to get out of a cult, they just do not want to let you go!! Good service, but since I did not use it anyway that money can go in my gas tank!

We keep a landline for emergency and our home security system requires a dedicated line. We also have 2 phones that don't need electricity if we loose power for an extended period of time (and we cannot recharge our cell phones.)

Plus what we learned around 911 and Katrina is that everyone uses their cell phones and it crashes the system.

I haven't had a landline for 6 or 7 years and I don't miss it. Only telemarketers would call it and I'm rarely home anyway.

A simple landline phone that I'd never use costs way too much anyway..

LOL...the landline is only good for the telemarketers

i don't LIKE my land line... however i live on the ONE STREET in town with ZERO service for any kind of cell... so we had to do it.

2 emergencies in about 3 years was plenty of reason for everyone i know in my area to keep a landline handy.

I never answer the land line, but I like the security of knowing that if I'm choking I can dial 911 and someone will know where I am.

I just moved and didn't want a land line, but sadly my apartment building is like a bunker and has no cell service. So I had to add an extra bill to the house. But there is something kind of nice about having a land line. It feels so very old school.

Cell-only and I'm happy not to have a bill for something I'd never use. But I am a little concerned about emergencies. There's no way my son could figure out how to dial 911 on my cell. I wish it were possible to get an emergency-only landline. Or something equivalent to pay-as-you-go.

Speaking of old school, I have a landline because I need it for my DSL! For my desktop computer! Yeah! I'm like Anne, I use my landline and can barely remember to turn my cell on. I mostly have it for emergencies.

Cellular only for several years now. Don't miss the landline at all.

in a earthquake, cell phones may not work but land lines -- super old school, with attached receivers -- will.

You must not have been here for the Northridge earthquake.

as long as i have my beautiful telephone from 1948 i will never give up my landline.

http://flickr.com/photos/nadessa/2499294952/

On 9/11 in NY cellphone reception was rare or overloaded, but dialing up through my landline I was able to mass e-mail (after some repeated attempts) and let all my peeps know I was ok. I'll now always keep a landline for incoming calls and emergencies.

Many apartment and condo lobby intercom systems require a land line for communication with the building's system.

In my condo, you don't need telephone service for the intercom to work, but you still physically need a conventional phone connected to the wall jack to use the lobby's intercom.

I did the opposite of most people and got rid of my cell phone. I have a direct line at work and a home land line. It's so great! i love not being prisoner to my cellphone when I'm away from the house.
Plus, I have an old school answering machine too. No automatic voicemail for me!

cell reception was out on 9/11 because the tower was on top of one of the wtc towers.

I'd never get rid of my land line. I have small children, and if a sitter had to call 911, I would want the operator to know exactly and instantly where the house is. Same goes with my elderly parents' house – in a medical emergency I know that they need only call 911 and not have to worry about details, such as an address, when they are already stressed out about the emergency at hand.

I only have a cell phone and live in New Orleans, which obviously was a problem after Katrina, when cell phones hardly worked in the surrounding area for the week that I was there before I managed to make it to Austin. However, we could still text in the time directly after the storm, and it's not like landlines worked either.

My husband says all phone lines should allow a call to 911. We don't have a landline but have a phone attached anyway to the plug on the wall in case of emergencies. I've never tried calling 911 though to test it. Does anyone know if my husband is right about being able to call 911 without a paid landline?

Both are handy! We use DSL, so our land line is required; however, we just consolidated three land lines into just one for our home and home businesses. People don't call as much as email us regarding jobs these days.

I've dialed 911 from my cellphone while on the street - The calls went right through every time.

BTW - Your cellphone doesn't even have to have service activated and 911 will work: We had a news report recently of some homeless person making crank calls to 911 on a cellphone.

I keep my land line for emergencies and at my high tech office, which has a huge "redundant" Voice over IP network (that goes into two separate parts of the city), we kept a dozen land lines. Our red phones live in our drawers but, in a blackout, we'll have phone service.

We keep a landline for emergency but that is about it. I don't even remember the number!

i still like landlines. i've never had a cell phone or voip call where both people could hear each other clearly for the entire duration of the call - if at all. paying 2 bills isn't great, but the lack of quality on those technologies kills me. i find them largely useless except for emergencies or 1 min. 'making meet-up plans' calls.

I dont own a cell, I guess I'm a rare one

I don't have a landline. The biggest emergency I've yet to encounter is losing my cellphone in the house and not having a landline to track it down with. I ended up emailing a friend and asking her to phone me. Ah, technology.

I'm with Hollie.

I home office so I keep a land line for long conference calls. But- I never give out that number and keep the ringer off .

I got rid of my landline last fall. It was a $400 a year leech on my bank account. The sky did not fall.

I do understand the safety benefits. I lived here during the Northridge quake, so I know that even though you are off the grid and without utilities, the phones often still work. $30 a month is just too much to pay for a service that only has 911 benefits. I pay as much a year in renters insurance. The landline phone charges are better spent on earthquake insurance.

Here's a suggestion: since landlines have safety benefits, then the city of Los Angeles should keep the disconnected lines live for 911 use only.

cellphones suck

No landline for 5 years and love it.

i like the aesthetic of on old timey wall mounted land line phone...

but i haven't used one in years. i get all these free minutes on my cell, which include long distance... it just doesn't make sense NOT to use my cell phone for all calls.

Still use landline for long chats. I find the delay effect of cell phones a bit annoying on those heart to hearts.

And I also had the experience of the Northridge earthquake. The old-school, corded landline was the only way I could reach my family that morning. I'll never forget it.

I'm old school. Still have the landline but I do have a cell phone that I use mainly for emergencies.

I think I'm one of the few 20-somethings in the world who hate cell phones. My husband and I have one pay as you go cell that is only for emergencies. I haven't made a call on it in months. Personally, I don't want to talk on the phone when I'm out and about. I don't even really want to talk on the phone that much at home.

I only have a cell because my brother thought I needed one. The most annoying thing was when I went camping in the woods and people were mad because I was in a nice deep valley and they couldn't reach me. That is the whole point!
The second most annoying was dating a guy that wanted to text me daily. I don't text!
I like my land line because I can use it in case of emergencies, like calling the power company to tell them the lines are down. I have gotten in the habit of using the cell more often and it is handy, but I only use it once a week or so. In fact my phone is so old that they don't even sell the same style anymore and the phone guy looked shocked that I own it. It's only 3 or 4 years old.

I have both -- I have dsl and prefer to use my landline either. I keep the cell phone in case of emergencies when I'm out, although I also tend to forget my cell phone at home. I absolutely detest cell phones though. And it annoys me the way people think since I have a cell phone I should always be immediately available.

i use to work for 911 and so i highly suggest that everyone keeps their land line phone. cell phones will NOT save your life is you were to call 911 since there is no way to tell where you are calling from. until they actually start putting a gps chip in the phone and upgrade all 911 call centers, it's best to keep a land line phone. also my land line phone happens to be one of those old corded phones. if the power was to go out, we wouldn't be able to use our cordless phone so that's something else to consider too.

I have no landline, and two cell phones. (You can’t get two numbers routed to one cell. Ugh!)

I was looking into one, but they cost is pretty ridiculous considering the whole concept is outdated. I live in San Diego where the reverse 911 calls saved many lives in last year’s fires. However, I don’t see myself paying an extra $40 a month for one.

http://www.dcrinteriors.com

Landline-only user for many reasons:

It's technologically superior - there are never any dropped calls, never lack of service.

The ergonomics of a land line phone are far superior to that of any cell phone I've seen or tried.

It's so much cheaper. My phone bill is less than anyone's I know: $18/mo

I never have to remember to charge my phone.

So I get some telemarketer calls - I let the machine take all my calls anyway (yep, no voicemail).

I have a landline at home, an office phone at work. That's all I've ever needed. Why does everyone have to be so accessible?

Got rid of the land line 3 years ago (but do have the old phone stored somewhere, a corded one as stated above because they work in power outages).

If people have their phone service turned off for non-payment, they can still dial 911. But if the account is totally canceled, then I am not sure if plugging in the phone and calling 911 would work.

On my cell phone bill I have two 911 charges or taxes - not sure why there are 2... but it is supposedly because if I dial 911 my location can be traced automatically. My old outdated cell phone couldn't even do this but at least the bill was lower.

If your telco skimps on emergency power you may not have phone service in a blackout. We discovered that in the Netherlands.

At least with cell, there are 3 networks to choose from. Some of these rely on undergound cables, others on radio links between towers. But as you can call the emergency number on any network that is still in the air, cell is not so bad as it looks.

I hate phones all together. Maybe I had a bad experience when I was young or maybe I just hate it when my mother calls, but there is just something about them that repels me. The only reason we have a landline is for the DSL, and the only reason I have a cell is in case I need to tell hubby what to get from the supermarket on the way home!

Add that to the ridiculous prices we pay for our landline (around $70 US a month for our phone and internet) and mobile calling rates in our country (New Zealand) which are about $US 30c a minute and 15c for each sms, I really begin to wonder why I pay so much for something I can't stand.

I have both- as someone else mentioned, on 9/11, my land line was the only way to keep in touch with family, so I like to have it in case of an emergency. Also, I seem to get spotty reception on my cell in my apt.

In South Mississippi, land lines were out for weeks after Katrina. Cell service was up much, much faster. When I canceled my landline, they told me to keep a phone plugged in because I can still call 911 from that line. If I pick up the phone, there's a dial tone; if I try to dial a number I get a message saying "this line is for emergencies only." So I have 911 service but I'm not spending an extra $70/month to have two phone lines. I'm just one person. One phone is plenty.

In Canada, there was a recent death due to a mis-routed 911 call via cell phone. Unlike with a land-line, a 911 dispatcher can't see the address you're calling from.

http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Columnists/Clancy_Roy/2008/05/07/5493746-sun.php

This is not unique to Canada, as it also happened in Iowa:
http://www.kimt.com/news/local/19191234.html

Nor is it unique to cell phones, the same problem exists with VOIP:
http://kob.com/article/stories/S436180.shtml?cat=504

If you exclusively use a cell phone or VOIP, please be aware of this.

My husband and I have never had a landline - when we got married, we just got two cell phones. It's worked great (no earthquakes here - east coast), and is way cheaper for us. We move a lot, so we never have to worry about transferring service and extra fees. We'll probably never have one again.

I haven't had a landline for years. I moved a lot in college and got sick of having to set up new service in every new apartment. Then for one year in 2006 I had a landline (it came as part of a "triple-play" package of internet, cable, and phone). I didn't give that number to *anyone*...not even my mother. I didn't even know the number myself, yet from the day I got it I had telemarketers calling every half hour until I finally unplugged the phone.

I rarely talk on the phone anyway...my cell phone is left in my purse almost all the time.

I still have my land line phone, it was drilled into me, if you live in California you have to have a land line in an emergency. So I do and I only pay $10 bucks to keep it going.

I have just a cell phone... due to moving around a lot in college. When I have my own place again, I'll most likely get a land line though with a phone like the one in the photo (not a cordless). I like having to slow down my day and sit to talk. With a cell phone, I feel like I'm always rushed and not giving my full attention to who I'm talking to. Plus, it seems as though just when the conversation gets good... my phone dies. Annoying! Ha, ha... this does seem like a hot topic though with lots of opinions!

gave up the land line after katrina. i had one installed, but only got calls from telemarketers & couldn't justify the monthly charge for that. and *nothing* worked very well in katrina's aftermath--except for cell texting.

test

Two friends with brain tumors is a situation that urges me to be sceptical. That plus the fact that during 9-11 cell phones were overloaded and then during the 2003 blackout there was no way to charge cell phones. Not to mention the sound quality and spotty coverage. On the health front, check out the article excerpted here, link below:

Every time you use a cell phone, you are exposing your brain to dangerous and potentially cancer-causing radiation.

Study after study has shown the connection between cancer and cell phone use, and the information has been out there for a decade now. But cell phone companies have done their best to deny, obfuscate, or downplay the danger.
…..
At this point, you cannot completely avoid wireless radiation from all sources; they pervade the environment. However, getting rid of your cell phone altogether can help protect you. But even if you don’t want to take that step, you can still minimize your exposure and reduce your risks by doing the following:

Children Should Never Use Cell Phones: Barring a life-threatening emergency, children should not use a cell phone, or a wireless device of any type. Children are far more vulnerable to cell phone radiation than adults, because of their thinner skull bones.

Reduce Your Cell Phone Use: Turn your cell phone off more often. Reserve it for emergencies or important matters.

Use A Land Line At Home And At Work: Although more and more people are switching to using cell phones as their exclusive phone contact, it is a dangerous trend and you can choose to opt out of the madness.

Reduce or Eliminate Your Use of Other Wireless Devices: You would be wise to cut down your use of these devices. Just as with cell phones, it is important to ask yourself whether or not you really need to use them every single time. If you must use a portable home phone, use the older kind that operates at 900 MHz. They are no safer during calls, but at least they do not broadcast constantly even when no call is being made.

Use Your Cell Phone Only Where Reception Is Good: The weaker the reception, the more power your phone must use to transmit, and the more power it uses, the more radiation it emits, and the deeper the dangerous radio waves penetrate into your body. Ideally, you should only use your phone with full bars and good reception.

Turn Your Cell Phone Off When Not In Use: As long as your cell phone is on, it emits radiation intermittently, even when you are not actually making a call.

Keep Your Cell Phone Away From Your Body When It Is On: The most dangerous place to be, in terms of radiation exposure, is within about six inches of the emitting antenna. You do not want any part of your body within that area.

Use Safer Headset Technology: Wired headsets will certainly allow you to keep the cell phone farther away from your body. However, if a wired headset is not well-shielded -- and most of them are not -- the wire itself acts as an antenna attracting ambient information carrying radio waves and transmitting radiation directly to your brain. Make sure that the wire used to transmit the signal to your ear is shielded.

The best kind of headset to use is a combination shielded wire and air-tube headset. These operate like a stethoscope, transmitting the information to your head as an actual sound wave; although there are wires that still must be shielded, there is no wire that goes all the way up to your head.

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2008/06/14/now-half-the-world-has-a-cell-phone-why-that-is-a-brain-tumor-epidemic-waiting-to-happen.aspx?source=nl