714/657 Area Codes

[Morrigoon]

GD: Not saying drop area codes, just stop adding so many. Go to an 8-digit regular phone number so that people don't have to dial the area code in their own area. Because now, people in Anaheim have to dial 10 digits every time they call. Then they only have to care about the extra digit when dialing outside their area, in which case they're probably not trying to memorize the number anyway.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by Morrigoon

GD: Not saying drop area codes, just stop adding so many. Go to an 8-digit regular phone number so that people don't have to dial the area code in their own area. Because now, people in Anaheim have to dial 10 digits every time they call. Then they only have to care about the extra digit when dialing outside their area, in which case they're probably not trying to memorize the number anyway.

It makes more sense to me to keep things consistent. Dial the full 10 for everything, rather than dialing just 7 (or 8) for some numbers, but the full 10 (or 11) for others. Keep it simple.

Adding an 8th digit mean a pretty expansive (doable, but expansive) retooling of our telephone switching system that, with a few billion numbers still unused in the current system seems pointless.

A LOT fewer: eight digits would be 10 million (10,000,000). Dropping all numbers starting with "0" and "1" (you can't [under our current system] have those as the first number of a phone number) and you're down to 8 million.

There are a lot more than just those that are excluded (any number starting with 911, 411, 555, 311 come to mind, that's another 40,000 right there). But your math is off. Excluding numbers that start with 1 & 0 leaves 80 million, not 8 million. I was keeping it simple with "fewer than 100 million".

[Kevy Baby]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

There are a lot more than just those that are excluded (any number starting with 911, 411, 555, 311 come to mind, that's another 40,000 right there). But your math is off. Excluding numbers that start with 1 & 0 leaves 80 million, not 8 million. I was keeping it simple with "fewer than 100 million".

You are correct. I was the mathematical idiot this time.