Are Phone Booths Coming Back?

Phone BoothNeed a place to have a private conversation on your cell phone at work? Or maybe you need to change into your super suit? The Finnish company Framery designed a sound proof “phone booth” for you to do either.

Many people at work are subjected to an open floor plan with seemingly square miles of cubicles where you can hear everyone and don’t get a second of private time. Framery goes into great lengths to discuss the importance of the sound insulation for privacy, the acoustics inside, and the design of these booths.

They have four different designs, and one of the four is actually large enough to hold more than one person. They are selling it as a small mobile conference room and it appears to be a good solution to have some privacy and to avoid disrupting those around you.

via Neatorama

NYC Prototype Payphones Offer A Glimpse Into Phone Booth Future

NYC Prototype Payphones Offer A Glimpse Into Phone Booth Future

With the rise in the popularity of mobile phones, the lowly payphone has been completely pushed aside as being only useful for homeless patrons to privately relieve themselves. Stumbling onto a payphone will probably result in an empty housing where an actual payphone once sat, but New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is looking to change that as he’s looking to upgrade the city’s 11,000 payphones.

Bloomberg issued a challenge a few months ago with the Reinvent Payphones Initiative to crowdsource ways to upgrade New York City’s payphones. The results of the challenge have produced five final prototypes that range from a complete reinvention of the traditional phone booth, to a kiosk that can record changes in the environment.

Unfortunately, the prototypes that are being shown won’t replace any of New York City’s payphones, but instead be used in order to inspire what the final decision becomes. Considering any of these five final prototypes would drastically change how people would use payphones in New York City, we can’t fully understand the reasoning behind asking for prototypes, to only turn them down to build their own payphones that are inspired by said prototypes.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: WADI Affordable Water Filtering Technology Powered By Solar Energy , Griffin Intros New Kiosk Retail And POS Solutions For Businesses,

TARDIS Police Call Box Has an Actual Phone Inside

Do you still use a landline? If so, you are one of very few left. But it’s a great excuse to buy yourself this TARDIS phone. This touch-tone phone in a phone box isn’t any bigger on the inside, but it is still pretty timey-wimey.

Tardis Phone Booth with an Actual Phone Inside
And it won’t call Gallifrey or anywhere else in the universe for that matter, but you can call your friends on Earth. But if you get a call that sounds all electronic and they are asking for someone named “Exterminate” I would just hang up, disconnect the phone and run. Just run. And don’t look back. Also, don’t blink. Just in case.

The TARDIS phone will cost you £59.99 (~$96 USD) from Victormorris.com.

[via Geek Alerts]

SmartScreens begin rollout to NYC payphones, City24/7 and Cisco eying expansion to additional cities

SmartScreens begin rollout to NYC payphones, City247 and Cisco eying expansion to additional cities

Slowly but surely, payphones around New York City are losing their innocence. As planned, City24/7 has started to convert seldom-used booths into LCD-equipped information kiosks, with so-called SmartScreens broadcasting “neighborhood news, current events and entertainment listings, local deals and specials.” We’re told that multiple mobile apps are being made available via the 32-inch multitouch panels, though as of now, only ten installations have gone live. Over the next several months, the number of installations will increase to up to 250 participating phone booths throughout the five boroughs, and once it’s reached saturation in the Big Apple, City24/7 and Cisco are planning to expand into over a dozen other foreign and domestic cities. The SmartScreens are designed to use real-time, location-based services, tied in to the network throughout the city, and moreover, each booth is equipped with gratis WiFi, NFC and Bluetooth capabilities. In other words, they’re fit to live in.

Continue reading SmartScreens begin rollout to NYC payphones, City24/7 and Cisco eying expansion to additional cities

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Source: Smart City 24/7

We Should Turn All Phone Booths Into Aquariums [Art]

Though most payphones are now of the open air variety, this idea of converting old closed kiosk phone booths into aquariums is just plain brilliant. People only use payphones to pee in and do drugs, let’s transform ’em into pillars of nature! More »