Hacker News Reader

Comment by gerdesj | Hacker News Reader

I used to use the bloody things (I'm 47) - I suspect your research is based on pictures and supposition.

At rest the rotary dial was at say null. As soon as you moved it over a number and then released it, that was the number that was dialled. 0 and 1 were first (obvs). When you hit the backstop (a small metal shim) then you had hit nine. It isn't as bad an interface as it might sound. You would get feedback via a series of clicks as the dial returned to null and also via force (springs etc).

There really was a good reason for picking 999 originally and the world has moved on since but I still assert that 999 is a far better number (or nowadays: a symbol) for invoking an emergency call than any other number.

View on HN

That's a really strange phone you're describing. Did it have a single hole on the dial? Where are you from?

I too used rotary phones - I'm 28 (if it makes a difference) and I grew up in a former Soviet republic. The phone had a dial with 10 holes in it: 1-9 followed by 0 (just like on a modern phone keypad, by the way). You stick your finger in a hole over the digit and rotate clockwise until the the stop. Then, take the finger out and wait for it to rotate back to the original position. Then you dial the next digit.

Just FYI, Hacker News seems to be flagging most of your comments and making them invisible or "dead". I was browsing with showdead on and was able to "vouch" for your comment and raise it from the dead.

I'm not sure what to tell you to do to fix this problem, but I thought you might want to know. I think the site tries to trick you into thinking everyone can see your comments when they're actually made dead. So you might never know.

I used rotary phones too. They looked like this: https://www.outsideopen.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/IMG_0... and this: https://img1.etsystatic.com/004/0/6113020/il_fullxfull.35452... and this: https://img0.etsystatic.com/141/0/9295718/il_340x270.1171692...

What did yours look like?

That's really interesting! With North American rotary phones, you put your finger into the hole that corresponds to the number you want to dial, turn til you hit the backstop then release. There was no null position.

Unless I'm misunderstanding what you are saying, which is entirely possible.

Do you have a picture of this style of rotary phone? I've only ever seen or used the kind ficklepickle described (and that's all I can find pictures of online).

Reply on news.ycombinator.com