Do you actually know anyone who doesn't know how to operate a traditional telephone handset?

LOL, No! I call BS. We have a 1950s era black rotary dial phone. My grandkids love to play with it. I never had to give them instructions. Searching for pictures now.

I haven’t had a landline in over 15 years. I don’t miss it at all.

You can fast forward to the 2:00 minute mark if you want to skip the beginning.

Enjoy the video. https://youtu.be/updE5LVe6tg

There are still pay phones in the country. I read a while ago there are still about 100,000, but it would be good to double check that. Many are in national parks and places that don’t have cell service.

I agree about real landlines, the copper wire. They work during and after a disaster. I lost electricity for 8 days after Hurricane Wilma, but my phone worked. There was sewage backing up into our housing development, not near my house thankfully, and I could call the pump station.

@JLeslie, yes, that’s exactly the kind of thing I’m talking about. Wondering if anyone around here knows someone personally and in so-called real life who actually doesn’t know the process instead of something that might have been staged for TV or YouTube.

@Jeruba I wish I could test my niece and nephew for you. I’d be curious myself. I don’t think Ellen staged it, but I don’t know for sure.

I do, I know some twenty somethings who can’t read an analog clock.

I find that hard to believe too @ARE_you_kidding_me. They still teach that in schools, to tell time on an analog clock. It’s like a 3rd grade lesson.
They also have home ec and shop classes still.

I am one of the few who do not have anything but a landline.

I know someone who couldn’t read an analog clock at about 12. Next time I see her I’ll see if I remember to (tactfully) ask if she’s gained the skill. She’s seventeen now.

@Dutchess_III Apparently this is not something that we teach our kids across the nation. I would not have believed it either until I found a couple people who could not. Both were engineers so they were not dumb people, just young.

This tells me that it isn’t an urban myth

I can tell you that it was hard for my mom to get used to dialing first on her cell phone. On a land line we take the phone off the hook first. Not surprising young people would try to dial first.

yep

Then how do you explain that my <age 8 year old grandkids all naturally knew what the land line was for and how to dial it? (Still looking for pictures….)

Found pictures! << She’s rolling her eyes at whoever is on the other end! Trying to explain. Just cute!