On Archaic Communications

CONGRATULATIONS to Matiti Plus (letter on e-mails and faxes) in The Namibian recently, voicing a long-felt sentiment.

I have an almost illegible 10-year-old fax machine, which I don’t intend to replace just for the sake of some previous century businesses that are innocent of e-mail facilities. The motor industry by the way seems particularly pre-electronic.Ever got a quote from a garage or panel-beater by email? I know you can send a fax by computer but not the other way round.Unless some young Namibian entrepreneur with a computer starts a service by which, should you still not have a computer, you can send a fax to his given number but including the email address of the desired destination.He (or of course she) receives the fax digitally (some machines can do this), quickly transposes it to email form, and forwards it on to the grateful recipient.Problem solved.On a similar topic, I wonder why the telephone directory each year still devotes pages to arcane procedures and mysterious codes for sending telexes, since the last office I remember with a telex machine (a contraption the size of a dishwasher) was in about 1984.Perhaps the compilers of the phone book get paid by the page.Still on this subject, I have noted with amusement that the codes in the international dialling section, for Finland and Chile, are mixed up with each other.I noticed this because I once had reason to phone both countries.It’s been that way since 1992 and never changed.There is actually a number to call for correcting mistakes in the book, but that number has also never been answered since 1992… Bill Torbitt WindhoekThe motor industry by the way seems particularly pre-electronic.Ever got a quote from a garage or panel-beater by email? I know you can send a fax by computer but not the other way round.Unless some young Namibian entrepreneur with a computer starts a service by which, should you still not have a computer, you can send a fax to his given number but including the email address of the desired destination.He (or of course she) receives the fax digitally (some machines can do this), quickly transposes it to email form, and forwards it on to the grateful recipient.Problem solved.On a similar topic, I wonder why the telephone directory each year still devotes pages to arcane procedures and mysterious codes for sending telexes, since the last office I remember with a telex machine (a contraption the size of a dishwasher) was in about 1984.Perhaps the compilers of the phone book get paid by the page.Still on this subject, I have noted with amusement that the codes in the international dialling section, for Finland and Chile, are mixed up with each other.I noticed this because I once had reason to phone both countries.It’s been that way since 1992 and never changed.There is actually a number to call for correcting mistakes in the book, but that number has also never been answered since 1992… Bill Torbitt Windhoek

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