A conference call is a telephone call in which people from different locals can easily chat each other up. This usually involves using special codes and systems and a separate conference call provider. Basically this is like that first of all phone technologies, the party line, in which you could listen in on people you didn’t know talking about things you didin’t understand. Most TV commercials that feature conference calls have people using systems that don’t work. One recent conference call has a woman telling off a boss only to learn that the mute button on her phone doesn’t work. Oops. Other conference calls on TV have people that don’t speak the same language being baffled by each other. In short, conference calls on TV never work out well. In the real world, setting up a conference call can be a bother as well. Little things like not knowing who is talking or too many people talking at the same time tend to make conference call hosting a waste of time. The major conference call providers must love all this.
But the real news in conference calls in the fact that every major company in the world seems to use a conference call to make press announcements. Companies used to announce Quarterly Earnings, now they announce they will have a Conference Call to talk about their Quarterly Earnings. I guess the conference call rates must go down with every extra hundred callers. Most of these conference calls are webcasts, but a few are still using good old fashion telephones and inviting anyone that cares to listen in to dial up. There is something odd about having a conference call with countless persons.. Addmittedly most of these companies are not likely to attract the Howard Stern fan kind of caller, but I would think it is always a possibility of getting a prankster or two. Bababooy as a conference call solution might be good for a giggle.
A quick Google got me 1-10 results for about 31,600,000 press release conference calls, four of the top five being for Google conference calls. To be perfectly honest this whole world of conference call services is kind of baffling to me. I don’t like talking to one person at a time, let alone as many as feel like calling in.
This is good news for all the conference call centers, conference call providers, and conference call companies out there. If real people don’t want to make conference calls anymore, there is always the conference call press release.
