Cell phone usage in India: What the heck is a "Missed call" in cell phones!??

[fineleg]

Wait, I do know what it is now. Until a few months back, I had no darn clue what the heck is a "Missed Call"...People in India keep referring to this in person, in chat, in Radio shows, you name it... Friends say: "Give me a missed call"......give you a WHAT!?? Very popular phrase used by nearly everyone in India Apparently they dont use VOICE MAIL in India, instead they have evolved this "Missed call" concept. A friend explained it to me a few months back when I was talking to her. Cut-and-paste from some random blog:

And then there is the whole concept of “missed calls“. Missed calls are when you call someone you know, you let it ring only once or twice, and then cut the call. This is generally between people who talk regularly and a missed call conveys a pre-set message. For example, a wife might give her husband a missed call at the end of the work-day to convey that she is heading home and that its time to meet up. Or someone might give a missed call to a friend they commute with indicating that its time to pick him up. Or a student might give a missed call to her parents - so that the parents can call back (that way the parents incur the cell phone charges). People evolve elaborate signals through missed calls: one ring might mean they are heading home, two rings might mean they are running late. Sitting at the Uzanto Delhi offices, I would often hear a ring or two on someone’s phone, they would look at the phone and then continue what they were doing. Its a system that works quite well. In fact, its brlliant: communication without explicit communication. What the missed call means seems to depend on who it is from, time of day, and number of rings. I wonder if cell phone providers can build some type of an offering that facilitates this?

Whither TCP/IP network protocols, here comes the missed call protocol :hysterical: One ring + caller id + time of call = Two rings + caller id + time of call = Three rings =...

[fineleg]

Missed call, also known as missed call alert, - relatively unknown in USA, UK... is the preferred way of communicating in India. The Indian mobile user has mastered the art of missed call. Instead of leaving voicemail, mobile users in India prefer to dial a number, let it ring a couple of times and hang up. And the person who gets the missed calls knows that someone called them. The missed call can be a pre-arranged signal or pre-arranged message to mean something specific like “I have left the office and headed home,” or “could you please bring the car to where you dropped me off?” etc. The missed call has many variations like the number of rings, the number of missed calls, or the time the call was made. Every month millions of cell phone users are added in India and they continue to flummox marketing folks in the innovative way in which they use their mobile phones

[fineleg]

Etiquettes go missing in missed calls! New Delhi, March 16 French turn off their mobiles during meals, Chinese call and hang up after a few seconds while Spanish are reluctant to use voicemail. But when it comes to Indians, it is the missed call they are most (in)famous for. The Indian mobile user seems to have mastered the art of missed calls - and actually to communicate without answering the calls! While cellphone operators are reluctant to give the exact share of missed calls, according to industry estimates, it is somewhere around 20-25%. Writes Nick Gray in a Moblog (mobile blog) — in India ‘missed calls’ were very popular, as a way to say, “I’m thinking about you” or “call me back.” I would often hear someone say, “I’ll send you a missed call when we get there - see you soon.” Kobita Desai, principal telecom analyst, Gartner, says “Users tend to resort to giving missed calls when the message to be conveyed is just to make an announcement of one’s presence or somewhat in those lines.” “No doubt mobile tariffs are quite low and the price differential with fixed is very narrow. However, that is not necessarily the case with prepaid tariff which is still significantly higher with a shorter pulse rate,” she says. Almost 75% of mobile users have prepaid connections, with calls being billed at 60 seconds whereas fixed calls are billed at 180 seconds. But when it comes to ‘Who loses and who gains on missed calls’, Ms Desai says, “It would depend on where the call originates from.” But for the customer, it’s all about money. Who needs etiquette if it costs you money! :two_thumbs_up: :P —PTI URL: http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=120655

[Holysmoke]

How the freak did you not know what a missed call was. I sent/recieved about 20 missed calls a day, every day. And all the missed calls convey different messages. Best part about them is that they're free. In the US, even when you send a voicemail, it costs you (That 1 min of msg that you leave).

[Holysmoke]

Its like a free, preset text message.

[Desi Cartman]

Its very useful in Aus as some people have free call after 8pm so if u wanna talk to ur friend who has free calls then just give him a missed call and that way u can talk for free Its also a signal if u r waiting for someone (say outside the building ..) so to signal just give him a missed call For overseas users : sometimes messages dont get delivered overseas so u can use it as a signal that "yes I got ur message" I havent used this too much but yes it can handy and its free :two_thumbs_up:

[beetle]

We are like this only finey?:D

[fineleg]

^^ Actually Rads, it is a neat idea to flummox the cell phone service providerz and some money in the pocket of customerz...Pure Indianz teaching the impure indianz a few neat trickz :D

[Aditi]

Missed calls are free + no voicemail.....hence the concept arose....I get sucked into the missed call phenomenon every time i go back & it works really well :)

[Rajiv]

FL, you born in US or been here too long

[Desi Cartman]

FL' date=' you born in US or been here too long[/quote'] or has too much money to ignore this world famous technique to cut down phone bills

[Guest HariSampath]

Missed calls are man's evolutionary superiority over technology, and the cost cutting Indians are naturally at the forefront. Missed calls are also very commonly used between young college / school kids to convey subtle messages without parents raising eyebrows ( like , 2 rings means get to the chat online). On anothet front , folks traveling outside their home locations call home/spouse and hang up, signaling "call back", if the outside area calling is expensive or if coverage is not available for calling. This was a great challenge to service operators right from the begining, and as I had worked in 3rd gen cellular networks , I know the huge technology costs that service operators incur due to this simple and ingenious method. Network elements in any E2E cellular network work on the principle of channel resources, frequency allocation, and load principles. This concept involves a lot of telecommunication procedures that establish a phone call and make a phone ring somewhere. To give some idea to folks who may not be in hi-tech telecom it goes something like this. When we switch on the cellphone , we are effectively sending a paging message to the nearest network element announcing " I am here in this place", and the network element responds by saying " Ok, I have got you in location XX), and this constantly keeps changing as we move. If we need to make a call ( voice or data call) , so many procedures are done and ready before that, and as we dial a number , just the identity of the location of the individual phone is a variable. Certain procedures like Channel processing, frequency modulation, messaging channel procedures, roaming procedures, soft handover, softer and harder handovers while on the move , acknowledgement channels, primary and secondary channels, power control, interference etc, so many things much more complicated than the above simpler procedures take place. The amount of technology utilised, software resources, frequency resources , spectrum costs incurred etc for one single call to make a phone ring somewhere are very high. For example, when a 32K mobile originated voice call is made ( a call initiated by a cell phone to talk ), all the above procedures occur, and if the call is to another cellphone, the costs are so much higher . If at the end of it no phone call is actually completed ( missed call), then the service operators incur losses as there is no revenue for all this. Of course the unit charges are always calculated with these things in mind, but this is a market driven phenomena and cell operators are under constant pressure to keep unit call charges down to increase subscribers and be competitive. Some of the compensations may be like charging a full unit ( minute) for those calls that last a few seconds like " I am on the way home honey"....but dont compensate enough. Most networks in the world are designed and made in USA and Europe ( past 2-3 years, there are hybrid networks coming up and places like China, Korea India re getting involved), and service operators all over the world never quite had any idea of how to make provisions for these "missed calls", as it was a distinctive feature in India. Network manufacturers , some 7-8 years back, never had to think about this economy of technology but due the huge ARPU targets and losses in India , are now asking network makers to inbuild some systems for reducing it.Like allocating a designated channel ( low cost channel) for setting up the call and later switching to primary communication channels once the call is up ( answered) Another impact is the huge amount of calls and network clogging and traffic jams, which can really hurt services and quality due to large percentage of missed calls in a network, particularly second genaration TDMA networks , it is slightly better on 3rd gen networks like CDMA networks. Missed call commonsense is nothing new...remember Morse code and pre arranged meaning of signals ? It is the fundamental way we communicate and transmit information....pre arranged meanings based on mutual understanding..ALL languages are based on this, lingual and software too.

[Gambit]

With IMS' and FMC's worldwide spreading imminent, voice calls will effectively become free in over the next 3-4 years.