One morning a few years ago as I was getting ready to get in the shower a spam call comes in to my landline. I don’t remember the exact bogosity but I think it was the ol’ your computer has a virus thing. When he asks for payment I say I will get my credit card but it is down in my car and will he wait? He agrees and damned if he wasn’t still waiting for me when I got out of the shower 20 minutes later.
My personal best was 2 hours and 10 minutes before it was me that got sick of playing them.
After that I put the "This Number Out of Service" tones (http://www.k3pgp.org/telezap.htm) on my answering message. That knocked out a lot of the spam diallers.
Usually I don't answer any number that's not on my contacts list, and let them go to voice-mail. If they really need me, they'll leave a message.
I do that too. I even got an app that does this automatically. I just get a silent notification afterwards, it's great. It's very rare that I'm expecting a call from someone I don't know already, so there's no problem.
Unfortunately, not everyone has this privilege -- people who work with sales, for instance.
You are a hero. We need a personally secretary app that would identify spam calls and keep them waiting forever, plying To Elise music in the background.
But when I used to, I turned it into an even more fun game that you described
My goal was to waste as much of their time, and as little of mine, as possible.
Hi, this is so-and-so from DIRECTV. We’re calling with a special offer….
Oh sweet! I’m so annoyed with my cable company
That I let them get into their spiel
A quick sec, I got a pot on the stove
Disappear for 30s
Oh hey, sorry, you were saying about 150 channels?
Let them get going
Ah, shit. Paperboy is at the door. Gimme a sec I’ll be right back, this sounds like an awesome deal
And so on, with longer and longer gaps between each fake reason for disappearing, and more enthusiasm for his pitch each time I returned
I remember the DIRECTV example in particular because I tied That dude up for over 40 minutes.
Barely impeded my watching Farscape and kept him from harassing anyone else for the duration.