Nervous with the service

(Telephony) - I feel like a slacker. Not the Pauly Shore kind, but like a draft-dodger in the campaign to kept the Internet industry humming. I’m the New Economy equivalent of the homefront guy in those World War II movies who wastes gas and doesn’t collect tin cans or raise a victory garden. I’m not doing my part in the high-tech economy, and pretty soon Van Johnson is going to ask me, “Say, bub, don’t you know there’s a war on?”

See, I haven’t been buying communications gizmos recently. And I probably won’t be gifting my friends and loved ones with any electronic hardware this holiday season--whether wired, wireless, flat-screen or Internet-ready. And for that, I would personally like to apologize to Gateway, Dell, Apple, Compaq, Intel, and all the ISPs who depend on them, because it’s playing hell with everyone’s quarterly earnings and causing the NASDAQ to fold like a lawn chair.

Apparently, I and my recalcitrant kind are throwing the communications industry into a tizzy. We slackers insist on dawdling along with our 56k modems and our non-WAP phones, when Wall Street and Silicon Valley are both depending on every able-bodied American wallet to open up and disgorge for the very latest gear.

In my defense, we already have three computers in the home--a three-year old desktop and two laptops. Yeah, the hard drives are all laughable compared to the speeds and storage available in today’s mid-priced packages. You know what? That’s still not enough to pry $1000 out of my back pocket. I’ll stand pat and simply do my big downloading at work like everyone else.

We have a mobile phone. I know, we should have two. That would give us a phone for every family member, including the cat.

I have a wireless PDA. I last used it to check my horoscope while waiting for a weather-delayed flight.

It’s a sad inventory, to be sure. I badly wanted to bulk it up with a Net appliance for the kitchen, or an interactive TV, or a home gateway so our household can log onto the Web en masse. But my wife stopped me dead by pointing out that I usually don’t check e-mail while eating breakfast or watching TV. Truth be told, I sometimes go whole evenings--entire weekends!--without reading e-mail.

We have a home networking system. We call it “waiting till the other person has finished with the computer.” I’m ashamed to tell you how well it works.

And as for broadband…As God is my witness, while I write this, I’ve been on hold for 45 minutes with my voice provider, who also sells me cable and wants to sell me data. They’re having trouble adding caller ID to my phone. In fact, they’re having trouble finding any record of being my provider. I think I’ll wait a while before taxing their skills with high-speed access.

Industry watchers would say I’ve plateaued, reached my sales saturation point. I say I’ve reached my connectivity saturation point. At this point in time, I do not need more gadgets or services to keep me in touch.

That state of affairs will change. I’m as susceptible to advertising as the next guy. But for now, Gateway, Apple, Dell, Compaq, Intel--get yourself another boy. I’ve done my part.

Brian Quinton is Editor-in-Chief of Upstart. E-mail him at brian_quinton@intertec.com -- just don't expect a response anytime outside of office hours, apparently.