Phone books: California allows Verizon to end automatic delivery of paper phone books

[CreekDog]

(as I post this, 3 of the 4 phone books delivered to me and my neighbors remain outside, untouched (a terrible waste of paper, energy and potential source of litter --oh, the 1 phone book not there, it was mine and threw it in the recycle bin).

California Stops Automatic Delivery of the Phone Book

By SustainableBusiness at Matter Network

Wed Jun 15, 2011 9:13am EDT

Just weeks after San Francisco passed a law stopping the automatic delivery of telephone books, California regulators approved Verizon's request to end deliveries of printed white pages statewide.

...

The California Public Utilities Commission granted Verizon's request to provide customers with an online, electronic version of the white pages. Customers also can continue to receive the traditional printed volume by request. Or they can request a free CD-ROM directory of residential listings.

In October, 2010, Verizon asked the PUC to waive the existing requirement to deliver residential white pages in print format. The company noted that significant human and natural resources are expended annually to print and automatically distribute directories to customers who may not want or use them.

"The PUC's decision to allow Verizon to end the automatic delivery of residential white pages listings is good news for California consumers and the environment," says Tim McCallion, president of Verizon's West region.

more at:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/15/idUS85259546620110615

[Taverner]

1. All in all probably a good idea

Although if I'm missing something do let me know

[ejpoeta]

2. supposedly we do not do automatic delivery here in WNY of phone book.

yet we still get the talking phone book. find it out by the mail box. In a way I am glad if they stop delivering them. I mean, all that paper. How many phone books do I have sitting here. But I do actually use them. Mostly I look things up online. But sometimes I have looked in the phonebook.

[SoCalDem]

3. great idea..

we walk them right to the recycle bin.. The print;s too small for either of us to read & I can find any number I want online..and faster:)

[AsahinaKimi]

4. Once there were

four phone books left at our door. Verizon, AT&T, and two others..who needs that many?

[shraby]

7. I've found some people/places are not in one book, but

are in another. Also some are not in the new books, but are in the older ones. Local government/cemeteries/libraries, schools are treated differently from book to book, some having some of the numbers other books have the missing ones.
If there was consistency, it sure would help. Not everyone has a computer, but almost everyone has a phone of some sort.

[CreekDog]

11. do you think all directories should be automatically left for me when i don't want them

i don't want any of them.

:shrug:

[shraby]

14. They all can be recycled when they have outlived their

usefulness.

[CreekDog]

15. why should they be delivered to people who will NEVER use them?

to people who don't want them?

do you understand that recycling doesn't mean something's environmentally friendly?

phone books that aren't used are 100% waste, though they are recycled (sometimes), all the resources to print them, deliver them, and deliver them to the recycling facility (if they don't end up in the landfill or as litter instead --it happens to things that aren't wanted).

in other words, your answer is terrible.

[tridim]

5. Now, to outlaw junk mail.

[Freddie Stubbs]

8. Doing so will speed up the death of the Post Office

[CreekDog]

9. Junk mail should be opt-in

:hi:

[SecularMotion]

6. The law allows Verizon to stop printing residential listings

I imagine they will still distribute phone books of yellow pages aka business listings and advertisements which are still a revenue source.

[CreekDog]

12. yikes. good observation --how do we get these things to stop

:shrug:

[TheWraith]

10. Good. You might as well expect deliveries for your icebox these days. nt

[Raine]

13. I don't mind having one for the yellow pages but

more than that is just a waste.