British 90s nostalgia and shite

I just found a guide to choosing a telephone in a 1997 Argos catalogue. And it's brilliant.

Well okay it's not brilliant. But it is pretty fascinating. It shows you how different phone technology was just 25 years ago.

Cordless phones

One of the latest inventions in 1997 was "cordless phones". A woman in the guide asked "A cordless phone would be great" and wanted to know "Do they work differently to normal phones?" This sounds like a naive question, like a caveman asking "Do you make fire by rubbing two sticks together?" but to be fair, cordless phones were complicated back then. The base was powered by the mains supply, but the handset had its own battery. If you forgot to put the phone back in the base, it could run out of battery, and then if Chris Tarrant tried to call you for a Phone a Friend, your friend would miss out on a million pounds. That's something that wouldn't happen with a landline phone.

Also, with a cordless phone, you can't strangle yourself with the cord.

I remember my family's first cordless phone. The technology seemed like magic. Whether it was black magic or white magic, I couldn't tell. You could walk around anywhere in the house with the phone, including the bathroom. It was convenient, since you no longer had to make calls about drug dealing while standing in the living room with everyone in your family listening.

More ground-breaking features of 1997 phones

The guide also talks about the ground-breaking features available on 1990s phones. They include:

• Find out the number of the last person to call you
• Redial the last number you called
• Mute button, which lets you call the caller a cunt without him hearing you

• Set the volume of the phone

All this is too modern for me. Redialing the last number that called? Being able to set the volume of your phone? What happened to the good old days when you had to power your phone by riding a bicycle in a thunderstorm?

Quotes from weird members of the public

Then there are quotes from members of the public:

I may have photoshopped one or two of them.

REN

Then the guide talks about REN. The only Ren I know is Ren from The Ren & Stimpy Show and I don't think he ever had to deal with corded versus uncorded phones.

The guide says it's important to look at the REN when choosing a phone, apparently. If you don't do this then the universe could implode.

All this is too complicated for me. Two REN 1.5 phones? Four REN 1 phones? How can the average person understand this? I don't remember my parents dealing with this in the 90s.

Helpline

If your phone breaks, then what do you do? Call a helpline, of course.

"Hello? My phone isn't working. Can you help me? Hello? Why isn't anybody answering?"

Mercury helpline

There's something called a "Mercury helpline", which I think is for when you have mercury poisoning because your phone has dangerously high levels of mercury in it.

Some phones were "Mercury compatible" which means the level of mercury in them was the same the level of mercury as your old phone, so you could expect the same level of symptoms of mercury poisoning (memory loss, vomiting, and respiratory failure).

Phones you could buy

There's also photos of phones you could buy:

But they all look pretty much the same, don't they? Numbers 3 and 5 even look identical.

Just ten years in the future the first iPhone came out, by the way.

Conclusion

After all this, I still don't know how to choose a phone. I'll probably just steal someone else's.