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Calling card

45 points| apsec112 | 9 years ago |en.wikipedia.org | reply

44 comments

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[+] k_sze|9 years ago|reply
This feels almost like SYN/ACK/NACK, but for people. Which means you could DDoS an aristocrat by sending them a lot of visiting cards.
[+] thedudemabry|9 years ago|reply
My first thought was that this would be an interesting protocol for calling someone.

I often receive more annoying robocalls on my personal phone than welcomed calls from unknown numbers. My usual solution is to quickly google the number to see if any scam reports are available and then quickly answer if not.

But I might start the practice of texting ahead of calling someone unfamiliar with a quick message like “This is John Smith's phone. I'll be calling shortly.” That way, I would ensure that my call was picked up or at least given the priority they prefer.

Or maybe I'm just a weirdo that worries too much about the consequences of actually answering robocalls :)

[+] dmix|9 years ago|reply
> Sometimes the name of a gentlemen's club might be added, but addresses were not otherwise included. [..] The visiting card is no longer the universal feature of upper middle class and upper class life that it once was in Europe and North America. Much more common is the business card.

And "gentlemen's clubs" now typically means strip clubs in modern culture.

[+] chrissnell|9 years ago|reply
These are still in use on some circles. When I was young, my parents sent me to a thing called Cotillion. It was a sort of evening camp for young people where we learned table manners, ballroom dancing, and ettiquite. Calling cards were part of the deal. A proper host had a special tray for them near the entrance for people to leave theirs.
[+] davissorenson|9 years ago|reply
Interestingly, while in English we now say "business card", it seems that at least Swedish and Finnish, and probably other languages too, retained some form of "visiting card". In Swedish "visitkort" and in Finnish "käyntikortti" (literally, visit card) are still the terms for business card in use today.
[+] cwmma|9 years ago|reply
They were distinct concepts, my great grandfather had both [1], so maybe in those other languages they didn't overlap in use like they did in America. For timing I found them in his address book he brought to France in WW1.

1. https://imgur.com/gallery/GNdcj

[+] FabHK|9 years ago|reply
"Visitenkarte" in German (for both today's business card and the old style calling card).
[+] jaclaz|9 years ago|reply
"Biglietto da visita" in Italian, it was used also for accompanying a gift, most people used to have two sets, one, a proper "visit card" without anything but the title and the name (and the title was usually striken with a pen to show familiarity) and one more properly a "business card" with the postal address and (once available) phone number.
[+] siscia|9 years ago|reply
In Italy we have "biglietti da visita" which literally translate, as you may guess, in "visiting cards."
[+] tmcpro|9 years ago|reply
In India they still call them visiting cards
[+] nift|9 years ago|reply
Same goes for Danish - visitkort as in Swedish
[+] gbog|9 years ago|reply
Interesting article but it shows the cultural biais of Wikipedia, not a word about Asia where visiting cards might have been even more important to social interactions.
[+] barnabes|9 years ago|reply
It's odd that in 2017 we are still having this debate. wiki welcomes you to improve the article. In fact that's the whole idea behind the site. It's odd that some users are still missing this use case in its entirety.
[+] kijin|9 years ago|reply
The article you're looking for is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_card

It is a more general article on what we now call business cards, and contains a significant amount of information about the use of business cards in Japan and the etiquette involved.

OP, on the other hand, is about a specific precursor to the modern business card that only existed in the West.

[+] bunkat|9 years ago|reply
Would be great if you took a few minutes to improve the article then. Reducing the cultural bias of Wikipedia happens the same way as improving Wikipedia in general, one article at a time.
[+] icebraining|9 years ago|reply
Well, of the English Wikipedia, rather.

It'd be fun if articles had links to their equivalents in other languages, with automatic translation. A problem with Wikipedia is that each language is a separate silo, which lowers the value of an universal encyclopedia.

[+] nthcolumn|9 years ago|reply
An interesting comment but it shows the preferred language of the contributor. ;)