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555 (telephone number)

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Telephone numbers with the prefix 555 are widely used for fictitious telephone numbers in North American television shows, films, computer games, and other media.

Not all numbers that begin with 555 are fictional—for example, 555-1212 is one of the standard numbers for directory assistance throughout the United States and Canada. In fact, only 555-0100 through 555-0199 are now specifically reserved for fictional use - except for the 800 area code where only 800-555-0199 is reserved - and the other numbers have been released for actual assignment.

Area code 555 in the North American Numbering Plan is reserved for Directory Assistance applications.

Fictional usage

The phone companies began encouraging the producers of television shows and movies to use the 555 prefix for fictional telephone numbers, roughly during the 1960s. One of the earliest uses of a 555 number can be seen in Panic in Year Zero! (1962), with 555-2106. In older television shows from the 1950s or 1960s, "KLondike 5" or "KLamath 5" was used, as at the time the telephone exchanges used letters and numbers in phone numbers. More recent works set in this period typically use this convention as well. For example, in Back to the Future Dr. Emmett Brown's 1955 phone number is "KLondike 5-4385" while the 1985 Jennifer Parker character writes the number 555-4823 on the clock tower flier telling Marty to call her at her grandmother's. In 2011, the fictional Netflix Relief Fund satirized the company's price increase of that year and used the fictional number 1-555-368-7147.[1][2]

The number "2368" is a carryover from "EXchange 2368", which was common in old telephone advertisements.[3] This represents "Exchange Central", with 2368 being the numeric version of "CENTral" in alphabetic dialing.

Before "555" or "KLondike-5" gained broad usage, and before touchtone phones became standard, scriptwriters would sometimes invent fake exchanges starting with words like "QUincy" or "ZEbra". The letters "Q" and "Z" were not used on the old dial phones.

In the Seinfeld episode The Pool Guy, Kramer gets a new phone number which is 555-FILK, which he keeps getting wrong numbers from with 555-FILM (movie phone).

Many times in Rugrats, the number 555-5555 is used. It's used for many businesses and places in the show.

Real uses of 555 numbers

Throughout North America, 1-XXX-555-1212 will connect to directory assistance for the specified XXX area code, 1-800-555-1212 will connect to directory assistance for all 1-800 numbers and 1-800-555-1111 will connect to a Bell Canada operator.

Also, in some areas of cellphone reception, 1-800-555-1234, a commonly used fictional number, is Nations' Tel in the Pacific Northwest and may reach a number that claims to be in use by the IRS.[citation needed] It is now used by 'NCH Software of USA', a software development company.

In 1994, the North American Numbering Plan Administration began accepting applications for nationwide 555 numbers (outside the fictitious 555-01XX range). This would mean that a consumer from any area code could dial a seven-digit number such as 555-TAXI, and the owners of that number could connect the call to a local car service. However, according to a 2003 New York Times article, the desired functionality requires the cooperation of local phone authorities, and most phone companies have been reluctant to cooperate.[4] Despite the fact that the service is virtually unavailable so far, most of the available 555 numbers have already been reserved.[5]

In addition, 555 use is only restricted in North America. Neglecting this fact resulted in a lawsuit in the late 1980s: in his daily The Far Side panel, cartoonist Gary Larson included a graffiti of a 555 number by which prank calls could be made to Satan. When the panel was printed in Australia (where 555 was at the time a standard exchange), the owner of the 555 number became the subject of much harassment, and sued Larson and his syndicate for defamation. The suit was unsuccessful.[6]

555 numbers are mentioned in the 1993 action film The Last Action Hero, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. The character of Danny Madigan (played by Austin O'Brien) tries to convince Schwarzenegger's character that he is inside a movie by pointing out that 555 numbers give at most 9,999 possible telephone numbers(although there are technically 10,000 possible phone numbers: 0000-9999), clearly not enough for all phone users in Los Angeles. Schwarzenegger's character replies that area codes would solve that problem and O'Brien's character drops the subject.

The practice of publishing specific numbers assigned for fictitious use gained demand after some telephone customers were flooded by errant dialers using the phone number popularized by Tommy Tutone with the song 867-5309/Jenny.

See also

References

  1. ^ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbxXTzISToA
  2. ^ http://allthingsd.com/20110728/dont-look-away-from-the-devastation-of-the-netflix-price-hike-video/?refcat=news
  3. ^ Telephone ads of the 1940's [cont]
  4. ^ Biederman, Marcia. "Personal 555 Number Is Still Mostly Fiction", The New York Times, February 6, 2003. Accessed September 10, 2008.
  5. ^ NANP Administration System
  6. ^ "Laughter and Litigation". Radio National. 27 March 2001. Retrieved 2009-04-21.

Further reading

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