"Instead of radio signals.... these ones would use wires!"
--silence--
At this point, they were even more confused than before.
They couldn't help but look at Landon with puzzled expressions.
Was it really possible?
One should know that previously when Landon had talked about the whole voicemail thing, they were utterly blown away by the concept... as they truly found it hard to believe.
How could this device record their voice for this voicemail thing?
And what's even more shocking, was that they could listen to voicemails that were even 3 days old.
In addition to that..... with these land phones, more than 2 people could be on a single call at a time.
So how could they not be overly excited to begin the new project?
But when Landon said that they would be using wires rather than radio frequencies..... their excited moods quickly dampened down, as they found it had to believe that one could make these landlines without radio wave transmission.
But since the creator of the walkie talkie had said so, then maybe there was really a possibility of it happening.
For now, they chose to wait and listen up Landon's explanations.
.
Landon looked at their doubt-filled expressions, and calmly took his time to explain things further with them.
With land phones, as one talks, sound waves hit a diaphragm in the microphone... that converts it into electrical signals, which later gets sent along the telephone wires.
And the person on the other end of the phone, also receives these signals.... as it hits their own diaphragm and sends it to the phone speakers for them to listen to.
In a nutshell, that was it!
.
After listening to his Majesty's thorough explanation.... everyone's eyes immediately lit up from amazement.
But at the same time, they couldn't help but worry a little.
"Any questions?"
"Your majesty.... if it's like this, then wouldn't every phone call have to be connected by someone for them to pass through?" One of them asked questionably.
Landon hearing this, couldn't help but nod in appreciation for these engineers.
As expected, they had realized it as well.
.
What they were talking about, was the use of operators.
Earlier on back on earth, phone calls had to be connected by phone operators before they could pass through..... as all calls first went straight to the phone company's headquarters, which acted as a central exchange.
One would place a call.... and would directly speak to an operator, who in turn would take down the number they were trying to reach and connect them to that person instead.
And comparing them to Walkie talkies that didn't need any 3rd partner to contact someone, of course, the men weren't really too pleased with this new technology.
For starters, if all operators were busy... one could stay on the line for quite some time.
So what if it were an emergency during that waiting period?
.
"Nope!... we won't be needing anyone to connect the calls.
In essence, we would be using a Switch!"
"_"
Of course, the reason why modern phones connected without delay, was because at the company's base..... they had an electronic switch system, using a process called multiplexing.
In short, this system could allow thousands of conversations to be transmitted at the same time along one cable.
And it was due to this technology that thousands of phone operators ended up jobless or retired early.
Landon knew that hiring thousands of phone operators wasn't something good for the long run.
Hence he decided to stick with modern technology when remodelling the inner works of these land phones.
.
As phone operators, the question was.... do they still exist?
Of course, they did!.... but the job description was completely different from that of connecting calls so that one could talk to their loved ones, or do a business transaction.
In the modern world, phone operators were just specialty agents that directly worked with customer service.
In general, they handled large volumes of calls, worked in call centers as customer representatives..... as 911 operators, where they would take one's message and relay it to the police.
And of course, they also worked within the hospitals, as they got in touch with the emergency dispatchers and many more.
In short, they were typically used in everything else, except connecting personal calls.
So with the emergence of phones, for sure, Baymard still needed phone operators.... as he expected each industry to have it's own call center sector, for listening to customer complaints about their products and so on.
And even the hospitals had to have their own as well, which tackled questions on drugs within the pharmacy, hospital dispatches and the list went on.
Of course, they were also seen within logistic companies, large hospitality companies like grand hotels that needed to gather hundreds of phone bookings or reservations all at once.
.
Landon spent the entire day on theory, as his students had all bombarded him with multiple questions.
And on the second day of classes, they began production immediately..... and just like that, a week had passed and Landon immediately passed on the role of teaching them to Tim.
Most of the parts were very familiar to these students of his, so they made them with little to no efforts.
It was assembling everything together that really hit them hard.
"Wait!.... wasn't this capacitor to go here instead?"
"No! No! No! Bro... it's the diode that's supposed to be there!!!"
"Ehh?.... why is my circuit not working after testing it out?"
"Bro!... how would it work when your circuit loop is still open?
Look!.... place this here to close the circuit!"
Ah!.... I see!!
Dammit!!... How can I be so stupid?"
"_"
.
With that, operation landline was in full effect.
Of course, while all this was going on..... Landon on the other hand, was getting ready to leave on his rescue mission.
With a crazy boss like the system, how could he stick around Baymard while his 'soul' was potentially on the line in the long run?
It was time to head into his enemy's den..... the empire of Terique.