Callcard Blog
When Callcards made the Junior Certificate!
If you happened to be sitting the Junior Certificate Foundation Level examinations in 1996, your Section 5: Media Studies examination question would have included Callcards! Recently discovered by some keen Callcard collectors, you would have received a grand 10 points for picking out your favourite Callcard out of the 8 choices and explaining the [...]
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Manage your IrishCallcards collection directly from IrishCallcards.net!
I am delighted to announce a new feature of the IrishCallcards.net website. From now it is possible to manage your Irish Callcards collection directly from the website! With our Colnect style feature you will be able to not only manage your Callcard collection from the website, but also get in touch with other Callcard collectors privately to arran[...]
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A brief history of the chip based Smartcard
Chipped based phonecards were first introduced by France Telecom in the year 1983. Invented by French inventor Roland Moreno chipped based phonecards were revolutionary in terms of better security and durability compared with the previous magnetic and optical card types. Moreno had researched and developed the smartcard (chipcard) for use in bankin[...]
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20 years on from the last Callcard Collectors Fair
It was 20 years ago this year, on May 26th 2001 Eircom was to host the very last Callcard Collectors Fair. Since the year 1996 Telcom eireann, later Eircom had hosted yearly Callcard fairs in aid of charity. The charity of choice over the 6 years running was the Irish Brain Research Foundation, and briefly the National Council for the Blind (1996 &[...]
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Do Callcards still work?...
A question I am quite often asked, do Callcards still work? The answer may surprise you. Callcards lost popularity back in the late nineties due to the increase in affordable mobile phones. Gradually shops stopped stocking Callcards and Eircom (now Eir) started to decrease the number of public payphones. By the end of 2009, Eircom have already rem[...]
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The story of the Telecom eireann Callcard
Before Callcards became an iconic symbol of nineties Ireland, an advanced trial and rollout took place by Telecom eireann in the late eighties. This roll out saw trials conducted in cities Dublin, Galway and Limerick. The cards tested during these trials relied on magnetic and optical strips which held the credit or “units”. Introducing the c[...]
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