When the Ansaphone came out, Bell Telephone didn't let customers attach their own devices to the telephone line— even the telephone itself was rented from the phone company, not owned by the customer. …why?... Hahimoto's solution was a device with no electrical connection to the phone line at all. his answering machine interacted with the phone the same way a human user would: by lifting the handset, speaking into the microphone and capturing the caller's voice through the speaker. The phone sat on top of the machine with two prongs that lifted the handset when the ringing of the phone was detected by an electrical sensor under the phone (Battle 2023).