Communication
Writing as a Technology of Record-Keeping and Administration
Writing arose independently in more than one region, often tied to administration. See its materials, scribes, the alphabet, and the limits of ancient literacy.
Technology area
Communication
Recording and transmitting information has always required media, codes, and channels. This area traces the path from writing to the mobile phone, through paper, printing, electrical signals, and radio waves, and shows how each stage shortened the time and distance between sender and receiver.
Articles
Communication
The Path of Paper as an Information Medium
Paper emerged in China and spread across Asia, the Islamic world and Europe, cutting the cost of writing and preparing the ground for printing.
Communication
The Printing Press and Large-Scale Reproduction
Movable type had Asian antecedents; in Mainz, Gutenberg's workshop combined a type mold, alloy, ink and press into a system for producing books.
Communication
The Telegraph and the Beginning of Electrical Communication
Developed by many inventors in the 1830s and 1840s, the electric telegraph made information travel faster than trains and ships and reshaped railways, the press, and markets.
Communication
The Evolution of the Telephone
The telephone grew out of collective and contested research on sending the voice over wires, and evolved from manual switchboards to global digital networks.
Communication
Radio and Wireless Transmission
How the theory of electromagnetic waves became ship-to-shore wireless telegraphy and then broadcasting, with patent disputes, the vacuum tube, FM, and spectrum regulation.
Communication
The Evolution of Mobile Phones
The mobile phone grew from three ideas: divide territory into cells, reuse frequencies, and shrink the handset, a path that ran from car radios to smartphones.
Milestones
- c. 3400–3200 BCE
Writing on clay tablets
Accounting tablets with numerical and pictographic signs appear in Mesopotamian cities. Other regions developed writing systems of their own.
Read: Writing → - 2nd century BCE – 2nd century CE
Paper in China
Archaeological fragments indicate paper before the improvement that tradition credits to Cai Lun, around 105 CE.
Read: Paper → - 1377
Book printed with metal type in Korea
The Jikji is the oldest known surviving book printed with movable metal type.
Read: Printing press → - c. 1450
Printing in Mainz
Johannes Gutenberg and collaborators develop a system of movable metal type, press, and ink suited to Europe. The 42-line Bible dates to about 1455.
Read: Printing press → - 1837–1844
Electric telegraphs
Cooke and Wheatstone in Britain and Morse and Vail in the United States develop systems. The Washington–Baltimore line is demonstrated in 1844.
Read: Telegraph → - 1866
A lasting transatlantic cable
After the 1858 attempt failed within weeks, the 1866 cable establishes stable telegraph communication between North America and Europe.
Read: Telegraph → - 1876
Telephone patent
Alexander Graham Bell obtains a patent in the United States. Priority disputes involving Elisha Gray and Antonio Meucci remain debated.
Read: Telephone → - 1901
Claimed transatlantic radio signal
Guglielmo Marconi announces reception of a signal between England and Newfoundland. The technical proof of the feat is debated.
Read: Radio → - 1920
Regular broadcasting in the United States
Station KDKA in Pittsburgh begins regular broadcasts in November 1920.
Read: Radio → - 1973
Call on a portable phone prototype
Martin Cooper of Motorola places a call in April 1973 using a prototype portable cellular phone.
Read: Mobile phones → - 2007
Smartphones go mainstream
The iPhone is unveiled in January 2007 and Android reaches the market in 2008. Phones with Web access and apps become popular.
Read: Mobile phones →