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The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century’s On-line Pioneers
The Victorian Internet is a non-fiction book written by Tom Standage. It was published in 1998, but the setting presents the Victorian period when the telegraph was invented in the mid-19th century. The book presents an overview of the development of telegraph communication technology. After several attempts and experiments electricity appeared to be bearing fruits, the telegraph involved carrying electrical impulsions over wires and could happen over broad areas and distances in a matter of seconds. Tom goes ahead to highlight some benefits of the telegraph such as being natural and cheap to construct. Attempts to pass the wires underwater in an attempt to link North America and Europe did not bear fruits at firsts because the government felt it was a lot of money. Governments seemed sceptical on investing large sums of money on these projects because electricity was still a new invention and people were not well conversant with power and things it can do. On its success the telegram finally became popular was too expensive, and only the rich could afford. As advanced technology telegraph advanced too and it even developed own shorthand. Standage does not fail to present out the challenges brought about by telegraph just as it happens with any kind technology, for example, he puts it out that the criminals took advantage of the telegraph to get new ways to break the law.
All along the author had an ideology in mind, and he wanted the audience to telegraph as the pioneers of the modern day technology. The same way technology and the internet are used today the same way the telegraph was used then, to find love and marriage. When writing this book in the late 20th century, Tom wanted to describe a life of the 19th century and that of the ending of the 20th century. Both cases presented massive instances when both technological inventions brought massive changes to their users.
The Telegraph was a highly scientific invention which started In America and the United Kingdom and spread out to the rest of the world. Before the invention of the telegraph, information was passed on by people on horses or even boats. Moving from using horses and boats to transmit information, and finding a system which they could send messages to vast lands in a matter of minutes. This cannot be seen as an improvement in communication but an overhaul of the entire system. Before it, information was passed on horses and boats which was very ineffective and slow. The Telegraph was developed independently in America and the United Kingdom, and both invention stories faced almost the same problems such as lack of funding and trust from the government and sceptics.
The author’s title that tries to make an equivalent of the Victorian-era and today’s internet. This title is not an exaggeration of anything because in most cases a new advancement in technology has led to massive civil damage. First politicians and governments were not in for the idea of supporting the telegraph projects. But after its invention, it became of help to them because communication was so natural between departments or even political meetings and messages were easily sent privately. Journalism received a boost from telegraph too, hard copy data was able to be transmitted, and this changed the way they did business. Businesses were not left behind during this period also, and they received a significant boost because business people could communicate with their partners and stakeholders from anywhere in the world with ease. For the general society, telegraph changed the way human relationships were conducted, and to some extent, people got their marriage partners from telegram.
This book is very understandable and simple for anyone to engage in a school set up. Its language is straightforward and highly logical, this is so because first, the book does an excellent job in explaining what was happening at the time and presently on the internet era. I would tell the author to try and be more humorous even when the stories are chronologically around. This book opened my eyes on the subject of excess internet dependence in the 21st century. An era where everybody is on social media and shopping is done online. Just like telegraph transformed communication and even stock market trading the internet on our side has transformed even more, and I would be quite interested to understand more of the changes. Technological advancements have been there and will always come. In the 21st century hence the improvements will be even more rapid which means learning their historical impacts will be an integral part of copying and dealing with future consequences which highly likely will be even more challenging. I would recommend this book to my friend because first, it is a vibrant non-fictional historical book which is well written and detailed. In my opinion, this book should be used more often as a course book. How many students even know when telegraphs were invented or how? I recommend that you continue using it in this course because it is very educative and insightful.
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