The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-line Pioneers

Tom Standage is onto something. It seems that everything we know about the Internet today, we've already done before. The turn of this century was a lot like the turn of the last century."The Victorian Internet" is all about our world and the invention of the Telegraph. As cyberpunk author Neal Stephenson once pointed out, the telegraph was the world's first global digital network. It's when we started trying to push voice down the copper lines that we mucked things up.In this book, you'll find technological wizardry, geek pioneers, global aspirations, long-distance romances, and online scams. You'll discover what 19th-Century chat was like. There are growing pains. We see fear for the future and fear of moral decline. The Telegraph represented a sudden, massive interconnection of people thousands of miles apart, and the effects of this overnight deluge of information is clear in reading. You have to remember that these were people used to feeling safe in their own homes, blissfully unaware of each other, and only vaguely informed of events going on in other countries.Standage does a nice job of hitting on the hottest topics of our time, without hitting the reader over the head to make a point. Cybergeeks will love his stops at Cryptography, code, and the other programming-like solutions people came up with to solve their problems. Fans of history will be amused by the parallels between life then and now as "old media" learns to stop worrying and embrace "new media".In a narrative style that resembles the British TV series "Connections", Standage shows us what each side of the Atlantic was up to, the race to connect the world, and the sheer determination and boundless optimism that made it all happen. There are also interesting tidbits along the way: we get facts about Samuel Morse and Thomas Edison that most history books ignore. There are anecdotes from 19th-century daily life that we can easily identify with today. All of it combines in a way that is easy to read, decently-paced, and fun to think about and discuss with others.I give this book 5 stars for being clever with presentation and for keeping the various threads together without seeming fragmented. Tom Standage moves us through history without jumping around, and references earlier sections to remind us of where things are going. If you like history, technology, or even the geekier topics of machine logic, programming, and cryptography, this book makes an excellent read.

Interesting tale, well-written, but I was hoping for more science than anecdote. Still, tells the story of the telegraph and the challenge of getting a skeptical world to embrace a brilliant idea. I found it interesting that the telephone was invented accidentally while attempting to enhance the telegraph's message-sending capacity. Overall, fun to read.

This is a top-notch tale of the remarkable invention of the telegraph -- and how it blossomed from nascent experimental use in France, to the creation of Samuel Morse's electric telegraph which eventually interconnected the entire planet by the end of the 19th century. In all, "The Victorian Internet" by Tom Standage is a fascinating review of the history of the telegraph and how it parallels the Internet today.Even the title of the book indicates that the Victorian era was when the telegraph's use was at its height. People used it then much as they use the Internet today: to communicate with family and friends, expedite commerce, seek romance ... and deceive the unwitting through scams.We often think of the telecommunications revolution as being a primarily late-20th century innovation, but this book proves this is not so. In fact, if any group can lay claim to having to endure the greatest technological paradigm shift -- it would be our forebears from the mid to late 19th century.For prior to this point, the fastest way in which information could travel was the speed of a charging horse or fast sailboat. However, with the creation of the first optical, then later electrical telegraph, what once would have taken months to ferry a message across vast distances was cut down to a few seconds.Moreover, the seeds for many of the inventions and modern conveniences we take for granted now (i.e. the fax, telephone, Internet, etc.) are direct descendants of the telegraph and the pioneering spirit that caused it to undergo many improvements in its design. For example, the operating principle behind the telephones we use everyday was discovered quite accidentally when Alexander Graham Bell sought to improve upon the design and capacity of an existing telegraph. And the very word "network" itself derived from the "net-works" of telegraph cable which crisscrossed the globe. [The term "Internet" itself, comes from the telegraphic idea of "interconnected networks."]This short book is a fun and fascinating read (which I often found hard to put down), showing that the telegraph and today's Internet have more in common than we know. Thus proving what wise King Solomon had already exclaimed thousands of years ago:"That which has been is what will be,That which is done is what will be done,And there is nothing new under the sun.Is there anything of which it may be said,'See, this is new'?It has already been in ancient times before us."

Este livro conta a história do telégrafo, em termos mais leigos, não tanto voltado para engenheiros eletricistas.No entanto as histórias mencionadas são muito boas, desde as dificuldades de implementação quanto a de aceitação pelo público

very interesting topic, given how communication has sped up since the intro of the telegram, after being mostly flat for centuries prior. Well executed, not long, easy read, entertaining too, some good stories in there.

Loved the in-depth coverage of history of telegraph. Didn't realise telegraphs were a global network before internet arrived on the scene

Standage tells the story of the telegraph in this delightful short book. It opens with a chapter on the 'optical telegraph' - the signalling system based on a network of mutually visible towers which flourished particulaly in France. After this, it traces the decisive step made by Morse, Cooke and Wheatstone in harnessing electricity to convey messages. There are fascinating chapters on the sceptics who doubted the value of the new technology; the problems of inter-continental cable laying; alternative messaging techniques such as capsules shot through tubes with compressed air; the use of the electric telegraph by criminals as well as the police; online telegraphic romance; the hopes that instant communication would lead to international conflict resolution; and the growing realisation that in fact it was an invaluable military techonology.Finally telegraphy is over-taken by telephony, which allows a greater rapidly of communication and requires no intermediaries. The book closes with some thought-provoking remarks as to how new and revolutionary the Internet really is.Throughout the material is admirably selected and the writing witty and clear. It is also a self-effacing book: as far as could be seen, the word 'I' (in the sense of 'Tom Standage') appears exactly once - in the acknowledgements section. Strongly recommended. His book on planetary discovery (The Neptune File) is also superb.

The parallel development of two internet systems separated in time by nearly 200 years is amazing. Markedly different technology seeking the same goal. Rapid communication for its era. In this case days, weeks or months became hours. A historic change in communications. In addition is delves into the personal and private life of those developing this new technology. A must read for those interested in communication technology. I found the read both enjoyable and intellectually rewarding. Cal.