The Spirit of Independent Telephony

The Spirit of Independent Telephony PDF Author: Charles A. Pleasance
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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The Spirit of Independent Telephony

The Spirit of Independent Telephony PDF Author: Charles A. Pleasance
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description


Telephony

Telephony PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Telephone
Languages : en
Pages : 622

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The People's Network

The People's Network PDF Author: Robert MacDougall
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 0812245695
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 344

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Book Description
The Bell System dominated telecommunications in the United States and Canada for most of the twentieth century, but its monopoly was not inevitable. In the decades around 1900, ordinary citizens—farmers, doctors, small-town entrepreneurs—established tens of thousands of independent telephone systems, stringing their own wires to bring this new technology to the people. Managed by opportunists and idealists alike, these small businesses were motivated not only by profit but also by the promise of open communication as a weapon against monopoly capital and for protection of regional autonomy. As the Bell empire grew, independents fought fiercely to retain control of their local networks and companies—a struggle with an emerging corporate giant that has been almost entirely forgotten. The People's Network reconstructs the story of the telephone's contentious beginnings, exploring the interplay of political economy, business strategy, and social practice in the creation of modern North American telecommunications. Drawing from government documents in the United States and Canada, independent telephone journals and publications, and the archives of regional Bell operating companies and their rivals, Robert MacDougall locates the national debates over the meaning, use, and organization of the telephone industry as a turning point in the history of information networks. The competing businesses represented dueling political philosophies: regional versus national identity and local versus centralized power. Although independent telephone companies did not win their fight with big business, they fundamentally changed the way telecommunications were conceived.

Network Nation

Network Nation PDF Author: Richard R. John
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674088131
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 529

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Book Description
The telegraph and the telephone were the first electrical communications networks to become hallmarks of modernity. Yet they were not initially expected to achieve universal accessibility. In this pioneering history of their evolution, Richard R. John demonstrates how access to these networks was determined not only by technological imperatives and economic incentives but also by political decision making at the federal, state, and municipal levels. In the decades between the Civil War and the First World War, Western Union and the Bell System emerged as the dominant providers for the telegraph and telephone. Both operated networks that were products not only of technology and economics but also of a distinctive political economy. Western Union arose in an antimonopolistic political economy that glorified equal rights and vilified special privilege. The Bell System flourished in a progressive political economy that idealized public utility and disparaged unnecessary waste. The popularization of the telegraph and the telephone was opposed by business lobbies that were intent on perpetuating specialty services. In fact, it wasnÕt until 1900 that the civic ideal of mass access trumped the elitist ideal of exclusivity in shaping the commercialization of the telephone. The telegraph did not become widely accessible until 1910, sixty-five years after the first fee-for-service telegraph line opened in 1845. Network Nation places the history of telecommunications within the broader context of American politics, business, and discourse. This engrossing and provocative book persuades us of the critical role of political economy in the development of new technologies and their implementation.

The Americana

The Americana PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Encyclopedias and dictionaries
Languages : en
Pages : 962

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The Americana

The Americana PDF Author: Frederick Converse Beach
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Encyclopedias and dictionaries
Languages : en
Pages : 1178

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Telephony

Telephony PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 770

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Telephone Engineer & Management

Telephone Engineer & Management PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electrical engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 638

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The American Telephone Journal

The American Telephone Journal PDF Author:
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Universal Service

Universal Service PDF Author: Milton Mueller
Publisher: American Enterprise Institute
ISBN: 9780844740638
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
This book revisits the critical period of unbridled competition between the Bell System and independent telephone companies early in this century.