Sunday, June 21, 2009

Communications: 1867-1914

History of Communication Machine

Partial History of Communication

Timeline of Wireless Communication

http://wirelesshistory.org/fullscreen.htm









Credit goes to Orignal creator http://wirelesshistory.org

Heinrich Rudolf Hertz


Heinrich Hertz was a German physicist and mechanicist whose research with electromagnetic theory led to the advancement of wireless technology. Hertz’s main focus was on validating Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory. Out of essential for his wave research, he created a variety of wireless transmitters and receivers. In the beginning called Hertzian waves, Heinrich Hertz was the key developer of what are now known as radio waves. His exhibition on wave occurrence such as reflection, refraction, polarization, and intervention were the fundamentals for future researchers such as Marconi to make great advancements in wireless technology.

Hieroglyphics




Hieroglyphs are a writing system used by the Ancient Egyptians. That contained a combination of logographic, alphabetic, and ideographic elements. Hieroglyphs appear from artistic society of Egypt. Imprinted hieroglyphs are all more or less symbolic. They represent real or imaginary elements, occasionally styled and basic, other than totally familiar in most cases. In reality, the same character can even, according to conditions, be understand in various ways as a phonogram, as an ideogram, or as a determinative.

http://www.citrinitas.com/history_of_viscom/ideograms.html

Petroglyphs




Petroglyphs are images notch in rock, usually by early, especially Neolithic, peoples. They were a significant form of pre-writing symbols, used in communication from just about 10,000 B.C. to current times, depending on traditions and location. Many petroglyphs are deliberation to represent some kind of not-yet-fully understood symbolic or ritual language. The oldest petroglyphs are dated to about 10,000 to 12,000 years ago. Around 7,000 to 9,000 years ago, other writing system such as hieroglyph and ideograms began to appear. Petroglyphs were still common although, and tribal societies sustained using them much longer, even until contact with Western society was made in the 20th century. These images probably had deep literary and religious consequence for the societies that created them; in many cases this importance remains for their descendants.

Friday, June 19, 2009

Geoglyphs


Geoglyphs are source of visual communication and Geoglyphs are drawings on the ground, or a large pattern, or design produced on the ground, either by arranging stones, stone fragments, gravel to create a positive geoglyph or by removing patinated clasts to expose unpainted ground. Some of the most famous negative geoglyphs are the Nazca Lines in Peru. Other areas with Geoglyphs include Western Australia and parts of the Great Basin Desert in SW United States. Hill figures, turf mazes and the stone-lined labyrinths of Scandinavia, Iceland, Lappland types of geoglyph: The largest geoglyph is the Marree Man in South Australia. They were created by the Nazca culture between 200 BC and 600 AD.There are hundreds of figures, ranging in simple lines to stylized hummingbirds, spiders, monkeys, and lizards. The Nazca lines cannot be recognized as coherent figures except from the air.


http://www.citrinitas.com/history_of_viscom/ideograms.html


Early Paintings, Language and End of Prehistoric Era


Drawing and painting were ancient to way to communicate to people in those days. Early in those days people use to cave on the wall, rocks, and ceiling. Pictures were drawn on the on ground by arranging buy stone, gravel, or stone fragments. The cave man used to paint with the sharpened tool by which the sketch would last forever. The alphabet replaces the painting on the wall around 1700 and 1500 BC in the Sinatic world. The writing equipment which was being used for years got replaced by quill pen. When people used both the ink and the paper, and also developed a method of art which they used in their everyday means to communicate. After the writing instruments were quit developed and man found fountain pen as a great source to write and communicate to people.

Gutenbergs's Invention

Gutenberg's invention of the printing press is widely thought of as the origin ofmass communication-- it marked Western culture's first viable method of disseminatingideas and information from a single source to a large and far-ranging audience. The story ofprint is a long and complex one. It may be too much to claim that print was the singlecause of the massive social, political and psychological changes it is associated with.However, print did wield enormous influence on every aspect of European culture. Somehistorians suggest that print was instrumental in bringing about all the major shifts inscience, religion, politics and the modes of thought that are commonly associated withmodern Western culture.

pengreek




Since the beginning of time, people have had the need to communicate with oneand other. The most common type of communication is speech, but you could not talk tosomeone who lived 20 miles away. Then written language was developed, people markedsymbols on paper, stone, or whatever was available. Then hundreds of years passed, andpeople who wanted to share their ideas with people had to do allot of writing, untilsomeone thought to make a writing machine. This machine is called the printing press.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Pony Express


The pony express was one of the best ways to communicate with one another by a letter. Although you had to travel in long distance but, it’s not just you traveling but a horse too. By traveling on the horse, you spend less time and energy. Horse riding in today’s world is just a sport, but we do not ride them for longer period of time. But in 1860s, they use to send mail from a country to country. It took them days and days, and in any whether conditions to reach their destination. They took the mail from the shipping point and often they handed to another horseback rider and that rider would deliver to the destination. Although pony express didn’t last for awhile, we still admire the courage of the riders of that time.

Drum Signal


Drums were also used to communicate. They were mostly used in all countries but they are most recognized from Africa. They were used to send signals to neighboring groups. There were different types of patterns which indicated the types of messages.

Smoke Signal



Smoke signal was also on of the ways of communication back in the day. it was usually used by the ancient chinese who stay near The Great Wall and alert each other of enemy attacks by signalling each other from tower to tower. They were also used by North Americans. This was another way of communication without the requirement of technology. Although, Smoke signals are still used in Rome to indicate the new Pope.

Heliograph


Not all of us would know alot about these. Heliographs communication was used by a mirror with a small sighting hole in the center. The sender would look through this hole. It limited to use only in sunlight. The first recorded Heliograph was in 405 BC. When the Ancient Greeks used polished sheilds to signal in battle. The heliograph signals were very effective in the 1800s and were always used during wars. The signals though weren't accurate enough, because the sky has to be clear in order to see the signal. The flash of the signal could be seen nearly 30 miles away with a naked eye. The record is 183 miles.




SOS has been internationally known since 1906. SOS was used mainly for ships as an emergency signal in the early days of radio communications. They were used when ships were in an emergency and this was the only way to accurately ask for assistance. Furthermore, SOS was also signaled by using lights. The SOS signal was first adopted by the German government. The Titanic was the first ship which used SOS signal. SOS was another wireless way of communication which titanic had used. Above is the picture of the message that was sent from the captain of the ship.

Hieroglyphic Language


Hieroglyphics is the oldest language in the world. It was used in 3500 BC by Egyptians. The dates of invention varies by research. This language has been used from early to end of the Egyptian empire. Hieroglyphics is very hard to learn. It has different types of pictures instead of letters. This language was found on limestone. This was one of the first discoveries in communication. This was a new way of communication. They used to carve messages on the wall, limestones and wood. This was a new way to convey the messages to eachother.

FAX machine


The FAX was originally invented in 1843 by Alexander Bain. The fax is a method of encoding data, transmitting it over a telephone line and receiving a hard copy of the text, line drawings, or photographs at a remote location. The fax needs is consists of image scanner, a modem and a printer. Fax was a revolutionary invention for communication because it was a fast way to transmit information. in 1840's other way to transmit information was mail which would take couple of days to deliever. Fax would take couple of minutes to transmit the information. Invention of fax was a major discovery at that time.

Telegraph to telephone



In 1870's Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray both independently invented a device that could transmit speech electrically. Thier designs were similar. Both rushed thier designs to the patent office. Alexander Graham Bell patent his telephone first. Both inventors had a huge legal battle over invention of telephone, which Bell won. So Alexander Graham Bell is considered the inventor of the phone. Before the invention of the telephone, telegraph was a major medium of communication. The Telegraph was establushed mean of communication for past 30 years. It was a revolutionary invention. It took communication to a whole new level. It opened up a new window for communication and technology. The telegraph and telephone are both wire-based electrical communication system and Bell invented telephone in attempts to improve telegraph. The telephone was better than telegraph mainly because voice transfer with electricity. The telephone was a revolutionary invention in communication technology.

Typewriter


As we all know what this is, this is a picture of a typewriter. Before the computers and cell phones, this machine was used for a long time. Although some people might say that y do we need a typewriter? But typewriter is still being used in some small countries. And type writer is inexpensive and easy to use. Typewriters were the first writing tool after the ink pen and a tree leaf. In today’s world people just go online and send an email and communicate via computer. But, back then they had to type a paper in this equipment. Although it took so much time and energy, it was reliable. Nowadays, if we don’t have electricity we can’t use most of the communication devices. But this typewriter does not need any electricity or any type of natural resource to run it. All it needs is an Ink, and it is ready to use.
Here is the wikipedia web site where it shows most the typewriters from the past to present.

CB Radio

We often think, what if all the satellites and communication towers shuts down? There are few ways to still communicate and find out what’s going on around nearby area. Some of you might know what CB radio is, but those of you who don’t know what it is may question. How does it work? And don’t we need satellites or towers to communicate? The answer is no, we do not need satellites or towers. This old technology only uses an antenna which gets the signal out and the other is a receiver, which scrambles a signal from the antenna. People in today’s society still use this technology, people who travels a lot outside of a network area. So, this technology is also effective even though some people might have never used it.

Here is a link of a short video, that shows how CB radio works.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIPZgGQcCXQ&feature=fvw

Use Of A Telegraph

This is one of the eqipments that was used in early 1900s. I think this is one of the best ways of a communication because it is easy to use and more reliable than anything that we use in todays latest technologies. This telegraph was also showed in a movie called "transformers", where they had problems communicating with other people at the near death situation. So, it shows that even though we have a good technology existing today, there is still some hope for telegraph to be used in a near future.

http://www.telegraph-history.org/

Tuesday, June 9, 2009

Beginning of Communication


Pigeons were used as convey massages in early days. They were called pigeon messengers. Pigeons were trained to deliver the parcel or note to particular places.
These pigeons are specially breded. They have trained to learn their way home over a long distance. Notes or parcel were tied to pigeon's legs or sometimes put in their mouths. First time this pigeon messengers were used in 776 BC. This technique was excessively used in World War I.

Here is a video that shows use of pigeon messengers in World War I.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO7VTERTn1M&feature=related