In earlier posts tribal, agrarian and industrial society were discussed. In this post, post-industrial society will be discussed. One may wonder about the title and they may have an urge rename it as “information society.” Lot of definitions exists for information society [1]. Industrialization of a nation is gauged by amount of petroleum or energy usage. Likewise two metrics can be used for information society. First is extent of information usage. Next is economy of a country should hang on information production (for example movies, music videos, books, information equipments etc). So it is better to leave the discussion on information society to economists and social scientists. The present digital society may lead us to information society.
This is one part of series of articles dealing with evolution of societies. In the present society we encounter lot of displays. These articles try to find out the answer for “rise of display and smart devices.” I firmly believe engineering, technology, economics and end user behaviour has to be studied as a whole and not in isolation. That is why article like this appear in this blog which is dedicated to Digital Image Processing.
The post-industrial society can be broadly classified into pre-digital and digital society. In Industrial society electricity was used a form energy like coal and petroleum. In digital society, electricity is used to transport information. In digital society, information production, distribution and consumption happens in binary form i.e. ones and zeros. In pre-digital society analog signals were used and optional use of electronic components.
Official communication
Development of writing is attributed to rise of kingdoms. Kings and top military brass in capital city used to send commands to their marching army in borders via written letters. For government machinery and business, speedy and secured written communication is very vital. As electron travels in 2x10^8 meter/ sec (in vacuum 3x10^8 meter/sec) in conductor distance barrier is broken in the first time in history. Birth of pre-digital society can be attributed to telegraph. It was installed in United Kingdom on the Great Western Railway. Paddington station and West Drayton station were connected by telegraph system in 1838. It used a five-needle, six-wire system. The cables were originally installed underground in a steel conduit. However, the cables soon began to fail as a result of deteriorating insulation and were replaced with uninsulated wires on poles [2]. An electrical telegraph was independently developed and patented in the United States in 1837 by Samuel Morse. His invention was officially adopted as the standard for European telegraphy in 1851. Within next forty years, cables were laid in under the sea to connect continents. Telegraphic message from London can reach New York could in minutes, the world suddenly shrunk in size. As signal passes long distances, signal strength is reduced and corrupted by noise. Relays were inserted in between long distance cables. They acted as amplifiers for telegraph signals.
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| Fig. 1 An advertisement for Teleprinter | image courtesy Wikipedia |
A teleprinter (teletypewriter, Teletype or TTY) is an electromechanical typewriter was invented in order to send and receive messages without the need for operators trained in the use of Morse code. A system of two teleprinters, with one operator trained to use a typewriter, replaced two trained Morse code operators. The teleprinter system improved messaging speed and delivery time. Teleprinters connected to exchanges are called as Telex. These exchanges are functionally equivalent to telephone exchanges but they process data and not voice. Age of instant communication helped trans-national companies (present day equivalence – Multi National Companies) to consolidate their presence in the third world countries.
Due to industrialization, large scale migration occurred in developed countries. People moved from villages to cities. Letters were the only medium to communicate with their near and dear. In 1844 Innocenzo Manzetti first mooted the idea of a “speaking telegraph” or telephone. Alexander Graham Bell created the first successful telephone in 1876. First time in history, transfer of audio was made possible. Telephone communication is instant i.e. live, spontaneous response, interactive (letter is monologue), suited for all sections of people (literate to illiterate, toddler to old). As usual cost of telephone was very high and companies felt there is no scope for business potential thus reluctant to invest in telephone service. On those days concept of exchange never existed. Telephone owning Person A and person B were exclusively connected by cables. Slowly concept of manual exchange came into existence. Users used to blow whistle to alert the operator and tell them to whom the user wants to speak. Accordingly operator will make and break the connection manually. In 1891, Almon Brown Strowger developed electromechanical telephone exchange. It used stepping relay or uniselector which connects the input to among the possible outputs via series of electrical pulses [3]. The moving parts of the relay over the years got into wear and tear. Skilled technician were in demand for proper functioning of the system. In 1919 two Swedish engineers devised crossbar system to overcome the problems faced by Strowger system and got patent. In 1938 American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) built crossbar exchanges and put into use [4]. In 1960s computers were extensively used in exchange operations.
In 1887 Tivadar Puskás (the inventor of the telephone exchange) introduced the “Telephone News Service.” With Puskás's apparatus, half a million people could clearly hear the programme coming from the exchange. It was used to distribute entertainment and news. Later stereo systems were introduced [5].
In 1900s, AT&T was under threat of competition as patent of Bell's telephone was nearing expiration. Building a transcontinental telephone service was one among the options to counter competition. In 1906 Lee De Forest, an American inventor developed a triode in a vacuum tube [6]. It was used to amplify sound signals and aptly called “audion.” The weak telephone signals were amplified and transcontinental communication became a reality. Within years AT&T felt the heat of power hungry vacuum tubes. So they desperately wanted a device that can amplify the signals and at the same time consume less power. Bell laboratories (research arm of AT&T) after the end of World War II, created a team to develop semiconductor equivalent of triode. The team comprised of Bill Shockley, Brattain and Bardeen. They gave “Transistor” to the world. It really revolutionized the world. In 1959 newly recruited Texas Instruments' employee Jack Kilby came with a idea of building a whole circuit in Germanium substrate. Robert Noyce of Fairchild Semiconductor came with similar idea. He wrote a detailed patent application and got patent for “Unitary Circuits.” i.e. Integrated Circuits. Superiority of transistor over vacuum tubes is not because of intrinsic advantages rather the ability to mass-produce, and amenability to integration. Reduction in size of transistor resulted in faster switching speeds. Transistors face the 40 GHz speed limit [7].
Electronic mass media
Outcome of industrialization is creation of huge monolithic middle class. They were urban dwellers, migrants, non-agrarian occupation, semi-literates, had little extra cash and required news for existence. This created a perfect base for mass medium. In the start of 19th century news paper ruled the mass medium due to efficient printing machinery and transportation facilities.
In 1897 Marconi got patent for wireless telegraph and credited for birth of radio. Jagadish Chandra Bose demonstrated concept of wireless transmission even before Marconi [8]. After World War I, broadcast of radio signals started in USA. It reached the golden age in 1930s. Radio played an important role in formulating public opinion thus acted as a perfect mass medium. British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill's radio speeches at the time of World War II had great influence and helped to defeat axis powers (Germany, Italy and Japan). Unlike Print media which is limited to literates, radio is very convenient, suited for all ages and all sections of people.
British Inventor John Logie Baird in 1926 developed television with Nipkow's disk system. His system was adopted by British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). TV signals were transmitted between London and New York in the year 1928. Commercial production of TV started in 1932 and around 10000 sets were sold. Because of mechanical nature of scanning, Baird TV offered low resolution and excessive flickering. American inventor Farnsworth developed electron beam scanning technique. Due to its technical superiority it was widely used in Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) TVs [9].
In 1953, colour television came to existence in USA. Live broadcast of important events, recorded programmes, sports, news, debates and sitcoms were aired to viewers. Mass production resulted in product glut in the market. Companies went for branding to survive the cut throat competition. They spent huge amounts in Television advertisements to build brand. The advertisements were very persuasive and shaped public opinion. TV contents were made to cater public consumption and to garner sponsorship.
In Industries electric motor driven machines replaced human muscle power. The new-age workers were expected to control the machines. The jobs were semi-skilled and very repetitive. Factors like labour unrest, tight quality control and cost reduction forced the industries to move towards automation. Every manufacturing industry uses series of processes to convert raw materials into end product. The processes may be mixing, heating, storing, and transformation (solid to liquid, liquid to gas). Processes have to be carefully carried out to produce good quality product and to reduce wastage. This ensures increase in profit. Electronics is extensively used to control the processes.
Entertainment gadgets like Long Playing record, cassette player, video player, video cassette recorder evolved and flourished up to 1990s. A detailed note will be provided in the forthcoming “digital society” post.
Source
[1]. László Z. Karvalics , Information Society – what is it exactly? (The meaning, history and conceptual framework of an expression), Budpest, 2007.
[2]. Telegraphy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telegraphy
[3]. Telephone - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone
[4]. Thiagarajan Viswanathan, Telecommunication Switching Systems and Networks, PHI Learning Private Ltd.
[5]. Telephone newspaper - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia | http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_newspaper
[6]. An Outline of the History of the Transistor | http://www.pbs.org/transistor/album1/
[7]. Introducing the Vacuum Transistor: A Device Made of Nothing - IEEE Spectrum | http://spectrum.ieee.org/semiconductors/devices/introducing-the-vacuum-transistor-a-device-made-of-nothing
[8]. V. Aggarwal, "Jagadish Chandra Bose: The Real Inventor of Marconi’s Wireless Detector", The Ancient Wireless Association Journal, July 2006, vol. 47 no. 3, pp. 50-54. | (web.mit.edu/varun_ag/www/bose_real_inventor.pdf, PDF)
[9]. Understanding Media and Culture: An Introduction to Mass Communication 1.0 ~ Flat World Knowledge (Unable to get the URL)
Note
I want to thank Mr. P. Velmurugan, Asst. Professor, who lent me a laptop for a week, when I was in Delhi. There I spent much time in writing about digital society and tried to post it under the title information society. When I reviewed the article, I realized the fallacy and took one month to rectify it. This post pushed me to the limits.
