''Victorian Internet '' by Tom Standage

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[ISBN 0425171698] The story of the telegraph, the first of the technologies which claimed to shrink the world and bring people together and create world peace, and how society had to come to grips with the frightening prospect that messages could travel faster than trains.

Part of a Review From Amazon.Com: "The parallels between the now-ubiquitous Internet and the telegraph are amazing, offering insight into the ways new technologies can change the very fabric of society within a single generation. In The Victorian Internet, Tom Standage examines the history of the telegraph, beginning with a horrifically funny story of a mile-long line of monks holding a wire and getting simultaneous shocks in the interest of investigating electricity, and ending with the advent of the telephone."
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