Wired Telecommunications: History, Development, and Future

Introduction

The twentieth century was a period of enormous and rapid advancement in telecommunications. The early nineteenth century saw the connection of entire continents via telephone and telegraph wires, and by the close of the twentieth century, cell phones and satellite communications had become standard technologies throughout the developed world — as ubiquitous as a horse and buggy had been a century before. In between, technologies such as radio, television, and the Internet each played a significant part in reshaping telecommunications and bringing the world ever closer together. Understanding the development of telecommunications helps illuminate the cultures and societies that used these technologies, and points toward the future trends we can expect to emerge in coming generations.

The past two decades have revealed one trend that has promised to substantially change the telecommunications industry — and indeed such changes have already begun to take place in many regions. Instead of the many cables and long wires that provided telecommunication services for most of their development, telecommunications technologies are coming to depend increasingly on wireless technologies. Cell phones communicate wirelessly with cell towers, and from there to satellites and other towers; the Internet is distributed through wireless networks; and satellite TV is becoming more common.

At the same time, few telecommunications systems operate on a truly wireless basis. Wireless Internet networks still depend almost entirely on wired delivery to network nodes, cell phone towers include some level of wired connections with support technologies, and television services depend on wired delivery to some extent even for satellite services. Though wireless is the new catchphrase and is certainly a profound development in the way telecommunications services are provided and experienced, wired systems remain highly important for everyday use by private citizens and in large-scale governmental and business applications. This paper briefly examines certain key aspects of the development, current position, and issues facing wired telecommunications systems in this era of increasing wireless technologies and capabilities.

Historical Background

Samuel Morse first demonstrated the electric telegraph in 1844, and by 1851 there were already fifty-one independent telegraph companies operating in the world, with many miles of telegraph wire connecting important communication nodes throughout North America and Europe (von Alven, 1998). The first trans-Atlantic cable was laid in 1867, Edison invented multiplex telegraphy in 1870, and six years later the telephone was invented — by whom remains a matter of ongoing debate (von Alven, 1998). By the dawn of the twentieth century, there were an estimated twenty thousand telecommunications providers and just over eight hundred and fifty thousand telephones in service: the age of wired telecommunication had moved well beyond its infancy (von Alven, 1998).

Sustainability

Sustainability was not seen as a major issue throughout much of the development of wired telecommunications systems, and the industry is still not especially focused on such concerns. Relative to many other industries, telecommunications companies are simply not significant threats to environmental resources or consumers of inordinate amounts of energy (Hoovers, 2011). At the same time, the cost of maintaining extensive wire networks is quite substantial, which is one of many reasons wireless technologies have begun to be viewed as preferable to older wired systems (Hoovers, 2011). Sustainable development in wired telecommunications is not likely to yield great progress, as wire capacities cannot be substantially increased without shifting to entirely new materials such as fiber optics (von Alven, 1998; IBIS, 2011).

There is some degree of sustainability found in the ability to reuse wires and many other parts of the infrastructure as they are replaced. The metals used in the construction of telecommunications wires are valuable across many different applications, including being repurposed into newer wires for the telecommunications industry itself (IBIS, 2011). Expenses and resources for ongoing improvement and construction operations are somewhat offset by the reuse of these old materials, making wired telecommunications somewhat more sustainable overall (IBIS, 2011). On the whole, however, there is very little that can be done to advance wired telecommunications in a truly sustainable fashion.

Conclusion

The wired telecommunications industry took off quite rapidly and grew immensely throughout most of the twentieth century. It is clear, however, that the industry has seen its heyday, and that it will not come again. Wired telecommunications systems will continue to be a vital part of overall communications and information networks, but they no longer hold the primacy of importance nor the immediacy of demand that they once did. Wireless technologies are now the most common user interfaces and an increasingly efficient option for many large-scale applications.