by Lisa Lee

Created on: June 13, 2009

Technology has, like all else things in this world, advanced to a degree of such high sophistication and complexity that only a hundred years ago, it would have been thought impossible - or even witchcraft if you went far back enough. With this technology, communication has become commonplace - easily connecting the world into a little package. And through the advancements of communicational technology, we are opened to a wide variety of options for our choice of media, anywhere from being able to speak to, write to, or even watch people across the world.

There was once a time where, unbelievable as it is, people actually had to speak to each other. People could write letters and send them out by horseback or pigeon, but most of communication was oral. That meant you had to be physically close to a person to actually send out information. Since most communication was so limited, information thus became cumbersome and slow to receive and send out. Most villagers remained in their small villages, blissfully ignorant of all information beyond their own little village.

This sort of system lasted for thousands of years, relying on speech or text. Then, in 1837, the electric telegraph was designed and patented by Samuel Morse for quick, long-distance communication. While still primitive, the telegraph began the revolution in communication that would later spawn the telephone and the Internet. The telegraph was absolutely vital in emergencies since its speed, and people could now speak, in Morse, to people on other continents.

In 1875, a cultural revolution began that would change the world forever hence. Alexander Graham Bell had just patented an improvement over the telegraph, allowing it to send vocal sounds over a line, and thus, the telephone was born. Telephones work by transmitting electronic signals over a cable, and the data is transformed back into sound when the other telephone receives the signals. Now, people could listen to other people's voices and did not need to learn the differences between dots and slashes. Efficiency became even more efficient. Slowly, the telephone worked its way into a staple of our society, a common tool rather than luxury. While everyone surely has a phone, and doesn't give it much thought except for improvements, phones are becoming more advanced and complicated, some even using fiber-optics or satellites.

Some would say that the cellphone is just a sub-product of the telephone. However, by the immensity of its cultural

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