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Views Vacuum tube paved information highway For me the invention of the triode vacuum tube in 1915 by Lee DeForest marks the beginning of the information technology (IT) revolution we enjoy today.
Up to this time the performance of telephone networks was constrained by electromagnetic and mechanical devices. Coast to coast U.S. telephone calls were theoretically possible but wholly impractical with a calculated requirement for copper wires of 0.5- to 1-inch diameter. As it was, the telephone network in New York City warranted 90-foot poles with 50 cross-arms and 12 wires per arm along the entire length of Broadway. The street must have been almost waterproof! Broadcast radio and TV were also fundamentally impossible to realize, and all had to await the arrival of the electronic amplifier and oscillator. Despite the sterling efforts to create amplifiers using the gain of electromechanical coupling, and the generation of radio carrier signals through rotating machinery, it was clear that something fundamentally new was required. The arrival of the first stable device capable of electronic gain -- the vacuum tube -- had an immediate impact on the long-lines telephone network and saw the establishment of broadcast radio services late in 1919. The very first two-way telephone communication between the USA and U.K. was in 1926 from the AT&T Manhattan office to The Post Office in London. The regular public transatlantic service started in 1927 using High Frequency Radio with 12 channels. This was only eclipsed in 1956 by TAT1 -- the first Trans-Atlantic Telephone cable with an initial 36 simultaneous speech circuits. At the time, the accountants were concerned by the lack of financial prudence. HF Radio already provided 24 channels and the cost of calls was around half a week€™s wage at that time. So where would the demand come from? By 1986 there were 7 U.K.-to-USA cables with a total of 12,000 speech circuits, and 6 satellites providing 57,000 circuits. When TAT8 was installed, the technology had moved onto fiber optics with 7,680 base circuits in one cable. Today systems are being planned with capacities 1,000-fold the capacity of TAT8 and 5 million-fold that of TAT1. Onto the transistor It is difficult to understate the impact of Lee DeForest and his ground-breaking discoveries and invention. Try to imagine a world without radio and TV, only silent movies, and no telephones, no mobile phones and no computers. Why no computers? Without the demands from telephone and radio broadcasting networks, we would not have developed thermionic valves -- vacuum tubes -- to the height of perfection they reached. Nor would we have seen the transistor, integrated circuit, or an effective computer industry. No coaxial cables, optical fiber, lasers, microwave radio, satellites or space race. We would be living in a world of early Victoriana, with master and servant, telegraph systems and copper cables, messenger boys and telegrams, a world much slower than today, and unable to sustain a population now fast heading to 6 billion. Most likely the world would have stabilized to around 4 billion people and become a stilted place. Extinction would be staring us in the face with disease and disaster a much greater threat than today. The music and entertainment industry would be puny. No amplifiers; no radio, hi-fi, tapes or CDs, just plastic cylinders and discs scratching out their music with diamond tipped pins feeding acoustic exponential horns mounted in mahogany cabinets. No pop industry, with just the rich and privileged getting to see and hear opera, orchestras and bands. No TV, VHS, camcorders, computer games or pocket calculators, PDAs, laptops and PCs. Offices dominated by paper, typewriters, typing pools, and all business subject to the delays of the postal network. It gets much worse. International travel for only the very few on aircraft a far cry from today's jumbo jets. Train, shipping and aircraft organized by telegraph systems operating over copper wires and primitive wireless links. Travel schedules strictly rationed by unbelievably limited and expensive bit transport. A lack of trained telegraph operators, bottlenecks of information, ignorant populations starved of information and experience. We would have a polluted planet consuming more hydrocarbons to support incredibly inefficient manufacturing and logistic systems, with paper consumption destroying huge tracts of forest. Our science, technology and basic understanding would be limited by the crude technologies produced without electronics. No radio telescopes, no Scanning Electron Microscopes, no medical scanners, no accurate time keeping, no space race, no significant advance in materials and production techniques. To get a partial insight into this hypothetical scene, just visit the third world. With no telephones you cannot travel easily. You cannot book a ticket for train, boat or plane without traveling to the ticket office. When your plane takes off the destination has no idea of your status until you are within 200 miles or so. The supply and delivery of food, clothing, heat, light, power, water and all the things we so take for granted is then a big deal. And quite naturally life becomes focused on survival alone. There is just no time to think and do anything else. The only people who complain about modern life and the convenience and security afforded by technology are those who have it, but do not understand. Life devoid of modern technology is not utopian, it is tough. Deforest's legacy to mankind is enormous, much bigger than most can imagine. Thanks to him this article was typed on a laptop, and sent over a GSM link from a 125 mph train between London and Bristol. Had I not had this facility, not only could I have not done this, I could not do my job either, which would not exist anyway. No tubes, no transistors, no phones, no Internet, no industry! |