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GPRS (General Packet Radio Service) is a mobile data service technology that provided the main bridging link between 2G and 3G mobile services. The GPRS technology linked its users together via the private GRX (GPRS Roaming Exchange) networks, which…

Beginning in the late 1970s, BBS software allowed computer users with modems to “dial in” to bulletin boards running on a computer within local calling distance. These communities could be run by anyone with a working system and could only be “called…

Superseding the short-lived Bell 101 modem, the Bell 103 modem introduced in 1962 set the standard for networked computer communication for years to come. The technology was developed, as its name indicates, at Bell Labs, and was released by AT&T for…

Beginning with the introduction of telephone service in the late 1800s, the “party line” could connect everyone in the same community (often rural) along one phone line. The Rural Electrification Act of 1935 increased the number of rural communities…

Amateur, or ham, radio, was the successor to the amateur wired telegraphy of the late 19th century. The first wireless telegraph club was founded in 1908 at Columbia University; in between this date and the rise of commercial radio, the mania for…

Before the introduction in 1840 of the Penny Black stamp in England, postage was complicated and frequently expensive, limiting the degree to which the larger population could freely utilize the public postal system.

During the pre-reform…

The rise of influence of the religious/political “Platform,” as a physical location, did not always allow for the participation of the working class and the poor (Elkins 1980). There were restrictions on their time due to their labor obligations;…