Tom Standage is a journalist

Journalist

A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...

 and author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 from England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. A graduate of Oxford University

University of Oxford

The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...

, he has worked as a science and technology writer for The Guardian

The Guardian

The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...

, as the business editor at The Economist

The Economist

The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...

, has been published in Wired

Wired (magazine)

Wired is a full-color monthly American magazine and on-line periodical, published since January 1993, that reports on how new and developing technology affects culture, the economy, and politics...

, The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, and The Daily Telegraph

The Daily Telegraph

The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...

, and has published five books, including The Victorian Internet. This book explores the historical development of the telegraph and the social ramifications associated with this development. Tom Standage also proposes that if Victorians from the 19th century were to be around today, they would be far from impressed with present Internet capabilities. This is because the development of the telegraph essentially mirrored the development of the Internet. Both technologies can be seen to have largely increased the speed and transmission of information and both were widely criticised by some, due to their perceived negative consequences.

Standage has taken part in various key media events. He recently participated in ictQATAR

IctQATAR

ictQATAR, the Supreme Council of Information & Communication Technology, is Qatar’s independent telecommunications regulator and the Government’s technology advocate and facilitator....

's "Media Connected" forum for journalists in Qatar, where he discussed the concept of technology journalism around the world and how technology is expected to keep transforming the world of journalism in the Middle East and all around the world.

The Compression of Space and Time

The development of the telegraph led to a compression of time and space. Tom Standage believes that prior to the telegraph the speed at which information reached its audience was completely dependent on the transport used to disperse that information. The development of the telegraph freed the transmission of information from the time constraints of transport and eliminated geographic borders. (Standage:1998, p. 102) With the immediate flow of communication came speculation concerning the possible effects of instantaneous communication on society. These speculations included the idea that the telegraph would “cut out the middle man” and lead to the downfall and eventual extinction of the printed press. (Standage:1998, p. 149) This is because newspapers at this time could only disperse information as quickly as the transport that carried them. However, this speculation was proven incorrect with newspaper and telegraph companies establishing an alliance that allowed reporters to use the telegraph to instantly transport breaking stories back to the office. (Standage:1998, p. 150) This gave newspapers the advantage of a far greater reach of information and readership. (Standage:1998, p. 150)

Information Overload

Businesses began to seek ways to capitalise on the instantaneous flow of information brought by the telegraph. Prior to the telegraph, business had been conducted on a local level. Information from foreign counterparts and associates was received once or twice a month. (Standage:1998, p. 165) However, with the introduction of the telegraph the pace of business interactions greatly increased. Updates from foreign counterparts could now be sent daily. (Standage:1998, p. 165) But with this advantage came the disadvantage of an overload of information: the possibility of sending information on a daily basis led to a vast increase in the amount of information produced. If they were to remain successful in the market place, merchants were left with little choice but to adopt the telegraph.

List of works

• The Turk: The Life and Times of the Eighteenth Century Chess Player
• The Victorian Internet
• The Neptune File
• A History of the World in Six Glasses
• The Future of Technology
• An Edible History of Humanity

External links

• Official website