The Impact of the Telephone on Modern Society

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The Impact of the Telephone on Modern Society When the telephone was invented it was likely met with both excitement and trepidation. Certainly, Alexander Graham Bell felt he had created a useful tool that would change the course of history and it did; although it is for sure that there are people who would argue with that notion. While telephones have made the entire world a more accessible, connected place, it has also been a detriment to the development of relationships and face-to-face contact. From its inception, the telephone has been a tool to connect people to one another from long distances when they had no other way to engage in communication except for letter writing. In its early days, only the rich could afford to have personal telephones and most people were required to make calls through an operator. They were also given a time limit for their calls and could run into a wait for an open line if there were many calls being made at the same time. As the phone was becoming more prevalent in society, the advancing technology started to replace letters and face-to-face visits. As society moved into the 20th century, the thought process put into improving the telephone began to grow exponentially and the United States became the leader in teledensity. Telephones quickly morphed from large, complicated machines into smaller, portable models and in a very short span of years the world was introduced to the cell phone. Today’s phones are so self-contained with the inclusion of the internet that people can operate most of their lives from one little handheld device, thus further eliminating the need for human contact. Consequently, interpersonal relationships have suffered due to a lack of quality exchange. In a world filled with the ability to make a phone call at any given time or place, texting, instant messaging and email,
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