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If you found this article interesting, check out the book "the master switch" by Tim Wu. AT&T had an answering machine back in the 40s, but they were afraid th

If you found this article interesting, check out the book "the master switch" by Tim Wu. AT&T had an answering machine back in the 40s, but they were afraid that if anyone found out a phone call could be recorded, nobody would use the telephone. So they suppressed it.

sidewndr46 4y ago
This seems like it is nonsense. Recording was well understood to exist by the general public in the US by this point. Not everyone had a cassette recorder, but plenty of people understood that recordings could be made of audio.
- Overtonwindow 4y ago
  But not Telephone. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/spread-answering-machine-put-on-hold-180973503/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/spread-answering-m...
  - sidewndr46 4y ago
    I'm not really sure anyone counts "Smithsonian Magazine" as a source.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Yeah, merely calling them a “source” would be an understatement of SI’s significance.
- reaperducer 4y ago
  Not everyone had a cassette recorder, but plenty of people understood that recordings could be made of audio. Yes and no. They understood that recordings could be made of audio, but they expected everything to be live and ephemeral. That's why if you listen to old radio shows, very often the introduction includes the phrase "...coming to you by transcription from {$city}..." "Transcription" is what they used to call recording, and people were almost always told that what they were listening to was not a live broadcast. It's so common, I have to wonder if there was a period in time when it was a legal requirement.
- kk6mrp 4y ago
  In a world where a phone line was shared between multiple homes, knowing your neighbor may not only be listening, but also recording, has the potential to be much more worrisome.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  Remember that most people were on party lines. Third party doctrine is key to privacy - maintaining the concept that the call was an ephemeral event is key. Also, recording and eavesdropping was associated with rogue phone company employees. We don’t have strong wiretapping laws because of the foresight of congress. Phone company workers were crooked as hell.
  - wahern 4y ago
    The government could tap phone lines willy-nilly until 1967[1], regardless of whether any third-party's ability to listen to a conversation. Plus, the fact that any non-government person could surreptitiously record a conversation, and that recording be useable in court, didn't substantially change until this century, and even today it's mostly a mishmash of state laws preventing such disclosures, those laws are inconsistent, and in some states there's still effectively little preventing that from occurring. And the ability of the government to leverage third-parties to get around 4th Amendment precedent is still in flux. All-in-all, I would think the ability, and knowledge of the ability, to record a phone call was entirely irrelevant and uninteresting in the 1940s, at least regarding people's expectations of privacy. But I'm curious if there's evidence to the contrary. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katz_v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katz_v._United_States
    - Spooky23 4y ago
      We know that now because information is available at our fingertips and we’re nerds. The average person doesn’t know that. At the time, AT&T’s marketing was all about trust, a mission ethos to serve humanity, etc. They also had a close relationship with government at all levels. Their goal was to avoid awkward questions.

sidewndr46 4y ago

This seems like it is nonsense. Recording was well understood to exist by the general public in the US by this point. Not everyone had a cassette recorder, but plenty of people understood that recordings could be made of audio.

Overtonwindow 4y ago
But not Telephone. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/spread-answering-machine-put-on-hold-180973503/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/spread-answering-m...
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  I'm not really sure anyone counts "Smithsonian Magazine" as a source.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Yeah, merely calling them a “source” would be an understatement of SI’s significance.
reaperducer 4y ago
Not everyone had a cassette recorder, but plenty of people understood that recordings could be made of audio. Yes and no. They understood that recordings could be made of audio, but they expected everything to be live and ephemeral. That's why if you listen to old radio shows, very often the introduction includes the phrase "...coming to you by transcription from {$city}..." "Transcription" is what they used to call recording, and people were almost always told that what they were listening to was not a live broadcast. It's so common, I have to wonder if there was a period in time when it was a legal requirement.
kk6mrp 4y ago
In a world where a phone line was shared between multiple homes, knowing your neighbor may not only be listening, but also recording, has the potential to be much more worrisome.
Spooky23 4y ago
Remember that most people were on party lines. Third party doctrine is key to privacy - maintaining the concept that the call was an ephemeral event is key. Also, recording and eavesdropping was associated with rogue phone company employees. We don’t have strong wiretapping laws because of the foresight of congress. Phone company workers were crooked as hell.
- wahern 4y ago
  The government could tap phone lines willy-nilly until 1967[1], regardless of whether any third-party's ability to listen to a conversation. Plus, the fact that any non-government person could surreptitiously record a conversation, and that recording be useable in court, didn't substantially change until this century, and even today it's mostly a mishmash of state laws preventing such disclosures, those laws are inconsistent, and in some states there's still effectively little preventing that from occurring. And the ability of the government to leverage third-parties to get around 4th Amendment precedent is still in flux. All-in-all, I would think the ability, and knowledge of the ability, to record a phone call was entirely irrelevant and uninteresting in the 1940s, at least regarding people's expectations of privacy. But I'm curious if there's evidence to the contrary. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katz_v._United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katz_v._United_States
  - Spooky23 4y ago
    We know that now because information is available at our fingertips and we’re nerds. The average person doesn’t know that. At the time, AT&T’s marketing was all about trust, a mission ethos to serve humanity, etc. They also had a close relationship with government at all levels. Their goal was to avoid awkward questions.