I vote we bring back the teletype machine. Hailed by many as the first computer terminal, this nifty gadget allowed typed messages to be sent over electrical communications networks. From what I understand, however, the Telex and TWX networks that carried teletype messages are now defunct. Thinking about all these abandoned networks (like the incompatible, independent phone networks Starr describes) is a little bit creepy. I'm sure that once a company gets bought up or bankrupted by state-sanctioned monopolization, the wires aren't dug up and recycled. How many millions of miles of defunct, silent cables stretch across the nation? Will we someday need these simpler technologies, when we achieve the post-apocalyptic status implied by recent economic catastrophe?

Also, there's a teletype in my grandma-in-law's basement back in Boston, and I always wanted to get it running. The basement hobbyist, by the way, is a character that needs more attention in these histories. The rise of these technologies spawned a vast do-it-yourself movement, the uses of which ranged from entertainment to anarchism. Now that the HAM radio and the CB have gone the way of the internet and the cellphone, it's a lot harder to build your own machines or have a separate channel just for you and your pals. How does this solidify state control? Is there a contemporary equivalent to the basement communications hobbyist?