Recording

After growing open with technology accessible in our hands when ever, it is hard to think that there was a time period without it.  For example, It is hard to think to not be able to listen to your favorite song or record a message to your friend via phone.  I really enjoyed this lecture on the history behind recording because I have never stopped to think, why am I able to hear this message my friend just left for me?!?  I liked how this lecture tied in with music.  Music is something that interests all so when I hear music, I engage my full attention.  Without Edison's, Berliner's, or Maxwell's inventions we would not be able to record sounds.  I feel like the phonograph, gramophone, and microphone are technologies that caused other technologies to be where they are today.  I think those technologies inspired radios, then TVs, then today, Internet.  It is all a domino effect.  What I mean by that is if Edison didn't invent the phonograph, Berliner would not have been inspired to create the gramophone.  Without the invention of the gramophone, music would not have become a mass medium and influenced Maxwell's electronic microphone and gramophone.  I never realized how big the effects were with the recording inventions.  For example, it created a cultural identity.  People would know more about someone from where they lived because they knew what music they listened to...Bluegrass, classical, country, etc.  Overall, I learned a lot just over this small topic.  I learned about some early inventors, music, one of the first technologies all in one lesson. I believe that this lesson is very important because it is a base in history for the other lectures.