People in 1900 were not imbeciles. Anyone in an industrialized nation would have known what telephones, telegraphs and motion pictures were, so the concept of transmitting information electrically and projecting images onto a screen would have been well understood. From there the concept of the Internet is not hard to describe.
I was fashioning some kind of “millions of ladies, with no garments!” idea. Porn, folks. Lots of it.
Ha! I have to describe the internet to the year 1900 pretty much every time I visit my very ancient grandfather. Every time. I’ve even shown him the internet in action, and he still doesn’t get it.
I usually say that the connection to the other people is through a phone line, but instead of just transmitting sound, it can also transmit pictures, books, and movies. And they show up on a screen instead of being there physically, like if you sent those things through the mail. He asks how I can talk to my friends on it, and I say that it’s like a typewriter, only you type a line to them, it shows up on their screen, and they can type a line back (in instant messenger, at least) and it shows up instantly, looking much like the lines in a play.
He’s very fascinated with the idea, and he’s quite intrigued by the idea of online financial transactions, but he’s still rather stuck on the idea that it’s more like a fax machine than it actually is.
I’d be so pathetically grateful to be in 1900 I’d just tell them, “it’s like a party-line telegraph.”
Then I’d get a writing and editing job for the same company I work for now, get tickets to see Anna Held in Papa’s Wife, rent a nice little flat off Long Acre Square, and head off to Ladies Mile to buy some Gibson Girl dresses.
I was going to try and post something funny but then I read this and gave up, no way I’d come up with something that perfect!
With one of Charles Babbage’s Differential Engines at every telegraph station.
I was in grade 5 about 30 years ago. We had a science teacher who was really into computers. To demonstrate them he brought a modem the size of a suitcase to communicate with the university computer. The results were printed. But he predicted that some day everyone would own their own computer and that you would be able to play tennis with the computer. I imagined having a tennis racquet in my hand and having someone on the computer screen with their tennis racquet. Maybe the ball between us would be generated by the computer. It took many years till I realized he was talking about “pong”. You could describe the internet, but they would be imagining something totally different.
It’s hard to do. I mean, I came back from the year 2145 in the newest SC54Z3 Time Machine and if I tried to explain Zigglebat to you guys, you would never believe it.
Suffice it to say, orgasm and laughter do indeed mix well.
But to go even further back in time to explain the Internet in 1900, take two tin cans, some string, and play telephone for a few minutes. Now explain how you can then do this without string, and the cans are made of looking glasses that show you pictures from the other side along with sound. Of course, they will look at you like you just slammed Zigglebat, but they might understand the concept.
The first thing I’d do is say to them, “Holy crap, you find yourself in 1300! How do you explain the telegraph to people!”
After they puzzle over that for awhile, THEN I explain the Internet to them.
Daniel
I’m having great visual images of somehow transporting an Internet connection to 1900, entering “hot sex” in Google, and watching Anthony Comstock’s either melt or burst into flame (probably while orgasming).
Come to think of it, a couple of years ago someione published a book called something like The Victorian Internet. It was about the twelegraph. I’ve been meaning to read it.
Just because you had a poor teacher, it doesn’t mean the task is impossible.
The first thing you have to do is explain the concept of a “time machine.” That alone may get you a reservation at Chez Cuckoo.
I agree with all those who say that, with the telephone, telegraph, phonograph and motion picture already widespread, it would be easy to explain the Internet in 1900. But 100 years earlier, in 1800, it would get a lot harder, since the only form of mass communication then was the printed book and newspaper.
“It’s a bit like being able to read a London newspaper instantly in New York. But it can contain moving pictures and spoken words and music too. What’s more, you can compose a letter to the editor in New York, and it can be immediately read by everyone in London.”
Sure, you can get across the general concept, but I don’t think they could easily appreciate the full power of the Dark Side. Consider the act of planning to have dinner and see a movie. Let’s pretend that in 1900 they had all the choices we do now, but no Internet. Back then, you would check the paper for movies at the local theaters and probably eat at a restaurant you knew. Maybe you would go somewhere recommended by a friend, or maybe choose the one that the paper reviewed recently. If you wanted to try restaurants and theaters in a different city, you would either have to subscribe to more papers or take a trip to the newsstand or library, and then you would have to shuffle through a bunch of papers. Of course, in 1900 there weren’t as many choices because there weren’t as many people or businesses, and it was harder to drive long distances.
Today I can look up this information for the entire Bay Area without having to go anywhere first. I can look up restaurants and sort them by rating, cost, type of food, and distance. I can see what’s playing at every single theater in 9 counties, and sort them too. I can get realtime traffic reports, weather reports, and driving directions. What’s more, I can get all this information for anywhere in the country if I decide to take a road trip.
There’s a huge pool of knowledge on the Internet, but it doesn’t take that long to find what you want, and our search tools keep getting better. A person in 1900 could get the general idea, but I don’t think they could fully understand it without having access.
I think you could tell them, “turn a knob and you’d have, like, an entire Kinetoscope of whatever section of whatever newspaper from all over the world in front of you,” and they’d get it.
The internet is like the Great Library of Alexandria, accessible throughout the world. Although technically this Great Library may be browsed freely, in actuality most of the world chooses to let one librarian find the answers to all questions for them. Those areas of which the Great Librarian is unaware may as well be burnt.
With lots of Naughty French Postcards of Anna Held and Lillian Russell.