
Suppressing Innovation: Bell Laboratories and Magnetic Recording - bobbiechen
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3106703
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nitrogen
Is there a summary somewhere or a copy that doesn't require creating a jstor
account?

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neilv
Link with summary:
[https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275933493_Suppressi...](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/275933493_Suppressing_Innovation_Bell_Laboratories_and_Magnetic_Recording)

Interesting info at: (PDF)
[http://archive.wilsonquarterly.com/sites/default/files/artic...](http://archive.wilsonquarterly.com/sites/default/files/articles/WQ_VOL18_SP_1994_Periodical_19.pdf)

Complementary big quote in a footnote at:
[http://www.historyofcomputercommunications.info/supporting-d...](http://www.historyofcomputercommunications.info/supporting-
documents/b.10-the-us-vs-western-union-lawsuit-1949-1956.html)

There might be better links.

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acqq
Thanks. The most interesting parts of the text behind the second link:

"AT&T did not offer an answering machine to its customers until the early
1950s—and prohibited the connection of recorders to public phone lines until
1948, when consumer pressure became too great to resist. Why the delays?
Upper-level executives at AT&T, Clark says, feared that if recordings of
conversations were permitted, customers would be less willing to use the phone
system. A slip of the tongue recorded during a business negotiation, for
example, could be fatal to a deal. Also, some AT&T executives estimated that
up to one-third of all phone calls involved matters of an illegal or immoral
nature." ... "Surprisingly, according to Clark, the managers "paid far more
attention to the question of trust and image" than to potential profits. That
was a reflection of the public-relations problems AT&T was having as a result
of New Deal antitrust investigations." ... "When the Bell system finally began
offering answering machines to its customers in 1951, they were built not by
AT&T but by an outside contractor."

I am still not aware of the mobile phone which allows one to easily record a
conversation, even if today it could be easier than ever to implement that
feature.

