The term “transmission” originally referred to a farming method of scattering seeds over a large area. Radio broadcasting was compared to this method, and the concept of broadcasting human voices and music became viable in the early 1900s. The term transmission is an example of technology fueling new terminology.
The term transmission is actually centuries old. It originally referred to a planting method in which a farmer scatters, or spreads, seeds over a large area of prepared soil. During the early days of commercial radio, several engineers in the Midwestern United States decided that the broadcast concept fit their concept of radio broadcasting. In the same way that farmers broadcast seeds over a large field, radio transmitters broadcast their signals over a large receiving area. This is especially true with amplified modulation (AM) radio waves, which are sent across the open air in all directions from the transmitting tower.
When Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi set out to work on a wireless communication device, his main goal was to improve the existing closed-circuit telegraph and telephone technology. In fact, he called his system radiotelegraphy, still retaining the idea of using Morse code as the basic messenger. The idea of transmitting human voices or music would still be years away. Radio telegraphy was intended to provide wireless communications for ships at sea or for other locations where wires would be impractical.
It was not until the United States extension of Marconi’s wireless company perfected a means of transmitting voice and sound that the concept of broadcasting became viable. Some radio stations began broadcasting human voices and recording music in the early 1900s, although very few people owned radio receivers. An early sponsor of radiotelegraphy, now shortened to radio, was a Florida-based fruit company trying to liaise with its own merchant ships in South America.
In the 1910s, amateur radio clubs were formed in the United States and elsewhere, hoping to capture distant broadcasting stations whenever conditions were prime. The engineers working for these fledgling broadcast centers began to see the entertainment and commercial potential of radio, despite the prohibitive expense of boosting transmitter power. One such engineer, David Sarnoff, would eventually become one of the driving forces behind the National Broadcasting Company, otherwise known as NBC.
The term transmission is another example of technology fueling a new terminology. Other terms, such as lift-off, splashdown, websurfing, and reboot, are also the result of technical jargon that eventually entered the public consciousness.
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