Two technologies
are changing the world; computers and telephones. Telephones and computers are
everywhere but in the past these technologies have never been together... until
now. The term telephony refers to the connection of computers and telephones.
History
People have always wanted to communicate with other people
who were far away. Before the telephone, they wrote letters but letters
could take a long time to reach the receiver. The telegraph let people
get messages quicker, but they needed to go to the telegraph office where the
message was converted to Morse code and sent. Only people who knew Morse
code could use the telegraph. People wanted to be able to speak to people
far away, with a device that anyone could use. This led to the invention
of the telephone.
Though many people made discoveries that led to inventing
the telephone, Alexander Graham Bell is credited
with its invention in 1876. Telephone service in the United States started
in 1877.
Now
Today, nearly everyone has a telephone. Most people have more than one. Many of today's phones have an answering machine inside, so people can leave messages if there is no answer. They also include features like Caller ID, Call Waiting, and speaker phones. Even with the new features, phones still work the same way they have for many years. One of the new types of phones is the cordless phone, which lets you move around while you are talking on the phone. It doesn't need to be connected with a wire like regular telephones. One of the biggest changes is the way that phone calls are carried from place to place. At first they were carried only on copper wires. Now are they are also carried by satellites, microwave radio waves, and fiber optic cables. Phone calls can now be carried over the internet using a method called IP Telephony.
Telephony is talking through your computer speakers to someone else. It's the best of telephone and computer technology combined to let people exchange information more quickly and easily. The equipment used includes voice mail, voice response units(VRUs), fax servers, speech recognition and voice recognition hardware.
Later
Researchers are always studying ways to improve the quality of telephones, especially cordless phones and the distance that you can use them from the base station. However, they are doing more research on cellular phones than finding out ways to improve regular phones. Maybe one day, there won’t be any more regular phones and everyone will use cellular phones for everything!
