Word: coaxial
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Perhaps the ultimate in isolating technologies is television, especially when linked to a VCR and a coaxial cable. Harvard professor Robert Putnam, in a recent and much noted essay titled "Bowling Alone," takes the demise of bowling leagues as a metaphor for the larger trend of asocial entertainment. "Electronic technology enables individual tastes to be satisfied more fully," he concedes, but at the cost of the social gratification "associated with more primitive forms of entertainment." When you're watching TV 28 hours a week--as the average American does--that's a lot of bonding you're not out doing...
...almost every home by 2010 will cost between $330 billion and $500 billion. Critics warn that it is not only an expensive but probably also an unnecessary weapon, since there are no services -- current or expected soon -- that would actually employ fiber to the home. A hybrid system of coaxial cable and fiber-optic cable does the job just as well for a fraction of the cost...
...keep track of the billing. Moreover, new technology has created the ability to translate all audio and video information into digital bits that can be sent over phone wires. Of course the Bells, like their cable-TV rivals, must upgrade their lines into combinations of fiber-optic and coaxial cable so they can transport in two directions the volume of films and other fare they hope to offer. And they must also play catch-up with cable when it comes to providing the entertainment...
...hooking up with Nextel, MCI becomes an instant force in the emerging market for wireless communications. While wireless will not make up the backbone of the information superhighway, whose basic construction material remains fiber-optic or coaxial cable, portable phones, along with pagers and beepers, will be powerful extensions of the electronic network. Companies ranging from AT&T and Motorola to Time Warner and Bell South are racing to develop their own new portable-telephone systems, which will one day compete with existing cellular networks and traditional wall-jack phones. The wireless market is expected to increase sixfold...
...solution. Ultimately, he says, interactive motion pictures will be delivered to home game machines not on a disc but through the fiber-optic networks being built by cable and telephone companies. This summer he announced plans to sell a new version of the Multiplayer that plugs directly into a coaxial cable, where it can serve both as a cable TV and VCR controller and as a gateway to the information highway...