Book details of 'Understanding Modern Telecommunications and the Information Superhighway (Artech House Telecommunications Library)'

Title	Understanding Modern Telecommunications and the Information Superhighway (Artech House Telecommunications Library)
Author(s)	John G. Nellist, Elliott M. Gilbert
ISBN	0890063222
Language	English
Published	March 1999
Publisher	Artech House

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The Virtual Bookcase Reviews of 'Understanding Modern Telecommunications and the Information Superhighway (Artech House Telecommunications Library)':

Reviewer Rob Slade wrote:
I suppose I should have been warned by the fact that the title of the book uses the dread "Information Superhighway" cliche. The introduction implies that this text is aimed at a general audience, so one assumes that the authors think they are going to be educating the public in regard to modern telecommunications. However, it is obvious that they have only skimmed the surface of what is available. The first chapter starts out with a quote from one Charles Duell, Commissioner of the US Office of Patents in 1899, urging that the office be abolished since "[e]verything that can be invented, has been invented." I imagine that this quote, and those that begin the other chapters, were taken from a list that has circulated widely on the Internet: they all seem to be there. However, if the authors had done a little more research they would have found that the original piece makes it obvious that Duell is mocking those who are making this kind of argument, and, in fact, is taking the contrary position. This same level of research appears to be maintained throughout the work. Chapter one is a brief history of modern telecommunications, or, at least, that part of it which happened in the US. Random and disorganized topics to do with computers and the Internet fill chapter two. An equally mixed grab bag of telecom services is in chapter three. Fibre and switching optics are touched on in chapter four, but very poorly. Chapter five seems to be only a set of maps of undersea cables. Satellites are covered in chapter six, but the information is sometimes odd. We are told, for example, that "only six cities" in the world can launch satellites into geostationary orbits. Aside from the fact that this does not seem to make sense--I don't know of any city-states left, let alone those with a space program--a few pages on this is contradicted by a statement that a sea launch can reach GEO from anywhere. Chapter seven lists a number of options for the "last mile" of connection to the home, along with mentions of some services. There is a rough outline of telephone network operations and the major corporations in chapter eight, along with five paragraphs on the Internet. Chapter nine gives us such information about wireless technology as the "fact" that "TDMA [Time Division Multiple Access] is a derivative of GSM [Global System for Mobile Communications]." Looking to the future, chapter ten recapitulates much of what the book has already said. Then chapter eleven does it again in a different format. I would be remiss if I did not mention that the illustrations in this volume are more than normally pointless. Examples are the sample Web page with nothing on it, and five pictures of TVs with nothing on them. The text is almost equally informative, comprised of the banal mixed with the erroneous. I really can't see who would need this book. copyright Robert M. Slade, 2000
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