The alphabet democratized writing and widened the reach of written propaganda.

Evidence

A major step was the invention of the alphabet, and the replacement of the cumbrous writing systems—cuneiform, hieroglyphs and the like—of the most ancient civilizations. With the advent of the alphabet, writing was no longer a specialized craft or mystery, knowledge of which was confined to a small class of priests and scribes. In contrast to the earlier systems of writing, it could easily be taught and mastered, and could bring the message of a written text to a much wider circle. This was still far short of universal literacy, but it was a great improvement on what went before, and significantly eased the task of propagandists of every kind. — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 453

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the Innis/Ong literacy-and-communication-technology line in The Bias of Communication and oral-culture literature the reader has engaged. — connects to: Forged propaganda comes in altered-text and wholly-invented forms; Writing’s spread made symbolic communication media historically necessary — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 590; Writing transitioned from mnemonic signs to phonetic symbols. — Neil MacGregor, A History of the World in 100 Objects, 264 (+3 more)
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Forged propaganda comes in altered-text and wholly-invented forms; Writing’s spread made symbolic communication media historically necessary — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 590; Writing transitioned from mnemonic signs to phonetic symbols. — Neil MacGregor, A History of the World in 100 Objects, 264 (+3 more)