The telegraph prefigured the computer’s control of time down to the microsecond

Evidence

The penetration of time, the use of time as a mechanism of control, the opening of time to commerce and politics has been radically extended by advances in computer technology. Time has been redefined as an ecological niche to be filled down to the microsecond, nanosecond, and picosecond— down to a level at which time can be pictured but not experienced. This process and the parallel reconstruction of practical consciousness and practical activity begins in those capacities of the telegraph which prefigure the com- puter. The telegraph constructed a simulacrum of complex systems, provided an analogue model of the railroad and a digital model of language. It coordin- ated and controlled activity in space, often behind the backs of those subject to it. — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 864

Categorization

• XREF: Directly serves the reader’s goal of understanding Carey’s genealogy of communication technology — telegraph as precursor to digital, control of space-time ‘behind the backs’ of users. — connects to: The telegraph enabled temporal coordination that made standard time zones possible — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 857
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — James W. Carey, Communication as Culture- Essays on…, 864