A Tweet Through The Ages
summary
At 40 Mbps transmission speed the bottleneck is typing plus mobile latency so a modern tweet takes about 21 seconds end to end; a dumb‑phone SMS via a numeric keypad is about 51 seconds, leaving voicemail at 34 seconds and an electrical telegraph operator at 20 wpm about 33 seconds. A carrier pigeon at ~50 mph needs ~31 minutes, the Persian royal post about 2.5 hours, and the Marathon‑style foot courier covers the same distance but collapses on delivery.
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chapters (5)
- 0:00Start
- 2:11seconds to voice message
- 3:10seconds to telegram
- 3:39minutes to carrier pigeon
- 3:59SANQUHAR POST OFFICE SCOTLAND
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