Why 17 Million Telegrams Are Still Sent Every Year

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Video written by Adam Chase
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[@iafozzac]

You failed to mention that two thirds of those yearly telegrams are sent in Italy alone because it's considered the standard way to offer condolences

[@lilyyoung1002]

Thats interesting

[@KArkhon]

Also in most Balkan countries

[@joeyknight8272]

Interesting

[@axelprino]

At least it must be better than the phone ringing every few minutes, that's emotionally draining but people do it anyway.

[@andreanoli5221]

@Hernando Malinche we still do it, I don't know how it started though

[@Linkmon99]

Anyone else shocked that in the mid 1800s they laid a telegram line ACROSS THE ENTIRE ATLANTIC OCEAN.. and IT WORKED?! That alone needs to be a video

[@CHIL2903]

Have a look on here for The Transatlantic Telegraph Cable: A Tale of Extraordinary Perseverance

[@haweater1555]

There are many videos on this. The first few lines, even after great effort and resources, DIDN'T work. It was quite a leap of faith to even try again and again.

[@gayusschwulius8490]

It was a pretty wild ride, too. It took multiple attempts to work, some of the tries failed because the wire snapped and one even failed because it was attacked by sharks, if I recall correctly.

[@kimofrosty]

Vertasium touched a bit on his latest videos about laying the cables across the atlantic

[@GamingAmbienceLive]

someone made it recently and its really good, it talks of history of ocean cables

[@OhioCentralModeler]

Pagers aren't dead, virtually all hospitals still use them to get a hold of doctors for some inexplicable reason (at least in the US).

[@alezacrespublik6655]

I mean, you can't turn off notifications in a pager

[@wclifton968gameplaystutorials]

~2 years ago I was in the Westfield shopping centre in Shepard's Bush, London and the food court were still using pagers which were given to customers to tell them when to pick up the food they ordered from the counter since people can't be expected to download a stupid phone app or hear someone loudly shout "ORDER #420 IS READY"

[@max.the.imperor]

Because radiowaves used in pagers better penetrate lots of walls and floors, than phone signal. You can have no cell service somwhere in the basement, but still have pager connection

[@itaybron]

EMTs use them in my country.

[@LucasL512]

(Volunteer) Firefighters also carry pagers to receive alarms

[@schlachthaus5]

When a Japanese friend died suddenly, I sent a telegram of condolence to his family. Apparently a telegram from abroad (and especially from the United States) is considered an honor by the recipient and an excellent way for the sender to show their respect for the deceased and their family.

[@thisisAB]

When you sent the telegram was it addressed to a specific person or address? How would you know where to send it?

[@StationSquare.]

@@thisisAB He either had been to the friend’s house before, or the friend told him where their house was.

[@schlachthaus5]

@@thisisAB It’s a long story, but here goes: My great uncle went to Japan in 1945 as an attorney on General MacArthur’s staff and never came back. BTW, he helped write the Japanese constitution and is considered a hero of free speech in Japan by the National Broadcasting Service (NHK). Since he never married, he adopted his Japanese assistant, who was married with four children and several grandchildren. By the time I got to visit my Japanese family, my great uncle had passed away. I was living in Korea at the time and had interpreter friends throughout Asia, including Japan. They helped me make the arrangements.

[@GreatMewtwo]

I guess it is in line with the idea that written letters are more honorable than media as disposable as text messages, faxes or email.

[@shahranhussain6037]

@@schlachthaus5 interesting! do you have any NHK articles about him?

[@jovanweismiller7114]

My first job out of high school was microfilming old newspapers. When I was filming papers from the 1860s, it was easy to spot when the first successful transatlantic telegraph cable was completed. Suddenly, the dateline on European stories dropped from being two weeks in the past to being the day before publication.

[@donaloflynn]

Wow. I've seen the word dateline before (as a TV current affairs show title), but despite having a big interest in journalism and having worked at a newspaper for a short time, I've never thought about what a dateline actually was, i.e. the date that the report was filed. I know the word byline of course, but again I've never thought of it in the literal sense of the writer's name being on one line and the filing date being on another line, both appearing after the headline. I've never had reason to think of a report being out of date even before it goes to print.

[@HmmmmmLemmeThinkNo]

Thank you for your hard work! My mom uses it often in her work, and she occasionally does it, and it's necessary and difficult, and truly important. Thank you

[@craigcook9715]

@@donaloflynn byline is also used in publishing, if a writer wishes to have the work published under anything but their legal name. The legal name should be also on correspondence with the publisher, but in e.g., a short story, the byline is on the title page (and the short form of the legal name on the running headers of the whole work).

[@disorganizedorg]

Microfilm & fiche -- there's a technology that hung on well beyond its expiration date. I worked for about 8 years total in COM (computer output microfilm) service bureaus. That was in the 80s and 90s and the belief among my peers was that much of the business was due to the IRS only accepting silver halide film as archival quality. Once they OK'd data on compact disc the industry was truly dead. I still miss Bell & Howell 3800 series recorders; they were built like tanks and simple enough for operators to make some minor temporary repairs... just like working on your own car is now much harder, I disliked Datagraphix XFP hardware when I was forced to work on it after First Image bought out Anacomp's fiche business. The culture at work also took a turn for the worse, as is often the case with mergers.

[@lodestarlondon8850]

1860s? You must be really really old lol.

[@tncorgi92]

Shortest telegram (s) ever: Victor Hugo to his publisher, wondering how his book "Les Miserables" was selling, inquired "?". His publisher replied "!"

[@dr.jamesolack8504]

They sound like a couple of tight wads!

[@kaleb8082]

I’m not sure if it’s still accurate but a few years ago, it was still possible to request or update your leave via telegram in the US military. Apparently some guy read the regulations and sent his commander a telegram for his leave.

[@joshuacheung6518]

I couldn't find anything on that, if you can find a source for me i know some people that would happily do that for their amusement. Unfortunately there's a digital component as of over a decade ago so i think the reply would be "have you filed online yet"

[@vigilantcosmicpenguin8721]

Seems like a really cool guy.

[@Zzzlaldkfjrowpq]

@@joshuacheung6518 real reply would be "S1 already lost your DA31"

[@joshuacheung6518]

@@Zzzlaldkfjrowpq couple of my friends are fairly close with their CC, so maybe not

[@michaelwinter742]

Telegram use in military began phase out after Vietnam. They were discontinued in 2006.

[@AnonymousFreakYT]

Would it surprise you to learn that pagers are still alive and well? Specifically in medical settings. The main reason is that the radio frequencies used by pagers can pass through thick walls *FAR* easier than the frequencies used by cell phones. So people who work in hospitals - which tend to be giant cell phone no-signal-zones - still use pagers.

[@treyshaffer]

As a software engineer, I have to be on-call if our services is break, and we receive pagers for this purpose.

[@ghammer9773]

There's also the shocking interference thing... There are important medical devices (those I know specifically called out some suspect ventilators) that change their settings when a cell phone is being used nearby. Somehow, loop removal and RF shielding are not that functional in the highly regulated medical space

[@krissteel4074]

Up until about 2008 I was still using pagers to get notifications out to on call telecommunications techs as well- primarily for the same reasons in that the signal would have enough range and potential to still work in pretty much anything short of a complete meltdown of the electrical grid + mobile phone and landline services. Given it was our job to make sure the right guy gets to the right spot for all the potentially wrong reasons. Eventually it was phased out by SMS services due to multi-carrier support and an overall increase in the overlapping density of signals What never went away however, was fax machines, they might look like a scanner and be just software for the most part daisy chained into the IP phone network, but its still a fax and like in most places its legal documentation- its got when, from where and a signature on it. That might not seem like much, but its pretty hard to spoof that kind of info into emails to the level of being 'without doubt' and in the business at the time of doing a lot of legal things ranging from dealing with banks to police and security services it covered everything from 'go stock my cash machine' to 'secret government search actions' requiring a judge to sign off on it.

[@honeychubbs]

Huh, that's kinda wild

[@shawnerz98]

It's *not* that "the radio frequencies pass the walls far easier than the frequencies used by cell phones". It's the fact a paging transmitter can put out 250, 500, or 650 watts vs. the 35 watts from a cellular transmitter. Depending on the paging operator, they transmit on around 150 MHz, 450 MHz and/or 935-ish MHz. So it's more than just the specific absorption rate of brick and concrete.

[@Ishan.khanna]

probably because everyone would laugh at 16.9 million telegrams

[@ThePrufessa]

Yeah I SMH whenever I hear someone say $3.99 instead of $4. Or even worse they ignore the entire .99 and say $3.

[@DangNguyen-xx3zi]

nice.

[@Nobody-pv9jt]

@@ThePrufessa I think you missed the joke sir

[@deleted-something]

Te

[@MikePWJr]

@@ThePrufessa r/whoosh

[@SantiagoAntonutti]

Argentina uses telegrams for when you quit your job, specifically because its faster than a letter and it's a legal document, if the other part wanted to sue. Still pretty unnecessary

[@AxxLAfriku]

should i skip school for youtube video making? i making good stuff but i need much time to making. maybe replace school with making videos. i have two girlfriends. thanks for your opinion dear san

[@hdjono3351]

@@AxxLAfriku stay in school bro

[@joshuakevinserdan9331]

@@AxxLAfriku If you can do the work, do both. If you can't, stay in school, and then do youtube later in life.

[@JohnDoe-xp4iy]

“Here’s my two weeks notice” “Alright, see you in court you piece of shit.”

[@robertoaguiar6230]

@@AxxLAfriku if you can have two girlfriends you can do school and yt you poser

[@LucasL512]

I would have liked a better explaination about the practical side of the telegrams. Are the telegraph lines still operational, or do they use the internet? And how is the message delivered to you? Does some kid come running to you yelling out "A telegram for you sir/madam!"?

[@hdjono3351]

I believe most are using pagers

[@jupiterjones3789]

The specific details depend on the country In Germany you write them online and they get delivered by the mail man as a special way of delivering wishes and congratulations In some third world places there is still no reliable or affordable phone or internet connection and there are really actual telegraph connections but they die of quickly There is also in some places a structure like telegrams established as a backup for catastrophic takedowns of the communication network although this is typically not over wie by real connection and messengers delivering the messages

[@gjvnq]

In Brazil you can request a telegram online but they will arrive at the destination in printed form just like a letter. (Our IRS still likes to send telegrams probably because it leaves the printing job to the mail)

[@danilobarcelos7307]

@@gjvnq nem sabia que a gente tinha isso kkkk

[@Haibing22]

Oi, telegram guv’nor!

[@Bytewave]

The ARRL National Traffic System also exists, and is similar to telegraphs (although it operates over radio rather than discrete wires). Amateur radio operators send so-called "radiograms" to one another fairly often, although lead times on delivery can be up to a few days.

[@jr637-1]

As a ham operator, CW can be immediate two-way if you've got someone on the same frequency. But I never considered transmitting a message via a third-party before! Makes me want to learn morse code.

[@texasyojimbo]

@@jr637-1 hams used to do phone patches fairly regularly for overseas troops or scientists in Antarctica. I think that's no longer as common; other than some local repeaters I don't know of anyone who does phone patches anymore.

[@flazzorb]

Don't you love the return of bot replies, man youtube is really trying when a link with the word nude in it is clear to post.

[@chrisstevens7866]

@@texasyojimbo I think they still do it for the ARISS (Amateur radio on International Space Station) events where astronauts talk to kids at schools. NASA can stream the event online but they use radios as an educational opportunity and i've seen them set up at 1 school or at a NASA facility then phone patch to others to get more kids involved .

[@someperson7]

@@flazzorb I mean TBF your reply has that word in it too🤪

[@flamingash3809]

"so he could be there with his wife, the next time she died" LMAO

[@lightyagami3492]

It really be like that in the 19th and early 20th centuries though. 💀💀💀 Some men married several times before they themselves died.

[@lunatik0311]

Ikr lol

[@yokermitthefrog5169]

Same with the so after you’re done proving you didn’t kill your husband in court

[@mittensfastpaw]

Reminds me of how faxes are still in use and especially in schools. Despite it literally just being the same these days as a attachment to an email. One of which is much faster and more secure.

[@Sacto1654]

Faxes are still heavily used on countries where the writing system is not fully conducive for keyboard use, especially in Japan.

[@thermitekitty9070]

For boomers, faxes are in practice faster and more secure. No computer user error, the paper just comes right out of the fax machine. Plus in healthcare, faxes are always HIPAA-compliant, so it's a no-brainer until more places go paperless and the old staff retire.

[@jfbeam]

Lawyers, banks, and hospitals still live and die by the fax. I can't sign an iPad. :-) ('tho my lawyers have been accepting digital signatures for a while now. DocuSign makes their life so much better. But there are still things that require my hand written signature.)

[@jfbeam]

@@thermitekitty9070 Note: Faxes are not encrypted! What's going on the phone line is very easily intercepted TIFF image data. (what many people see as "a fax" today are actually scan-to-email, or scan-to-print systems over internal IP networks.)

[@vigilantcosmicpenguin8721]

Somehow a fax machine feels more outdated to me than a telegram.

[@EebstertheGreat]

There are supposedly still over 2 million pagers in use, and there may be close to a million people still using dial-up just in the U.S. So those things are actually kind of like the telegram. The difference is that dial-up and pagers still serve their intended purposes and are essential for some people. Telegrams have no practical value. They cannot be sent to locations near you, because virtually all of them have closed, so telegrams are just sent wherever and then brought by the USPS like normal mail. The only advantages then are weird legal trivia and a sort of faux historic romanticism.

[@sajeucettefoistunevaspasme]

How About iPhone 12 ?

[@jfbeam]

If you've ever had one of those hockey puck your-table-is-ready things, you've had a modern "pager".

[@BatCaveOz]

"Telegrams have no practical value. They cannot be sent to locations near you, because virtually all of them have closed, so telegrams are just sent wherever and then brought by the USPS like normal mail. The only advantages then are weird legal trivia and a sort of faux historic romanticism." Me - Congratulations on regurgitating what we just watched. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@sajeucettefoistunevaspasme]

@@BatCaveOz that what the video says

[@EebstertheGreat]

@@jfbeam Those are actually older than pagers.

[@stankythecat6735]

The concept of the first under sea cable still blows my mind. It’s the fing ocean… it’s wild they managed to pull it off

[@Zireael83]

thought the same while watching the video... that´s 100 times harder to pull off than the rest of the network/ sending/receiving-stations

[@jupiterjones3789]

Therefore it had to be tried several times - but I'm not sure anymore how often

[@StuffandThings_]

And they had to use another technological marvel of the day, the SS Great Eastern to pull it off too.

[@kepler656]

FING OCEAN

[@chrisclifford7080]

yeet cable into ocean

[@ShortHax]

I couldn’t be the only one who first thought it was the amount of messages sent in the Telegram app

[@talkalexis]

Actually, you are.

[@talkalexis]

The reason? You have 0 likes

[@Untitled_Pribor]

same

[@mairali840]

@@talkalexis well , actually he is not cuz he has more than 0 likes

[@abhinavdp7376]

Me too 😂

[@drax5709]

So according to Wikipedia Italy is responsible for over two thirds of the worldwide telegrams sent. "Poste Italiane still offers telegram service. Around 12.5 million telegrams are sent annually.[13]" What the heck are we doing with those??

[@nonnodacciaio704]

Condolences

[@Sennahoj_DE_RLP]

In Germany the health authorities Had used fax which is basically the same. To the Beginn of Covid 19

[@living_in_exile]

It's the common way to send condolences in Italy

[@CCLFan1]

1:40 -- "Are thou up?" should be "Art thou up?" because "art" is the informal second person present tense conjugation for "to be" because "thou" is the informal second person pronoun in English which was basically replaced by the formal "you". This is really obscure but I've never caught one of these before. Love you Sam! You're the best! 😄

[@justsomeguy5103]

The nerd force is strong with this one! (And I love it)

[@abhinavdp7376]

Awesome find!

[@mateuszbugaj799]

there is zero purpose in knowing this except to create this comment

[@jordanbell4736]

Knowing this is a byproduct of thoroughly studying grammar

[@HaveANiceDayLol.]

@@mateuszbugaj799 The dude speaks bible

[@donna30044]

The best reason for doctors and other emergency responders to use pagers rather than cellphones is that pagers are not usually subject to spam/robo calls. A pager can be left on while one's cellphone is muted, turned off, or in Do Not Disturb mode.

[@EsperRanger]

Telegrams are still used at some weddings receptions in Japan. I've been to a couple where they are used by people who could not attend in person and the wedding hosting company has the telegrams read by a professional "voice" - someone with a nice voice and very clear diction. They're also considered a bit trendy from what I've been told. Oddly enough, Japan has gotten rid of its pagers but still has FAX machines.

[@maddyg3208]

I think the Japanese invented fax machines (because it was a good way to send messages in their character-based script), so I'm not surprised they're still popular there.

[@gregoryborton6598]

@@maddyg3208 I mean, I live in Canada and they're still around. On the decline, sure, but still essential for navigating the courts and bureaucracy yet to or unwilling to switch to email systems.

[@mattkennedy9308]

Japan is also an interesting place in that a huge percentage of managers and supervisors are over 70 so that's about as advanced as they can get.

[@Ramog1000]

I remember that in the bbc show sherlock (the one that is a reimagination of sherlock in the new times) in the wedding episode they called the letters that also were from the people that couldn't be there telegrams too (atleast in the german version), they are read out by the groom. Like in that case I doubt it was actual telegrams but more so that they were called that way. That leads me to believe that it could be a wedding tradition in general (or atleast in the UK or in a weirder case in germany because it was the german dub) althought I can't find anything right now that would prove me right. If you want to know in more detail just write me up and I can look up if its refered to as telegrams in the english orginal dub too.

[@120salvo]

I mean, fax still exists for the same reason as telegrams: it’s instant and in writing

[@MahlenMorris]

1:21 "Flag signals" were actually known as "semaphore telegraphs" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_telegraph) and preceded electrical telegraphs. Because they depend on being able to see really far, they tended to get placed on hills. So if you see a place called "Telegraph Hill" (or Point or Place or whatever), that's usually why.

[@dalevaughn9446]

Also flag & signal flash.

[@sixstringedthing]

Now that is an interesting fact I wasn't previously aware of, although I did know about semaphore signalling in a maritime context. I'd never really thought about the significance of names like "Telegraph Hill" or Telegraph Point" in reference to land-based semaphore telegraph. I presume that names like "Telegraph Road" (common to many cities/towns) came about after the introduction of the electrical telegraph, referring to long strips of land that were clear-felled and/or graded to allow for the installation/maintenance of telegraph wires, and so became main routes of fast and easy travel between major locations.

[@lk29392]

So pagers are still alive and well in hospitals as a reliable means of communication given the lack of cell phone signals in large hospitals. I'd say there are likely millions of pager signals sent in hospitals every year.

[@stevejohnson3357]

Medical records are also faxed more than other things. Also most of the pay phones in the Vancouver area seem to be at St Paul's Hospital.

[@jfbeam]

I haven't seen a hospital without universal Wifi everywhere. With "voice over wifi" on just about everything these days, your cellphone will work everywhere as well. The problem is speed, security, and reliability. Pagers use very little power -- the one I had in the 90's would last a month or more on a single AA. Since the entire system is on-site, it doesn't rely on a great deal of outside services (towers, routers, messaging gateways, etc.) -- you have 100% control over all of it. Today you could get the same results with skype or any number of VoIP/IM apps. But the low power of pagers, and the fact the user can do anything else to them...

[@AlbertScoot]

Yes, for things like medical records you don't really want everything e-mailed since that leaves a permanent copy of records in the system. Imagine someone getting into an email of a doctor with hundreds of people's records in their email.

[@someguy4915]

@@jfbeam The 100% control over all of it doesn't really apply though, as a typical hospital would have support contracts on most of such equipment, meaning if anything broke they call the manufacturer. Much like when taking any other system actually. Security is not a typical feature of pagers, they can easily be spoofed and listened to by third parties, it's just that they're so simple there's not much to break. Skype, Lync, Teams, Skype for Business or whatever Microsoft decides to call Skype tomorrow is not something that would ever replace pagers, while it works pretty good it is intended as an entirely different thing. A VoIP solution seems nice, but is expensive to setup, complex and thus expensive to maintain.

[@fgsaramago]

Large buildings usually have cellphone antennas inside

[@adithyaramachandran7427]

My grandfather used to work at a telegram company. He still has one as a showpiece at home.

[@JeffreyLWhitledge]

He should probably go ahead and deliver that telegram already. It may be important!

[@maddyg3208]

My grandfather grew up in a post office and (presumably because he already knew morse code) was a signaller in WW1

[@LThunders138]

Here in Brazil, telegrams are used mostly by the government in situations like call up for civil service examination, judicial and extrajudicial notifications; and by private companies in some occasions, like when one of their workers go AWOL.

[@benm3382]

I have a theory that technologies almost never die once they become commonplace, even when they are replaced by newer ones. This is because every technology has a shape, including allowances and limitations (as McLuhan would say). A pager for example is replaced in abilities by cell phones and the vast majority of us have no reason not to use a cell phone instead, but when you want to send one way pages and you want a fast and simple device to do it then you would still want a pager like hospitals do. Telegrams mostly don't make sense in the modern world yet they serve a specific formal purpose as the closest thing to electronic letters, since they are recorded and delivered by telegraph companies and are each paid for by the sender. There is technically no reason a writer would need to use a typewriter in the 21st century but an author might find that the absolute concentration of using a typewriter instead of a laptop is still valuable. It's usually better to adapt to the devices that can do more things, but there is still value in the way different devices interact with the physical world differently.

[@smallstudiodesign]

We still use pagers in (higher end) restaurants for when customers on table wait list … they are alerted by the pager & return it as escorted to available table

[@Archbishop_of_the_Noodle]

Military instillations and companies that handle confidential information use them as well. Buildings block most forms of communication without landlines or pagers since they work differently than other forms.

[@drworm5007]

I prefer to use a slide rule for approximate calculations because it essentially allows you to see the whole times table (or sine, log, etc) at a glance giving you a better intuition for the proportionality of what you're doing. I consider it a major disadvantage of electronic calculators that numbers easily become meaningless to the user.

[@120salvo]

Oh yeah, this is why trains and bicycles will never die: they’re incredibly efficient in one specific niche

[@witchofengineering]

2:23 Actually... if you were using a telegram to talk to someone on the other side of the Atlantic, your words, for a moment, were, at the bottom of Atlantic...

[@filipe2338]

As your words probably were if you sent a message over the internet. Intercontinental internet cable are underwater as well

[@pvic6959]

this is true with the internet. the internet is connected via underwater fiberoptic cables

[@benjaminbrewer2569]

Nicely done sir!

[@keco185]

2:31 "That way he could be there for his wife the next time she died" Aw, that's so sweet---- wait a second...

[@fcalba]

My dad worked at a well known communications company back in the 90s, not going to say the name, and they received telegrams that they had to print out, fold and put them on an envelope with a stamp, to later take it to the post office. These telegrams were coming from out of the US, and then delivered via USPS.

[@bniisantos]

nOt gOiNg tO sAy nAmE

[@EebstertheGreat]

How else could they be delivered? I think telegrams have been delivered that way for a long time.

[@fcalba]

@@EebstertheGreat Can only tell you how they were delivered in the US, not sure it is the same for all other countries.

[@EebstertheGreat]

@@fcalba I looked it up, and I guess before widespread telephones, telegram companies would pay couriers on bikes to deliver telegrams in cities. So I guess that's one other way.

[@Zireael83]

@@bniisantos your keyboard seems broken

[@LordMardur]

In 2001 I was working in the German military. One of my duties was to collect telegrams from the telegram station, about half a dozen, twice a day. They were typically transfer requests (soldier XY with certain qualifications wants to be transferred to another unit close to location XY or with a certain job profile) and updates in regulations (open regulation 42 at page 69, strike out the 2nd sentence, insert "or else" after the 3rd sentence). And yes, I was manually updating the text book regulations in the bookshelf of the sergeants office with a pen. Fun times.

[@rapahelbarth2187]

These good prices ting offers in the US would be absolutely outrageus in Austria. I pay 20€ for 35 GB

[@ammo2222]

I was thinking the exact same Thing. I pay 10€ for 13GB

[@nonnodacciaio704]

Lmao I pay 16€ for unlimited data, sms and calls

[@MegaLokopo]

ting is pretty expensive in the us actually. You can get unlimited data for about 30 dollars using which ever towers you want.

[@unarmedduck]

£20 gets me 100gb a month in the UK. The US and Canada are getting hella ripped off.

[@rapahelbarth2187]

@@nonnodacciaio704 mine is unlimited too but the speed is limited after 35 gig

[@stagehits]

1:04 "Pagers... Have all but disappeared" Laughs in NHS

[@LancasterResponding]

1:05 Me staring at my fire company pager: It’s okay little buddy that guy didn’t really mean it

[@macmedic892]

I have fond memories of wearing a Motorola Minitor III on my hip.

[@Sci_X1]

Every person in the medical industry: .-.

[@bf0189]

Pagers are a vital part of health care. Doctors and nurses rely on pagers since they can get signals in large hospitals unlike cellphones plus you don't have to worry about battery life.

[@dr.jamesolack8504]

No worry about battery life? Well, not with the new fusion pager.

[@vc3928]

Specific real-world examples of contracts that still use telegrams would have made this video halfway more interesting.

[@ThePrufessa]

~5 Yahoo messenger calls per year is the most amazing fact I learned in this video.

[@mruler360]

>using Betty white with the telegram to show how both old and still active it is ooof, timely

[@plippilp2888]

Rip Betty White 🥺

[@klaratehcoolcat]

Usually when I click these types of videos I have to choose 2 out of 3: either 1) truly informative, OR 2) funny, OR 3) under 30 mins. The one liners are honestly great and the script is concise. Thanks!

[@Naruedyoh]

In Spain the Telegram is mostly used by the Royasl Family, mostly to wish happy birtdays and such

[@herlescraft]

Us: "super cheap 25$/m for 5gb of data" Me in italy: i have 80gb for 12€/m

[@cozzaronero]

Unlimited everything 5G speeds 20€/mo with vodafone

[@user-ym4xy6us5e]

Oh dear. My provider still charges $28.95 per message in addition to 88¢ per word. At least I'm not locked into a contract!

[@Lillith.]

My country still has a telegram service. I'm going to use that to send a stupid message to a friend and ask him to reply by telegram. Is it unnecessary? Most definitely. Is it memorable? I think so.

[@oliverlemley9343]

Pagers are actually still in widespread use in rural america for use in contacting volunteer emergency responders

[@taitano12]

If you count wireless telegraphy, it's used in emergency situations because a single tone is easier to recognize and use over radio static and ambient noise. A Code can be discerned through static that can render voice transmission completely indecipherable. In fact, I got my Amateur (Ham) Radio Technician Grade license just a couple of years after the FCC dropped Morse Code (or Code Wave (CW)) as a requirement for licensing in 2007.

[@ApocTheLegend]

watching this the day betty white died and seeing her in the video, trippy af

[@anthonyholroyd5359]

The use of telegram technology for railway signalling is an interesting topic in and of itself. I'm traincrew and drivers, guards and signallers still use bell codes to communicate with one another in the UK to this day.

[@nodak81]

Back in the early 90's my mom received a telegram to let her know my grandma had a stroke. We were dirt poor and couldn't afford phone service so there was no other way to contact us quickly back then.

[@lukeheidmusic]

Thank you for consistently making great/entertaining/mildly educational content!

[@LachlanKelly]

Yeah… the Betty White joke kinda doesn’t work now 😢

[@LQC2556]

Now what I want to know is in what manner they actually send telegrams nowadays (i.e. no way they still have telegraph operators when it can be done digitally, right?) Maybe that would've been a better answer to the "how" question.

[@Hobadee]

Pagers are still in use. They have much better range and reliability than cell phones, so they are still used to alert people when reliability is critical. For example, my buddy is on a Search and Rescue team; He has a pager so they can get ahold of him no matter where he is.

[@derekcollier1310]

0:59 Well that part of the video didn't age well.

[@king_james_official]

who is this

[@dominicquick5698]

That Betty White joke did not AGE well

[@2011blueman]

I didn't even know that telegrams still existed.

[@lightyagami3492]

Same. Makes me want to send some to random people thinking that i was sending messages to the future 😂😂

[@OLBastholm]

I thought they stopped existing more than a hundred years ago. I mean, phones have been at least somewhat common for around a hundred years.

[@PhilLesh69]

I think it was Reuters that began as a carrier pigeon message delivery service, or they used them to allow reporters to file dispatches from across europe. They could send a pigeon with a reporter from paris to report in Brussels. He could write his report and attach it to the pigeon, which would find its way back to its flock on the roof of the Reuters building in paris.

[@DescendDab]

I think its really cool that this technology is still being used! Its always a bit sad when different types of tech die out, so im glad that that isnt the case for this in particular :)

[@aashaychouhan3524]

Thought this would be about that damn app.

[@magnetsstyle]

Same

[@marcmckenzie5110]

Growing up in rural Kansas, my family sent/received a Western Union telegram a little less often than annually. A family engagement, an impending death, or a great achievement. Even then it was past it’s heyday (this was the late 1960s), but the cache was definitely still there. When I was a kid, I learned morse code, and once got to see a very rural message sent the old way. Fun to share!

[@user-ym4xy6us5e]

We do not say "it's" when we mean "its". We do not say "cache" (kash) when we mean "caché" (ka-shay). Credit to you for learning Morse code as a youth. Here's to better times.

[@JL-sm6cg]

In my life (born in 1975) the only time we ever got a telegram was in 1989 when my father's company that he had started at only a few months before (and was showing signs of the possibility of layoffs, I don't remember the whole story) sent him one on Friday night informing him he was laid off. He kept that thing for years, and even framed it with custom matting, with the words "Is this class, or what?!"

[@culturebreath369]

These videos are always so hilarious. But informative. 😂🙏

[@marcosettembre]

Ting: offers a good mobile plan Me with infinite data for free: I'm 4 parallel universes ahead of you

[@MegaLokopo]

Are you on a shared cell phone plan?

[@marcosettembre]

@@MegaLokopo yes, my entire family uses the same mobile company and they offered us free unlimited data because we have other promotions and we're long-time customers. (We use TIM which is the biggest one in Italy)

[@MegaLokopo]

@@marcosettembre That is impressive, but it sounds like you are still paying them money, so technically not free if that's the case, but still that is impressive.

[@StrokeMahEgo]

@@marcosettembre free unlimited but they probably throttle speeds after 1GB

[@Perririri]

Normie

[@Xeotroid]

Pagers are still commonly used by medical and security staff in places with poor reception like on concerts where the amount of people with phones causes disruptions in connectivity - not good if you're emergency personnel. And apparently this modern, first world country of USA still has a lot of people connecting through dial-up.

[@TheMaster4534]

At least they have fallback unlike third world countries

[@DoctorX17]

Ting is always watching and ready to answer your questions. Hi Ting!

[@mahmed4846]

This has to be one of the best ones from this channel

[@marcwenger9424]

This almost makes me want to send a telegram, and buy a CD player and VHS, or even go to the museum and look at newspapers

[@marcwenger9424]

...do a video on why newspapers still exists? WHO and WHY?

[@Ben01tM]

Also buy a film camera

[@RudyG01]

Newspapers are still cool ngl, better than to check the phone in the morning imo

[@jbird4478]

VHS is pretty awesome. It allows you to watch your favorite movies whenever you want without the distraction by the possibility of watching other movies.

[@kyleterry5190]

A CD player is too modern, use cassetes or those huge tapes

[@pedroarjona6996]

In México, a few years ago a criminal with a detention order for several crimes was subpoened to make a deposition on a civil matter with a lot of money at the stake. If he show in court to declare, he will be arrested inmediatly after, if he didn't show up, he will lose a lot of money. His lawyer came to court with a hundred page deposition in telegram, it was still a legal way to reponse in civil matters.

[@davidcox3076]

That's brilliant!

[@Swordopolis]

My hospital still uses pagers to alert certain staff when a stroke patient may need treatment on extremely short notice

[@byubuckeyes]

This was easily one of your most hilarious videos. Kudos.

[@metmatt]

Damn those Ting prices are so high. I never knew data was so expensive in the USA. In the UK I pay £20 for 200GB.

[@FeiKuan]

I can't be the only one who thought he's referring to the app when I first saw the title

[@lool270]

Your videos are great. You give some great information and keep it funny with random jokes.

[@timmontez31]

Bro I seriously love your stock footage 😂

[@sohopedeco]

Telegrams still exist in Brazil, but I heard they're just sent over the internet nowadays instead of actual telegraphs.

[@nelsonricardo3729]

So . . . not really telegrams, then?

[@Perseagatuna]

@@nelsonricardo3729 e-telegrams

[@sohopedeco]

@@nelsonricardo3729 The post prints it in the closest office to the destination and then sends it by motorcycle. It's same day delivery up until some 2 p.m.

[@priel4355]

Phone bills in the states are ABSURD, here for 10$ per month you can get 150gb of internet unlimited calls and unlimited sms

[@holger_p]

Wherever "here" is. And sms is dead, due to the internet. We are just a 2 person household, but with netflix and other streaming services, we use about 800gb per month. It's about 4GB per hour.

[@priel4355]

@@holger_p wifi?

[@holger_p]

@@priel4355 How you connect inside your house with cable or Wifi does not make any difference. It's not mobile phone, LTE, 5G or things like that. There 150GB would be around $50 for me. But I'm not streaming videos on my mobile.

[@MikailStoner]

This was hilarious. I like your style of breaking History down. Subbed

[@molotera8789]

I work as a receptionist for a state-owned entity and some courts in other states are still sending telegrams, theyre usually for our legal services department

[@daniel_poore]

One note: Actually if sending a telegraph to an overseas continent, you were guaranteeing your "words" ended up at the bottom of the Atlantic. SEE undersea telegraph wires, like today's modern underwater fiber lines for cross world internet these wires did the same thing but with telegraphs! Edit: continued watching to see you mentioned undersea telegraph. Lol

[@Perseagatuna]

So you mean these words I'm typing were once on the very bottom of the atlantic?

[@michaellomner]

Anyone noticed how he didn't mention the app telegram

[@californiahummus]

Working with public contracts there are still some cities and government agencies that require a general contractor to notify potential bidders. And sometimes you will be still be notifying the list of potential bidders by FAX.

[@sergie2822]

2:34 Wait, what? that threw me off, lol. 😂😂

[@jimsvideos7201]

1:51 I see what you did there.

[@quokka_yt]

?

[@hexium_]

Nice

[@unknownrealms8452]

Could you pls explain this phenomenon.

[@archygrey9093]

Apparently the telegram is one of the reasons for some of the shorter or simplified American versions of English words such as "Color" instead of "Colour" or "Flavor" instead "Flavour" or "Neighbor" instead of "Neighbour" and so on. Because telegrams were usually charged per letter people would drop letters or shorten words to make it cheaper to send.

[@rumned]

Isn't this is because Noah Webster made spelling reforms in the USA?

[@rumned]

Yep a quick Google search confirmed my claim. Noah Webster published his dictionary containing the reforms in 1828, Morse got support for laying telegraph cables across the US in the 1830s. So, the telegram is maybe not the *reason* for the American spelling, but one of the propagators of it.

[@weberman173]

its a mix of the spellign reform, not wanting to be british, and that NEWSPAPERS charged by the letter for advertisements..

[@CyaSurprise]

Very interesting video, as well as the ad segment. I live in Poland and my phone bill is 60pln, which is about 15usd a month. For this price I have unlimited calls, sms messages and data in my country + 5gigs a month everywhere in the European Union. I had no idea such services were this expensive across the pond 💸

[@AlexBurtonMusic]

In Turkey, you have been able to send telegrams via PTT since 1885. In the early 60s, the standard telegraph system was still in use. (Dots and dashes.) In the late 60s, the teletype system was introduced. These telegraph lines were abolished in 2010. Now they are sent entirely over the telephone and internet lines.

[@rumiwaldman1687]

Ting made me realize how expensive mobile data is in the US, I just got a new package of (as far as I car) limitless calls and text and 150GB a month of 4g mobile data for 10$

[@ludoxz]

where the fuck do you live m8?

[@MegaLokopo]

do you mean 15 GB per month? If yes, then mint mobile and visible offer better plans.

[@soumitrakandpal]

In India Airtel has a plan of 1.5 GB data per day for 28 days with unlimited calls and texts for Rs. 219 ($2.95)

[@dalzy25]

Astroturfing moment

[@pvic6959]

wow rumi seems to be #sponsored LOL

[@LotusFlyer]

i love you and i am going to build your house

[@lal12]

Maybe this is different in other countries, but what the Wikipedia page calls telegrams in Germany aren't really the same anymore. They are basically Texts that you send to the postal service online which then gets printed out and send as regular Mail. They are marketed as greeting cards and are quite expensive (13-20€). By that definitions there are a lot of services who print out postcards for you and send them to your friends.

[@Cruton2025]

I can't be the only Tim to catch the "streaming HI videos in the wilderness" reference, but it made me laugh in surprise.

[@jr637-1]

As a ham radio operator, does CW transmission also count as telegrams? (CW is just morse code)

[@gammondog]

No. They have to be transcribed on paper and hand delivered to the recipient. That's why it's called a teleGRAM. Telegraph was the mode of transmission and can include other modes besides CW. Facsimile and teletype are also forms of radio telegraphy.

[@nicholasspagnolo7842]

Betty white joke didn't age well

[@CarrerasCorradosCoffee]

Searched by recent for this one

[@VyraJade]

"That way he could be there for his wife the next time she died" Best line in the video😂😂

[@standard_gauge]

I suppose you could read it as the first wife died and he remarried and should she also be at deaths door he would be better able to arrive before she died

[@nrsrymj]

Your presentation is absolutely delightful. I've lost hours in your videos

[@pvic6959]

4:56 i worked at a similarly sized company that was mentioned and the reason we cant keep data for 7 years is because we're not allowed to. its a privacy thing. i find it funny how the public wants it both ways: 1) i want privacy, delete my data and 2) i want my stuff stored. companies go with 1) because laws are strict and privacy is important

[@WoWhistorian]

The public doesn't have a problem with companies keeping records stored. They have a problem with corporations harvesting their personal information and selling it to other companies or entities. Or worse, like Facebook does.

[@frequentlycynical642]

There are many records that must be kept seven years due to many regulations. Often for tax purposes. The size of your company doesn't matter, but its service does.

[@hedgehog3180]

@@WoWhistorian Also there's kinda two things being conflated here. People want some things stored but not others, specifically we all want to store data that could be relevant in a future legal case, like if there's a case about spousal abuse you obviously want to be able to use the messages sent between the two people as evidence in the court case. But what we don't want to be stored is information that is not relevant here, or not relevant in any society that respects privacy, so stuff like location data, posting habits, pictures and so on. Not to mention the point about legal use kinda also makes it clear why this shouldn't be used for profit. It should be pretty obvious that no one other than a court should ever have access to stuff that could be evidence and that in no way what so ever should companies be allowed to profit off that kinda information. I mean in a way that's basically a form of insider trading. Y'know if you set up a service handles private information then you should obviously take on these responsibilities. Saying modern tech companies shouldn't is a bit like saying if you start a railroad but do it in a slightly different way then it's ridiculous for the public to expect that you'd conform to the principles of the regulations that apply to railways.

[@pvic6959]

@@frequentlycynical642 that is a good point. thanks. Some stuff we're only allowed to keep up to 30 days (or delete it early if requested by the user). as far as stuff I work with, we're not allowed to keep for 7 years lol. but then again stuff like email stays around so its clearly allowed in some cases

[@pvic6959]

@@hedgehog3180 i 100% agree that modern tech companies should handle private info properly

[@MatthewStidham]

Who else caught the GIF of Betty White...

[@NoeleVeerod]

Lmao the iPhone 12 gone along with the dial up modem got me hard 😆

[@robkunkel8833]

The Southernmost Point of the Continental US is in Key West, FL and that little building was the terminal point for the telegraph line that went to Cuba. It was all laid by hand. Well into the last century, the owners used a schooner sailboat named the “Western Union” for repair work.

[@michaelabbott2781]

A video on why hospitals still use pagers would be at least half as interesting as this one.

[@Perririri]

Normie

[@nickpanciuk1965]

Never been this early before. Scary stuff

[@bam-skater]

Holy-moly the price of phone data in the US is extortionate

[@masonsykes2240]

The price of everything in the states is extortionate. 3-400 percent markups on everything compared to pre-pandemic. Fucking greedflation...

[@TrackStepstudios]

Your writing is fantastic my guy