Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph

Re:Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph by DoreenMichele on Wednesday July 26, 2023 @01:11AM (#36873365)

At the beginning of the 19th century, it was possible to wirelessly transmit a short message from Amsterdam to Venice in one hour’s time. A few years before, a messenger on a horse would have needed at least a month’s time to do the same.

...the low-tech predecessor of electronic mail more or less obtained the same result without wires or energy, while the internet consists of a cluster of cables and is devouring our energy resources at an ever faster pace.

So cool and I had never heard of it. You hear far more about how means of travel have sped up. We tend to kind of overlook the importance of speed of communication.

(And I read the entire thing thinking of Gandalf lighting the signal fire without permission via the help of a hobbit...)

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Re:Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph by TRiG_Ireland on Wednesday July 26, 2023 @05:13AM (#36874928)

One of the film's deviations from the plot which made little sense.

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Re:Email in the 18th century: the optical telegraph by heywhatupboys on Wednesday July 26, 2023 @08:43AM (#36876710)

I think it would take much less than a month+.

Assuming friendly territory, we have a distance of 1164 km by the path of modern roads. At walking pace, the average distance expected to cover in Europe was 30 km, so around 40 days.

Taking the speed of a horse into account, and the prevalence of roads in Germany and the Netherlands after crossing the apls, the horse rider should be able to make it with quick pace in 10 days.

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