Imagine if the technology of today were available in the past...

[dbeth]

Sorry...random posting today:

I was thinking about this as I tried to go to bed last night and was wondering: What if the technology we take for granted today (internet, cable TV, twitter, facebook, cell phones, etc.) existed before their time...and how history would be radically different (outside of the whole different technology thing). Think of some of history's major events and how they may have developed differently:

- 24 hour news networks (or some blogger) uncovers the Cuban Missile Crisis. Think of how heated health care reform is with non-stop coverage. You think Kennedy could have kept as much as he did under wraps and solve it in just 13 days today?

- Twitter in 1930s Poland and Germany. Jews tweet about what they're starting to notice not unlike what Iran dealt with after the "elections".

- cell-phone photo "leaks" of the Manhattan Project in the 1940s developing the atomic bomb.

*****

yes, I know it's random, and I'm NOT trying to get a political discussion going. I'm just trying to think of other examples of how today's technology would fit/change major events of the past. Any other ideas?

[SPTO]

Re: Imagine if the technology of today were available in the past...

Well I could imagine some high up military sources in the Third Reich leaking out Hitler's plans for war in the mid to late '30s. The only way it could be kept under wraps is if they bolted down internet access and usage as much as the Chinese do today but still some things would get out.

Course, there's the flip side to that as Hitler and Goebbels would have even MORE at their disposal for their evil propaganda in the run up to taking over Germany and solidifying power within.