The telegraph, in the mid 19th century, was the next technological breakthrough. Based on the new knowledge and understanding of the properties of electricity, the telegraph provided the technological metaphor and example of the wired network on which so much else has been based. "Electricity freed communication from the constraints of space and from the limits of physical transport. The telegraph was in this sense the decisive invention from which all other communications networks flowed" (Mulgan 1991, 33).
The telegraph, like the computer, was not designed with mass communication in mind. Rather, it was designed to control the movement of trains (Mulgan 1991, 1). Even today most computer networks are used to control the movement of "aircraft, missiles, goods, ideas and money" (Mulgan 1991, 1). But the telegraph had a profound impact on newspapers. With the technology of the telegraph, wire services like the Associated Press were born, allowing local newspapers to cover the nation and the world (Weaver 1983, 4). The telegraph even changed the style of reporting. During the Civil War when crucial news was sent over unreliable or easily destroyed telegraph lines, reporters concentrated all the important information of a news story in the top paragraphs to help insure their connection to the receiving end. Today this style of reporting, called "inverted pyramid," is still the predominant method of reporting the news. (Rogers 1986, 29).