Hans-Joachim Braun

Sound and Safe: A History of Listening behind the Wheel by Karin Bijsterveld, etal. (review)

Braun reviews Sound and Safe: A History of Listening behind the Wheel by Karin Bijsterveld, Eefje Cleophas, Stefan Krebs, and Gijs Mom

Reason and Resonance: A History of Modern Aurality (review)

207 The role of technology in the grander theme of the book is somewhat downplayed—necessarily so in most cases—but it nonetheless plays an important role in some of the essays. In part 4, “Observing in New Things: Objects,” for example, Kelley Wilder shows how the photograph helped visualize radiation at the end of the nineteenth century. Even here, though, the basic question is not so much about technology as it is about how technology changed the relationship between the observer and the observed. The book’s final section, “Observing Together: Communities,” demonstrates how communities of observers developed and how they came to “recruit, discipline, motivate, and coordinate observers—with significant consequences for the kind of observations produced” (p. 369). In other words, it is the story of how a consensus concerning the rules and even the objects of observation was established over time, leaving the relationship between observation and science in the state we find it today. This book is unusually coherent for an edited volume, thanks in large part to the introductory chapter and the editors’ comments that open each section. Similarly, individual authors frequently mention each other’s contributions, which is extremely useful in making connections among the very diverse subjects covered in the case studies. (There are seventeen chapters, with topics varying from Brownian motion to the Napoleonic Wars.) While most of the essays would work well in graduate courses that address questions of epistemology, relativism, and objectivity and subjectivity, some would also be appropriate as stand-alone reading for undergraduates, chapter 5, “Seeing Is Believing: Professor Vagner’s Wonderful World” by Michael D. Gordin, and chapter 7, “Frogs on the Mantelpiece: The Practice of Observation in Daily Life” by Mary Terrall being good examples. For a project that spans the amount of time and covers the range of material that this volume does, the editors and authors have made a wonderful contribution to what little historiography there is regarding the history of one of the mainstays of modern science—observation.

Analog Days: The Invention and Impact of the Moog Synthesizer (review)

other cities, the FCC tried to encourage participation by women, minorities, and small businesses. This laudable goal of inclusion inadvertently created a land rush, as people like Nicholas Wilson realized that there was money to be made by getting people to bid on a piece of spectrum. Wilson and many others established application mills, encouraging people to invest a little in the hope of gaining a lot. Many did, winning a small slice and then selling out or joining forces with firms that actually intended to provide service. Out of this chaotic situation grew the cell phone market. Luck and personalities played a role, but so did access to cash and credit and the ability to leverage them. Murray employs the familiar but effective technique at tracking small and large players as they try to manipulate the system, expand their empires, steal a march on their competitors, realize dreams, scam their clients, and just have fun. The emphasis is on individuals and the firms they created, to the neglect of larger economic forces and technological issues. This is not necessarily the first book you should read on the subject, but it is quite possibly the second. Readers looking for a more international approach from the perspective of one firm might find Anywhere, Anytime by Louis Galambos and Eric John Abrahamson very useful. Certainly, Wireless Nation will put people squarely in the middle of this technological change and destroy any illusions about markets being rational.