Bell Labs - The Company that Invented the Future
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- Опубликовано: 22 май 2024
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To some it was the ideas factory, to others it was the most influential institution of its kind in the world and in many ways has created much of the technology that is the bedrock of our modern world, in this video I look at Bell Labs and how it made our future.
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Written, researched and presented by Paul Shillito
Images and footage : Bell Labs Inc, ATT& T Nokia Bell Labs,
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did you say Mohamed atalla instead of martin atalla?
Excellent video.
It would have been even better to at least mention the Monopoly aspect, and how they were able to consistently be cutting edge with innovation, when that is counter to the typical attributes of a monopoly.
...and whether the AT&T breakup was the downfall of the once greatness of Bell Labs. Whether the govt anti-trust action might have done more harm than good, at least as it pertains to Bell Labs.
Nord. The insecure VPN. Thumbs down.
What I really want to know is, where do you get these wonderful shirts?
"Even though the UK is no longer part of the EU any more I still get blocked by some websites"
MASSIVE non-sequitur.. I'm surprised and disappointed that you agreed to read this bullshit ad script that is firmly targeted at the ignorant xenophobe crowd :/
Apologies for my first comment being negative (as is sadly often the case) I really do appreciate what you do, I highly rate your content and will continue to do so
My step father was a physicist at Bell Labs in Holmdel for over 40 years. He held 27 patents through them and was the person who designed the original articulating arm that held the laser for the first laser eye surgery. Art Ashkin was his good friend and use to come by the house often. At the time I thought what he did was neat, but being a boy never fully understood the scope of what went on there. It wasn’t till much later in life, and really learning the history, did I know. To my step father, it was just work, it was just what he did…
I also worked at the Holmdel labs 1977 to 1980
@@chrisschene8301 what did you work on while you were there?
@@tonenuff modems. Data phone ii.
Amazing thanks for sharing 👍
Sure bud
When I graduated from engineering college in 1975 I started doing field testing for Bell Labs. The system they designed had two parts: a control system based on a dec pdp11 minicomputer running a custom designed real-time operating system and hundreds of remote testing systems based on an Intel 8008 processor (the second one designed by Intel). From the engineers at Bell Labs I learned how to design computers from the chips up and operating systems. The on-the-job experience of working with the folks at Bell Labs led me to eventually working as an applications engineer for HP Labs taking theories and creating products. HPL and IBM Labs are also now gone. All were victims of short-term focused bean-counters and hence the decline of USA innovation.
It's weird how the US is self-destructive in that way.
@@ericvosselmans5657 I dont think it's just the USA.
@@Outland9000 I am from western Europe. We are self-destructing even faster.
IBM labs is alive and well in Switzerland
@Jim Pad, it was a product of its times, large monopolies, that made enough money to go around. But monopolies ended hence singular entities to support research in them. It's not lost, but not as concentrated either, the side effect is somewhat slower innovation and somewhat faster and cheaper adoption.
My father's engineering career started at Bell Labs in New Jersey… he always spoke very fondly of his time there.
I hope you don't mind my saying, your father is a high caliber, bona fide badass
@@b5627 His career took him all over some of the finest engineering firms in the country... Harris, Lockheed, General Atronics, Texas Instruments. Shortly after his work at Bell Labs, he interviewed for, but ultimately turned down, a position at Xerox PARC. He specialized in shortwave and cellular signal creation, transmittal and acquisition.
My father was an engineer with Bell as well from the late fifties to early eighties and also enjoyed his time there.
Yes, my father worked for Bell Labs in the 50s until 1982 when he retired. He was a PhD in Electrical Engineering. In fact, Bell was the only company he ever worked for.
I loved Bell labs, but in my role I was a technical associate. I worked with all PHDs pretty much as their programmer and experimenter, but to be at the top in the labs, a PHD was pretty much required. I was sort of a "little fish in a big pond." I worked around people who I considered "giants" , so I moved on to other companies where I could be a regular fish in a regular pond. I worked with the UNIX team, as we used UNIX and the PWB (Programmers work bench) to do our development on Dataphone II modems that my team developed. We did use PDP11 computers. I is pretty amazing that Linux looks pretty much like the UNIX I worked on at BTL. BTL was a national treasure, but it was a cutting edge research and development environment, filled with the most brilliant people I have been blessed to know, but I am not so sure BTL was equipped to move into the cut-throat commercial world. They were brilliant nerds, but not cut out for the commercial world.
Bell labs was the 'gold standard' for research labs as I was growing up.
I don't know how a 'next Bell Labs' could emerge in the 21st century. The business paradigm has changed substantially. Bell Labs grew organically at the pace of business in the 20th century.
Sadly, that's the truth. Gross margin and ROI focus have ruined these kinds of investments in the future. Few companies are willing to take the risk of investing in grass roots research if there isn't a business plan attached to it. For big companies it seems like less risk to just buy up-and-coming ideas, at the cost of progress for all of us.
Bell Labs wanted to learn, discover and create things that enhanced "our" way of life. Sadly there will never be another like it. Greed, $$$$, ROI, and productivity is all anyone can think about now....that window of brilliance that brought us all the cornerstones of modern technology that we take for granted today has long since slammed shut.
Myths and legitimate concerns about capitalism is actually what will prevent it. Bell Labs is a reminder of a lot of the good capitalism has brought the world and a lot of people don't like that. If something was to become as big as Bell, it would be broken up by modern antitrust legislation anyway. That's what happens when you have a society that is ashamed of existing.
I grew up not too far away from Bell Labs. It was the kind of place I dreamed of working at some day. And they weren't the only one, lots of big companies used to have laboratories and did lots of in-house research decades ago.
Whilst there are others, RCAs comes to mind.
Elsewhere, PMG (became Telecom Australia and then Telstra here in Australia), The UKs British Telecom & BBC, Japan's NTT also had their own labs and researchers that contributed to their own company's success, the technology ecosystem within their respective countries and the technical world as a whole.
I’m not sure if there’s anything quite like Bell Labs today but coming from a younger generation, Elon Musk’s ventures remind me of that dream of the future
Another example: a century ago the Pennsylvania Railroad had its own research division and did a lot of work optimizing and designing steam engines and other rail equipment. Many of their locomotives were designed and built in their own shops or the designs farmed out to contractors, they did their own signal technology and had lots of smart people on the payroll. The company ceased to exist around 1970.
@@Bruh-wb3qw I've heard Elon micromanages his companies - not good for innovation. The key to innovation is to give demonstrated creative people with practical experience their freedom while holding them to a high standard. This was always the formula for success from Edison until Wall Street bean counters took over and Asians were allowed to steal all new innovations.
@@chrisfuller1268 I dont know how true that is. Try micromanaging over 100,000 employees; you give him too much credit. His companies are leaders in the new space race and dominate global electric car manufacturing amongst many other things like research in neuroscience, AI, communications, infrastructure, etc. His companies are clearly sucessful and rapidly evolving so im not sure where you see innovation lacking here. What i have heard is that there is not a ton of hierarchy in his companies which i'd argue is probably good for innovation because you dont need a supervisors, superior to approve little things.
I run a mid sized PBX (~3000 endpoints). Telephony is my day in day out business.
The entire world of telephony has Bell Labs fingerprints all over it. It’s incredible the amount of innovation and influence they had on the world of telephony.
They never understood the Internet, though. VoIP was a complete mystery to them.
@@lawrencedoliveiro9104 Oh yeah, 100%. Even though they helped immensely with technologies and data sciences that became the backbone of the internet and modern data networks. Even in VoIP systems the routing logic and even just what things are named has a lot of Bell tells.
MA Bell, Got the Ill Communications.
@@lawrencedoliveiro9104 That was more of a "don't bite the hand that feeds you" thing. The same happened in a lot of telcos back in the day. Big telcos had a solid business based on existing copper. That existing copper gave them an edge over possible competitors, and gave their business a solid backbone that old business people could understand. It was like real estate. So, communications tech that threatened that was *frowned upon*. They continued to do things the old school way, even when it was more expensive for them to do so than to switch to VoIP systems themselves for their own networks.
"Let's not compete with ourselves" has been the doom of more than one large corporation, where management opposition to new tech they saw as disruptive to their own business meant the leaders of an industry ended up being the only ones not developing said tech.
Like Blockbuster losing out on streaming or Microsoft losing out on the server business.
Any jobs going? Uk based.
It was at its best when it was run by the innovators. My father worked in Homdel and I remember when he knew it was over. They had a parts department where people could take what they wanted for any reason be it personal or work related. The idea was that when you have smart people working for you to trust them that even if they are doing a personal project they are still improving their skills which is worth the price of parts.
Then one day he said they started locking up the parts and keeping track when the MBA types got in control. That was the beginning of the end.
By the time I retired from Bell Labs in 2001, the bean counters had changed the company and degraded the work environment. The changes could be traced back to 1984 when the company was split.
Sad how greed and $$$$ (and MBA types) pretty much suck the oxygen out of every room they enter. Aside from that.......Cheers to your dad for his contributions to our technological luxuries we enjoy today.
I worked for HP. When they started mixing smart people with 'politically correct' people, they may have got diversity and new ideas, but the 'self driven smart people' then had to make up for the 'shortcomings' of the diverse group. This affected productivity and the managers started focusing on your dress and how they perceived you, rather than your results. Didn't matter you worked long hours or your weekends were 'lost' during travel for the company, you were judged and your pay scale rated on how they judged you. After 9 years I 'bit the bullet' and after another 5 years, bit through that bullet and got out of the company. The bean counters replaced managers with team leaders and it went down hill after that. If someone tells me to work smarter and not harder, I would question their sanity.
@@David-yo5ws what HP did to their calculator group is a crime against humanity.
@@Liberty2357 When those 'bean counters' lose sight of what's in the books (real people), crazy things happen.
The Test and Measurement that got re-invented to Agilent Technologies and was going to be set up in Australia, (around the same time as ACO) suddenly had their 'in progress' construction of their purposed building stopped. The bean counters decided it was cheaper to hire buildings and not own them. The builder did a deal with Agilent and went to the bank and got a loan to finish it, backed with a guarantee of some years rent. Bill and Dave would be rolling in their graves to see how their HP people are now treated.
Great to see another CD video, when there's a gap it always worries me these days. A classic Droid video, as well - something I never knew I didn't know anything about! With most YT channels, you know pretty much what you're going to get, but with CD it's always an interesting surprise. Thanks, Paul.
My dad worked for Western Electric and Bell Labs from 1927 to 1969. He started at that building in NYC, and later in Whippany and Holmdel. It must have been so exciting to be a part of that period of tremendous technological and engineering advancement. I worked for Lucent in the late 1990s and it was a shadow of the company's past.
Shame what Lucent did to their workers
@@jcret510 what do you mean?
@@shailmurtaza9082 they messed with employee pensions and retirement accounts and locked them so employees couldn’t withdraw funds after having fraudulently reporting revenue in a similar way to Enron. Employees lost millions and I even see a lawsuit for $1.2billion. Had an uncle who worked for ATT then Lucent when it was spun off and he lost millions in retirement due to all of it and is still working now into his 70s just to someday retire.
@@jcret510 I see!
That is horrible
@donmoore7785 - I came to work for Lucent through an acquisition in 1999, as the telecom/internet bubble was still inflating. All these years later, I'm still disgusted by those who were "leading" Lucent at the time and how they destroyed such a magnificent company, hurt so many amazing employees, and lined their own pockets along the way. Seeing "Nokia Bell Labs" now makes me queasy.
My first post university job was at bell telephone laboratories in Holmdel New Jersey. Two Nobel prizes were awarded to bell labs researchers while I worked there. Reporters just to call around to all the bell labs telephone exchanges as the reporters were searching for someone who could contact the prize winners. I received several phone calls from reporters looking Phineas
I would say especially up here in Canada because even though Bell Canada/Bell was split up decades ago, you can still find traces of its technology and software in all of the telecoms up here.
I worked with Rogers and telus and a lot of the older hardware (switches and what not, the old electromechanical ones) were usually Bell labs stuff, and I even found Bell Labs "watermarks" in some of the really legacy software for both companies.
Thanks to all the engineers and geniuses at Bell Labs for inventing most of our modern information, technology and communications driven society, and thank you Curious Droid for sharing this video.
I think there is something to be said about the bell labs model of doing things vs the rush it out and patch it up later methods we have now. While it is sad to no longer see Bell Labs for what it was, there is a lot we can learn from them and their ways of recruiting and managing projects.
Also, some developments were made without management being fully aware of what researchers were doing. Like Unix and C, nowadays management structures try to to kill such kind of thing.
@@calexico66 Absolutely.
Has *anything* come out of Silicon Valley over the last 20 years that's anywhere close to the significance of what Bell Labs produced in an "average" decade?
And the lack of research centers like Bell Labs, is what I believe to be one of the main reasons, technological innovation and breakthroughs have almost ground to halt.
The breakthroughs form 2012-2022 amount to maybe 1 year in the 50's. And that sucks.
@@Renee_R343 is MIT college considered one or nasa? Im curious about what school would be best for ideas not being crushed and wants to really put the innovation before the money.
@@Renee_R343 I don't think that's true at all. I just think people don't understand the complexity & future applications of those breakthroughs yet.
"The Idea Factory" by Jon Gertner is a great read for anyone interested in Bell Labs history. As mentioned by others here the innovative work done by people at Bell Labs was mind blowing.
You are correct. Reading the book now. Took me back to my high school days as a lab assistant in physics. Time meant nothing as I played with home made solar cells and parabolic mirrors.
This channel is incredible. It supersedes most science-focused tv shows out there today.
I would actually love if you made a video talking a bit about yourself, your backround and what you're doing outside of youtube etc. I reckon alot of people would like that!
Truly I thank you for your amazing content and unparalelled quality you bring to the world.
You take care!
I had a professor of economics in the 80's who had been at Bell Labs in the late 60's or early 70's. He said one time that one of the great things about working at Bell Labs is that they supported researchers so well. "If you're a physicist they build you a lab to work in. If you're an economist they hand you a yellow legal pad." I wish I had been sharp enough to realize just what a bit of dry self depreciating humor that really was, but of course, I was just a dumb kid and was only moderately amused.
I was employed by AT&T briefly earlier this year, and stumbled across all this while I was trying to learn more about where I worked. Nobody in the company today is aware of any of this, aside from the one guy who maintains the 'AT&T Archives' playlist here on youtube. It's utterly baffling to me that the USA once had an engine of technology, money, and even culture, and just... Decided it wasn't worth it. I understand Bell Labs was ultimately a corporate entity, but it boggles the mind to think that government can't agree to keep discovering all the new tech that put us at the top, once upon a time. We proved that putting a bunch of smart people in a place where they can self-actualize works, so what even is the problem?
Well I'd argue the US is still the leading country in the world for tech innovation. But really, innovation isn't what it used to be because most innovations have been thought up by now. It's now mostly down to a case of 'who can actually do it?'. And the challenges involved often require massive resources thrown at things with huge confluences of science+tech fields all working towards a larger goal. So yea, it's about execution rather than ideas nowadays. And there's only so many companies that have the capabilities and resources to really compete anymore to solve so many of these really complex problems.
_"It's utterly baffling to me that the USA once had an engine of technology, money, and even culture, and just... Decided it wasn't worth it."_
Just like the British rocket programme. Ahead in many aspects dropping the programme overnight. Look up _Black Knight_ and _Megaroc_ on Mark Felton's channel.
@@maynardburger "....because most innovations have been thought up by now."
Really? If the 20th Century has taught us one thing, it's that discovery and invention are increasing, not decreasing. What's holding innovation and invention back isn't a lack of people willing and capable, but the bean-counters at the top of these sorts of organizations... Everything now needs to be 'profitable' in the short-term. We have lost the ability to think long-term, and realise that those sorts of small investments now may not show 'results' for years, but will yield orders of magnitude more than the current philosophy of pushing every cent out of everything in the short-term and it's going to bite us! Hard! (If it isn't already doing so)
AT&T was essentialy a monopoly so it had all the resources to run Bell Labs.
@@tolep
The private monopoly was broken up. You will find that funding for most inventions comes from public money. The outfit maybe private but pubic grants are given.
The Internet was a joint development between DARPA in the USA and the National Physics Labs in the UK. The NPL invented the key components, the router and packet switching. Both public bodies and publicly funded.
*Honeywell* developed an operating system naming it Multix. Unix is a pun on that being derived from Multix.
Being 80 years old, I was around for many of the hay days of AT&T and Bell Labs. It was an amazing time. The downfall came when the big wigs at AT&T got greedy. They allowed the breakup of the buisiness so they could get on the money train. President Reagan was ready to stop the antitrust action, but management agreed to the breakup.
So the nation lost an amazing company, with all of its attributes and advancements, and AT&T became just another ho hum company. Such a shame. Great video, as usual. Thanks.
so i think that you may the one who saw alien technology from wich...you all smart persons give us so much...copied technology or invented but after model...you saw in artefacts send there by...BIG BOYS....so GUES what now ther are smarter BOYS then there but in other companys...so is there the....HIGH TECH goes....to be copied...
Asianometry has several great videos about chip making. It involves insanely expensive lasers that require a truck-sized piece of equipment to work, but are so accurate they can cut a germ in two.
I worked for two years as an MTS at Bell Labs Holmdel. A wonderful experience. If you were curious about something, you could pick up the phone and a leading expert on the subject would happily explain things to you. You could walk down a corridor and the name on each door would be an internationally known researcher.
To be employed there having a PhD was a prerequisite. But within Bell Labs, everybody (every man that is) was addressed as "mister".
I really didn´t know they were behind SO MANY innovations! Great video!
Breaking up Bell Labs was one of the great unrecognized acts of corporate vandalism of the last quarter century. In general our "job creating" owner class isn't interested in producing anything new. They just want to set themselves up as rentiers, and squeeze the juice from the work of others.
I always had such a big curiosity for bell labs, always present in most wikipedia pages of major technological events.
Thanks from Santiago, Chile !
I used to work at Lucent, they had a great museum at the HQ with the Bell Labs inventions
i worked at Bell Labs in Murray Hill, NJ in a student type IT/computer position for several years in the mid to late 90's. It was an incredible place to work. It was exciting to work at an R&D facility as you never knew what or where you might be working from day to day. One day, my boss introduced me to Dennis Ritchie as he was still working there at the time! Some of my most cherished memories of working in my career field are from working at the Labs for the few years I did. It never ceases to amaze me how many discoveries came out of Bell Labs. I feel priviledged to have worked there.
Happy to see another one of your videos. Your channel is seriously one of the very best on RUclips!
This video comes with perfect timing as I've been watching old Bell Labs videos for weeks now. Amazing!
When ATT spun off Bell Labs, I saw that as the end of ATT. Now ATT is just South Eastern Bell under a name purchased for name recognition.
And the US is doing so well in private research. Because the bean counters destroyed Bell Labs.
Yep, seen this happen everywhere. Even my work is at the mercy of bean counters. Lucky I retire soon.
Think of what even a local phone call cost in the 1980's and compare that to the cost most any phone call to anywhere today. Bell labs ( and the virtually bullet / nuke proof system ) existed because of the $$$ flowing into the company.
Something else to think of. Bell Labs was inventing basic building block technology that was later integrated into other products or improved on by others, this is why there were so dominant. Things like the transistor , lasers and so on
What new ground breaking basic technology has been invented in say the past 30 years?
I noticed a wall of plaques in the video that said "Nokia Bell Laboratories". The buying up of legacy companies by upstarts with investor backing invariably cheapens the original brand as the new management cannibalizes the company assets and spins off subsidiaries for cash, all to please the investors with high stock prices and short-term returns. Innovation ceases when extraction begins.
You produce some of the best technology/science documentaries out there Sir. Well researched, and fascinating to watch. And I love your fantastic shirts! :) Thank you.
Fascinating video, with great use of contemporary photos and film. Terrific!
Bell labs is a thing of legend. I hope another one spawns up so I can be apart of it.
You could be the one to create it. Just saying.
You won't see anything like it coming out of the "job creators" who make the decisions now. They're a lot more interested in asset stripping than creating anything new and useful.
@@malcolmmutambanengwe3453 If you're saying Bell Labs emerged from the work of *one* person -- did you watch the video?
In an age where it's trendy for capitalists to think they hate capitalism, that will never happen. Modern antitrust laws would get in the way too.
@@samuelglover7685 did YOU? It literally did... I know what you mean, but the way you wrote it is a bit misleading, since what you actually wrote is very untrue (it's undeniable: Bell Labs only existed because of one man, Alexander Graham Bell).
Cool to hear the name of Harry Nyqvist. Since he came from the same village in Sweden as me (tot. pop. around 12 000 people) there is a small museum dedicated to his memory not far from where I live. :)
Only a small clarification. C++ is not a replacement for C. C and C++ are two different standards that are independent and both are used today for different applications. C is usually used for hardware close applications like drivers and operating systems. C++ have extensions like object oriented programming and exceptions and is used more in desktop applications. C and C++ are both general purpose software languages so you can use C++ for hardware and C for desktop applications.
Thanks. I was going to say it if nobody else did! Still a good video even with some small errors though. Keep it up, Curious Droid! Rocking channel.
Wonderful video and fascinating topic as usual Paul - hope you’re doing well ❤️
Love from space city, Tx!
This is an amazing documentary about an amazing topic. Well played and well executed. By far one of my favourite topics you've covered. I'd LOVE to see documentaries about some of the fathers of the semiconductor industry like William Shockley, John Bardeen and Walter Brittain who invented the BJT, or the less famous (I wonder why) Mohammed Atalla who invented the first working MOSFET. Which I would argue might be more groundbreaking than the BJT. But that's a tough contest. I could go on and on with names. Whether from Bell Labs, Fairchild, RCA or any of their competitors. Actually, it's a bit obscure, but I'd LOVELOVELOVE to see a video on the history of the 5400/7400 series, 4000 series and LM series of chips. Although that's a bit specialist for this channel maybe. It would make a fine trilogy of videos to compliment this one.
Growing up, one of the dads on the street was an engineer at Bell Labs in Murray Hill. Dad was also an engineer (chemical not electrical) and Mr Johnson got permission to give dad a tour (obviously the most sensitive areas were off limits). He came home very impressed and raved about the place, so much so that I have always considered the Labs to have been a national treasure. And what I found out later just increased that conviction. When I saw what happened to the Labbs, I was incredibly saddened. I am just glad Mr Johnson had passed away before things went really downhill.
I generally applaud and appreciate the distinction Paul makes when it comes to possible “alternative” outcomes to what we have had. By saying “as we know them…” he keeps that interpretation grounded in plausible reality!
Great video, love this topic and the incredible history of Bell Labs! I hope you're doing and feeling well, always look forward to your videos
Brilliant work CD..! Information presented in an enjoyable and fascinating way. Love the funky shirts..!
Paul, what a wonderful explanation of Bell Labs and a nice tour of their discoveries.
Some of the most high-quality videos on the Internet great job again
I began my professional career in 1968 in the Network Planning Division of Bell Labs in Holmdel NJ.
I stayed with Bell Labs for 19 years, departing in 1987 as the Network Planning Division was sundered in the wake of the break-up of the Bell System.
5:37 wow I never knew this ... incredible!
Bell labs was an amazing place, so much science came out of that place it's amazing. I wish this video was longer, I watched all old documentaries on YT about AT&T and Bell labs.
I'm guessing you also watched all of the Bell Labs own videos in which they were hilariously prescient about the future
Thanks for this fascinating documentary! I was glued to it from start to finsh!
Very interesting. Thank you for all the work, and then sharing.
Hope you're doing well lately, good to see another video from you.
Yay! It's Friday after work and there's a new Curious Droid!
Quality of this channel is unriveled. I love the shift from aerospace to electrical engineering.
Absolutely wonderful. Thank you SO much for what you do. --Fink
Awesome engineering video. More of such please! :)
They key was that Bell had a telephone monopoly in the USA. They used the profits to fund the labs - to make more money. Large monopolies can do this, as the British GPO Telephones did. Bell was a private monopoly and GPO a public one. GPO built the world's first electronic computer (Tommy Flowers), and optic fibre system in 1977, cell phones, amongst others. Bell's private monopoly was split up. The GPO was privatized.
thanks chief. i really enjoyed this video. the perfect balance between amusement and learning.
Thank you for the nice overview history of Bell Labs. Engineering at it's best.
Thank you Paul. Great to see you.
Another first class subject Droid...many thanks.
Really liked this video. Thanks for all the hard work.
One of the best, but then they’re all excellent. Thank you.
Thank you for always producing top quality videos! I hope you are doing well!
Very Informative video. I gained solid historical knowledge, thank you.
Got to meet Nobel Prize Winner Arno Penzias at a local electronics store in Highland Park, New Jersey where he lived. He was very nice and actually spoke to me for about 1.5 hours. We talked about everything and anything. At the time he was in charge of Bell Labs.
These guys in this video, all of them and then some. are the guys that laid the ground work for my modern life (1993) it's insane to think these were all just normal dudes going to work making history. I love it
Hi Paul, Thanks for another Great informative video. I hope Your health is still getting better and You are healthy. Cheers.
I have always loved your Video's.
Another Great job!
Reestablishment of a new Bell Labs like capability will only be possible if we return to a culture that values excellence and accomplishment over identity and aggrievement.
Another very interesting mini documentary. Keep up the great work 👍
Realy bloody interesting. I remember playing with some very early Philips transistors, potted in clear resin and painted black, they could be used as a light sensitive switch.
Absolutely fascinating! I've heard of Bell Labs but didn't realize just how much they did
Thank You very nuch! Another excellent video, full of new knowledge.
I hope Your health is OK!
All the best!
I am glad you exist. Your content is stellar!
Hi Paul. Love your content. Always very well researched. I just noticed a small error in your video on the definition you give of the CMB! Even if it does not impact the overall content of the video, I thought I'd give you a friendly shout out! Keep up the good work!
Another quality video. May I make a request? I would love to see a video about the Voyager spacecraft. I think you would knock it out of the park!
Here you go, see these 2 vids, both on the " Guy Collins Animation " channel
" Voyager "
" Secret Video #3 - Voyager "
@@bobroberts2371 I've never turned down an opportunity to watch anything about Voyager and I'm not going to start now. I find myself watching The Farthest documentary from 2017 again and again.
Fantastic video and subject matter Paul. Thank you for your great work. Here in Maine I believe the Andover tracking station was a Bell Labs signal downlink station for the Telstar satellite network.
fantastic video for sure, 7:19 is scary af tho
Amazing! So glad I found this channel.
Well done as always Paul!
In the late 80s, I remember going to Bell Labs seminar where they talked about their work with data transmission over copper. It was, it turned out to be DSL. It was very interesting as they talked how they were chasing fibre in the race for data transmission. The other great lab of the times was Xerox PARC.
well done. enjoyable to watch and learn.
Awesome video. Thanks for making it
Great vid sir!
This is the best RUclips channel I've ever subscribed to. You rock!
Wonderful job in producing this video, with just enough detail to highlight the wonders of Bell Labs but not so much as to make it a PHD thesis.
Another fantastic video as always
A very interesting video! I would love to see a followup video on Xerox-Park! :D
Top video as usual, great topic
As always, Paul produces among the finest content on all of RUclips.
These guys were unbelievably smart. The things they were able to achieve in such a short amount of time is nothing short of incredible. Cranking out life changing innovations was just another day at the office. Wish I could've been apart of that
I graduated from Electrical Engineering in '83, then some Telecom work, then switched to the Software Engineering in 1986 and retired last year (2021). This video summarizes my whole life (Almost). Sigh...
Another great video. If I may mention "the history guy" here he has an excellent video on just the transistor. The end of the video has a lot of passion in it. He also has one on the trans Atlantic cable.
Thumbs up for The History Guy channel! Actually, a couple years ago he said that at that point in time anyway the most watched episode he ever did was a history of screws and screwdrivers.!
Thank you for this excellent history lesson! It’s amazing to me how a few people and their discoveries can make such a difference! Have you done a video about John Goodenough??!! Now there’s an amazing person!
ruclips.net/video/kR8CESrigEg/видео.html
Thanks for sharing. Interesting as always.
Excellent! I always love your videos Paul.
At the university of Oklahoma, they had the Bell Systems Technical Journal archived. These were a great influence on my love of science (along with a complete collection that f Scientific American). These were great organizations that went beyond the technical but also inspired us ‘80s generation of scientists and engineers.
I worked directly with at least 5 of the authors of that version of the BTL technical journal. The person who stands the out I my mind is Helen Rovegno not because of her technical skill, which was indeed great, but because she was so socially unadjusted. This was an environment filled with brilliant PhD scientists, and she would openly insult their intelligence in large meetings. I doubt Helen was smarter than the other scientists at BTL.
I had a cousin who worked for Bell/Western Electric and we lived near their test bed telephone exchange. We got the first touch tone phones and features like call waiting. Never knew there were so many non phone innovations from Bell. I guess there were benefits to the monopoly but they abused it with huge bills & fees.
I loved this video. Thank you so much for the hard work!
Thank you for a fascinating video, forensically researched. Pity about "including, but not limited to..." which should never be said outside the context of contracts IMHO🙂
6:05 And 4.1 seconds. That’s always stuck in my head.
Dang, Paul left out the most important part about aliens giving us the transistor. lol
Another 10/10 production 👍