Bell System Technical Journal--Reason for publication? [Telecom]

hancock4 · 2008-02-23T22:22:27+00:00

The Bell System used to publish a scientific/engineering journal. Itcontained very 'hairy' articles on research developments of thecompany. Some were directly telephone, but others were generalscientific developments in a variety of disciplines.IBM published (may still do) a similar journal.What I don't understand is _why_ the companies went to the expense ofthese journals. I would think they'd want their research results tobe kept private for competitive reasons.The only explanation I heard was stuff for these journals was thoughtnot worth patening, so publishing it insured it would remain in thepublic domain just in case someone else tried to patent it.Any thoughts? Thanks! [public replies, please]PS. Don't confuse the "Technical Journal" with the "Bell LaboratoriesRecord". The Record was much less technical and more of a publicrelations house organ to let people know what the Labs was up to. Ithink most readers were employees of the company itself. The Recordincluded stuff on retirements, benefits, etc.If you are near an engineering college with a good library, see ifthey have old issues of the Record. Fascinating stuff!***** Moderator's Note *****Since my father-in-law retired from Bell Labs, I have some insightinto this question.(Pause for effect)Scientists don't work for corporations or their bosses. They _tolerate_their bosses and the corporations that employ them, but they regardboth as marginally necessary evils that enable them to do fun stuff.Scientists _really_ work for the admiration of their peers. They don'tcare what the suits think of them: they _care_ what the other techies think of them!Their bosses know this.Their bosses make an easy living because of this.Their bosses pay them pauper's wages because they can hold out thecarrot of publicity and wield the stick of humiliation to those whostrive to be the first to publish. Publish, as in "Be an author of a major achievement described in aprestigious technical journal". It has little to do...

Feb 23, 2008 21 Replies

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Robert Bonomi 18 years ago

I knew a guy who could (controllably!) whistle _modulated_ Bell-103 'originate' tones. I mean well enough to negotiate login/password prompts, get the MOTD, and find out if he had "new" mail, *without* anything other than a handset. (he _wasn't_ good enough to tell what the MOTD said, 'by ear', but he could tell the difference between 'You have mail', and 'You have new mail'.)

I could whistle a recognizable Bell-202 carrier, but with just noise as the modulation.`

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