THE NEWSPAPER OF THE FUTURE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 2608, 30 March 1889, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE NEWSPAPER OF THE FUTURE.

It is reported from Chicago that Professor Elisha Gray is about putting , the finishing touches to his telautograph system which was recently described in the technical papers. It is claimed that the reproduction made by the instrument is just up to the point of not being the original. The difference is enough to prevent long distance forgeries, and at the same time tho copy at the other end is so nearly like that which is written at the sending end, that for all ordinary purposes it is the same hand-writ-ng. It is intended, of course, to put the new system in competition with the telephone, but perhaps there will be more limitations to its employment than are now supposed. If it be anything like what it is said to be, there will be nothing to prevent our special artists at the seat of war, or any other seat, from sending in an illustrated account of what ie going on. In this way the reader of the daily paper will not be dependent upon his imagination for tho description given in the letter, but he will be able to gather from the sketches just how things happened. This will be a development of journalism ; but it will jot hold a candle to the journalistic enterprise with which Mr. Edison ie credited, viz., the issuance of a talkiug , daily newspaper. The idea of this appears to bo to charge the record cylinder with a condensation of the news of the day, so that each subscriber can listen to the instrument while at breakfast, and will not be under the painful necessity of borrowing first the sugar bowl, then the milk jug, the coffee pot, or tho toast rack to prop up his paper with. If a now opera has been produced the night before, he can listen to an able but concise criticism of it, and enjoy with his family the sensation of having repeated the choicest passages of the music just as they were rendered at the theatre by the prima donna or the "star" tenor. These various suggestions and promises (remarks the Electrician) leave ono vory much in doubt as to what the newspaper of the future will be like.