The revolution in the latter half of the nineteenth century molded our nation into what it is today. The revolution produced inventions that quickened processes, made items cheaper, and added more luxury for the American people. Advances in production, infrastructure, and other areas made for a bright and promising future for American society. The first event that started the chain of industrialization was the building of the transcontinental railroad.
Ewin Tang/Lauren Archibald
Monday, February 21, 2011
Railroads: The Industrialization of America
The Industrialization of the United States was set off by the start of the railroads. They became known as a symbol of hope for all that our nation had to offer. Businesses were created and booming. Transportation, of both people and goods, became easier, faster, and cheaper. The railroads were connecting America in a way that it had never been connected before. They quickly became the core of the nation’s operating system.
Before the Civil War there was about 45,000 miles of track placed in the U.S. By the early 1900’s another 170,000 miles were added to the Nations railroads. This was made possible by the Pacific Railroad Act, passed by congress in 1862, as it authorized the construction of a Transcontinental Railroad. This railroad made up most of the track that was set down by 1900.
Works Cited:
http://resourcesforhistoryteachers.wikispaces.com/file/view/800px-Seattle_-_Railroad_Avenue_-_1900.jpg/83316175/800px-Seattle_-_Railroad_Avenue_-_1900.jpg
Lauren Archibald
Production
As the United States entered the industrialization era, new buisnesses and products would grow. In the past, it was difficult to create and repair any kind of product (such as a gun) because no two products were exactly identical. In order to fix something such as a clock, one would have to hire somebody to make a customized part just for that product. Interchangeable parts allowed workers to create parts of a product in the exact same size and shape. This way, products could be assembled much more efficiently, and for a fraction of the price. Thanks to interchangeable parts, most Americans would be able to afford products made with interchangeable parts. Citizens would also find it inexpensive to repair products now that most products had identical parts.
In an assembly line, workers are usually given one task. The amount of work each worker must put in is reduced as much as possible in order to get the most amount of work finished in the least amount of time. The assembly line benefitted some workers because it allowed people to work a job while only specializing in one task.Works cited:
Jones (textbook).
Hien Nguyen
Infrastructure
The Subway:
On September 1st, 1897, the first subway in the United States began running. More than one hundred thousand rode this subway its first day in action. This type of trasportation was mimicked after the first subway in the world, based in London. This was meant to improve public trasportation. With this new subway, people were able to travel short or long distances in less time than it would have driving. This trasportation was cheap, quick, and didn't make the traffic on the streets worse.Water Treatment:
The treatment of water slowly started to evolve after the Metropolis Act in 1852. This required the water supplied to London to be treated by sand filtration. Dr. Robert Koch and Dr. Josph Lister proved that microorganisms can cause diseases. In 1895, after the Metropolis Act, Allen Hazen made this proposal to the Unites States. He believed that treating the water with slow sand filtration would remove these harmful particles.Works cited:
Trey Speer
Regulation On Innovation
The most important factor that led to America’s stunning success in information technology was not the free market but government regulation. Countries that never experienced this great regulatory splintering are at a disadvantage. They are trapped in a mid-20th-century form, characterised by domineering, vertically integrated firms, which try to do everything in-house or at least keep it within their family of closely related companies. As a result, customers are beholden to suppliers, and innovations go under-exploited. 
Innovation, regulation, and the Internet, there is deep confusion about the ideas of “regulation” within our political culture and about its relationship to innovation and the Internet. The fashion is to say that regulation harms innovation; that government-backed rules undermine creativity; that the best or most effective policy for regulators is, as Federal Communication Commission (FCC) Chairman Williams Kennard put it, to allow the “marketplace to find business solutions… as an alternative to intervention by government.” Any talk about “regulating” cyberspace invites the breathless reply of the impatient young Capitol Hill staffer. Innovation has always depended upon a certain kind of regulation; the greatest examples of innovation in our recent past evince this reliance. And unless we begin to see the relationship between this type of rule and the innovation it promotes, we are likely to kill the promise of the Internet. 
Proposals to increase regulations on mobile wireless services, for example, by applying “net neutrality regulation, are often based on claims that such regulations would enhance innovation and increase consumer choice. The business practices that would be banned by such regulations are efficient mechanisms for spreading and reducing risk, lowering transactions costs, and enhancing marketing activities, all of which contribute to innovation and choice. While some types of exclusive agreements and other “discriminatory” practices can theoretically harm competition, the precondition for such harm to occur—i.e., market power in one or more of the affected markets—generally is not present in wireless markets. Hence, the proposed regulations cannot be justified on grounds of market failure. Rather than increasing innovation and consumer choice, as promised, they would severely disrupt the wireless sector’s highly successful business model and significantly reduce innovation and consumer choice. 
The belief is that patents prevent “vertical innovation” and instead promote “horizontal innovation.” Apparently, patents prevent from building onto patented technology so innovation never really advances with patents and all you can hope for is modest improvements. Never mind that the thesis ignores reality and that those with a sophisticated understanding of patent laws and a strategy understand that companies build on patented technology constantly, and that is in and of itself a strategy, and a wise one at that. Never mind that blocking patents exist in every technology and that causes fragility of a patent portfolio and causes every company to continue the invention march or risk obscurity. 
Trademark law is a form of intellectual property rights, which provide owners, inventors and creators of property protection from unauthorized use. The three primary forms of intellectual property are patents, copyrights and trademarks.The US is lagging seriously behind other countries on broadband access and this is due primarily to a failure of U.S. telecom regulation. Everyone agrees it would be better if more Americans were enjoying broadband capability in computing and telecommunications.
Works Cited:
english.peopledaily.com
economist.com
www.prospect.org
www.heartland.org
ipwatchdog.com
www.itif.org/media/feed
Glenda Murrell
The Effect of American Industrialization
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Greater Macy’s 1926-1928 (Library of Congress) |
The growth and innovation of American life happened so quickly it was not yet stable of perfect in any imagination. The economy felt the surges and the plunges of the inconsistent nature of the newly industrialized nation and this lead to declines in conditions throughout cities the workplace and all classes of sociey. As said by Andrew Carnegie in "Wealth", "Much better this great irregularity than universal squalor." In other words, isn't some growth a learning process?
Our government was not yet equipped with the experience and unfaltering honor needed to withstand the temptations of corruption, bribery, and intentional neglect. The organization of the new structure of the nation began to crumble. Only years of struggle between labor and management and learning through failure in the new American territories would bring this hardship to an end. Out nation felt many growing pains during this period in time but it also lead the way for many innovations in the way the common person carried out their everyday life. Things became easier, more efficient and also more complicated.
Krystal Clarkson
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