Cicero’s Web: How Social Media Was Born in Ancient Rome

Maria Popova explores how the dynamics of papyrus scrolls ultimately led to our modern day social media.

Cicero

We’ve already seen that modern social media come from a long lineage of primitive predecessors — from the florilegia of the Middle Ages, which predated Tumblr by half a millennium, to Voltaire’s Republic of Letters, the Facebook of its day, to Edison’s early “viral” cat videos to Félix Fénéon’s analog “Twitter” of early 20th-century France. But it turns out social media originated even earlier than that, in ancient Rome. In Writing on the Wall: Social Media — The First 2,000 Years (public library), history-whisperer Tom Standage takes us to task with debunking our presentism bias by tracing the surprising, scintillating history of what we know as “social media” today. And it turns out we owe it all to the famed Roman statesman Cicero.

In 51 B.C., the Roman Republic passed a new anti-corruption law, requiring high-ranking government officials to take up posts in the provinces. Cicero himself, much to his dismay, was appointed regional governor of Cilicia, a province in present-day Turkey, inconveniently far from Rome’s hotbed of political activity. Anxious about falling behind on critical knowledge about the power dynamics in Rome, Cicero had only one hope: The sophisticated information-exchange network the Roman elite had developed.

Brain Pickings | Read the Full Article

Cicero’s Web: How Social Media Was Born in Ancient Rome

Brain Pickings | Read the Full Article

Trending Articles

Practice Sheet of Right form of verbs for HSC Students

Download: FK ft Shenky – Nakuyewa ”Prod by: Shenky”

How to win at Markstrat (Markstrat Tips and Tricks) – Vodites

Ominde Commission Report and Recommendations – Ominde Report of 1964

Bureau of Internal Revenue: Regional Offices (Directory)

GO 53 on Enhancement of Ex-gratia upto 5 Lakhs Toddy Tappers in Telangana

Cakewalk CA-2A Leveling Amplifier v2.0.1.97 WiN, v2.0.1.96 OSX Incl Keygen

Mp3 Download: Mdu - Kunjenjenjena

How the kill the job , when DTP request running for long hours.

Microsoft Intune から展開しているアプリのアップデートについて

18-year-old girl was beaten for half an hour by two Northampton men in 'an...

Car crash in Dunton Bassett leaves driver in critical condition

Macky 2, Two Others In Road Accident

Application log 00000000000000089514: Could not convert queue DLVST90CLNT

Detroit mafia: D’Anna Brothers agree to plea deal

Delivery block field greyed out using VA02

Muloraki Au

【個人撮影】スマホのプライベート映像♪「中に出さないで///」カラオケ屋での生ハメ撮りが流出ｗ【リベンジポルノ】＠PornHub

BREAKING NEWS: Diamond Platnumz Is Reported Dead After Ghastly Car Accident

FIAT 500 B0111 B0112