What do fax machines have in common with electric cars? More than you may think. History professor Jonathan Coopersmith, who studied the development of fax technology, argues in this March 2017 essay in The Conversation that in order for electric cars to eventually succeed, competing electric car makers need to follow the example of fax development and adopt uniform charging standards. (In case you aren’t familiar with them, fax machines were once key business communication tools, allowing a printed document to be fed into a machine and transmitted over telephone lines; a similar machine on the other end of the call would receive a facsimile of the original document—hence, “fax”.)
Read it here: Coopersmith, “What fax machines can teach us about electric cars”
- Does Coopersmith’s title live up to its promise? What can fax machines teach us about electric cars? Summarize Coopersmith’s argument. Is it persuasive? Why or why not?
- Coopersmith’s essay doesn’t really have an explicit They Say; still, he is entering an ongoing conversation with competing positions. What is the conversation that Coopersmith is joining? Why might he have chosen not to present an explicit They Say? Is his choice effective? Why or why not?
- According to Coopersmith, the eventual success of fax machine standards was due to two key factors. What were they? How easily were you able to find the information for answering that question? What device does Coopersmith use to tie the information together?
- Coopersmith is a history professor who has done extensive research on the development of fax machine standards. Why might a historian have studied such a topic? Do you think the history of these standards is a topic worthy of research? Why or why not?
- We generally don’t have to pay much attention to the standards that facilitate our daily lives. One example, as Coopersmith notes, is being able to plug any toaster into any electric outlet in the US without a second thought. What other standards do we rely on and take for granted? (Here’s another example to help you start thinking: standard time zones didn’t just happen by themselves.) Choose one such standard and investigate its history. Write an essay briefly summarizing your investigation and take a position on whether the standard is important and worthwhile, providing reasons to support your conclusion.
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Coopersmith’s title does live up to its promise. Fax machines can teach us how to make electric cars so that they have uniform standards. Coopersmith argues that electric cars will only be successful if they all have a uniform standard and his argument is persuasive because he connects fax machines and electric cars by saying that fax machines were successful for businesses since they had a standard.
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I dont think the title of this article fits with the information stated in the article. It wouldve been better to use a title such as “Electric cars:following the footsteps of fax machine development”. The only thing fax machines can teach us about electric cars is that it is shown to be more effective to develop a universal way to connect all of the products. For example, once the fax machines started to connect and all work together, they sold more. Likewise, inventing a universal charger that is compatible to all electric cars would be more convenient and the product would become more popular.
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Coopersmith is persuasive and promising to his title, we can always learn from the past because it repeats itself. Just like with fax machines, you hav big businesses fighting for electric cars. When it comes to business the only thing that matters to these people are the money that comes with their designs and products. Eventually when this is set aside and companies are willing to share their ideas and models with the world, we can have a breakthrough. It took companies almost 30 years to develop a standard fax machine and that only happened because Japan was willing to help other companies and make it easier for companies and their consumers to buy and demand a product. Coppersmith argues that we are in the same phase with electric cars that we were with fax machines. Until companies make a standard for consumers and companies, we won’t have a breakthrough.
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I think coopersmith brings up some valid points about the widespread compatibility issues in electric cars although i believe the underlying cause is the lack of a pressing issue to push people to change their lifestyle. In today’s current time gas is not relatively expensive nor inaccessible so for the common person who enjoys the roar of an american made V8 engine there is no necessary reason to purchase a prius. When the day comes where driving a gasoline powered automobile is not a viable option then the market will adjust.
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I agree with Coopersmith that the success of the fax machine and its technology was attributed to rival companies making their products both competitive and compatible. I like how he tied the electric car industry with the fax machine industry by showing how different technologies were alike in ways. This can be seen especially in the market place. When looking at the success of new technology like that of the electric car, the key is making things universal and standard. Coopersmith makes a good analogy in the beginning by describing how much of a hassle it would be to only fuel your 2011 GM car with only available pumps that cater specifically to GM models between 2005 and 2012. I agree there does need to be a universal standard to improve the success of the electric car industry. At some point manufactures and electric car companies need to get together to standardize their models just like the Japanese did in 1977 to push for telephone communication and fax standards.
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The success of fax machine standards were due to two things. First, royalty-free, meaning any company could use the standard without paying a fee to its creators. Second, the standard was not so restrictive as to prevent fax machine manufacturers from introducing other features, allowing for competition in other areas. This information was not too easy but then again it wasn’t hard to find within the article. It just took a while due to the extensive background knowledge that was incorporated in the article. The background facts that were used, helped Coopersmith tie in the two keys to the success of the fax machine standards.
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I do not believe that Coopersmith’s title lived up to its promise. While he did draw a reference to the fax machine, it was more about how industry needs to work together to develop a standard rather than about the fax machine itself. Based on his title, I expected Coopersmith to draw a more direct comparison between the fax machine and an electric car, rather than just say that the fax machine was successful because they developed a standard and that is what the electric car companies need to do as well. I see where Coopersmith is coming from, and I see how his ideas are persuasive and more likely than not accurate, but with his title being what it is, I find the article more of a let down than anything.
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in reply to sara, i agree with your points. Until it becomes profitable for companies to make the endeavor to switch to electric cars they will stick to their current ways of making millions of dollars which is tied in to the oil business. I like the parallel Coopersmith draws between the fax machine and the electric car, past trends often follow new ones.
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I think that the title of this article suits, but to a point. In a way the only thing that fax machines can teach us about electric cars is how to improve the compatibility of the power source. Which is what this article seems to relate to anyways. Coppersmith writes a persuasive article in regards to relating two thinks that aren’t alike and then finding something they both have struggled with.
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Coopersmith did a good job at comparing the electric car with the fax machine. Yes, his argument his persuasive because he uses a successful example by comparing it to the fax machine, but I believe we will not see much of a change in electric cars yet. Society is stuck on gas vehicles, but when the day comes where gas is at an all time low society will adapt and make that change.
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Coopersmith spends a lot of time in this article drawing comparisons to the fax industry. In particular, he notes that a Japanese government push to make the use of phone lines standard across the business environment in Japan – and the eventual influence the Japanese business world had on world tech markets – made the fax market boom in the 1980s and 1990s. He’s essentially arguing that standards can make a market more expansive and profitable.
While I respect this opinion, I think that Coopersmith overlooks the true hero of this story: The Market. Yes, he mentions the idea that market dominance has the ability to set a standard for particular products, but he essentially eschews the “invisible hand” for a more “hands on,” government-dictated, top-down approach. In the marketplace of ideas, the best (or most convenient, or the most cost-effective, or the best sold)) idea wins out. While this may be a method that takes some relative time and conflict (think Edison over Tesla when it comes to AC/DC electrical powering), the market – and the consumers’ dollars – can and should be the ultimate arbiter of winning standards.
The reasons why Nokia phones, Apple’s “firewire,” and other “nonconformist” products are now relics of the past; the market didn’t find their inconvenience worth the dollars, even though they might be superior products. Fitbit will continue to be the dominant step tracker on the market – despite its similar charger issues – as long as consumers find the price point worth the (relatively small) inconvenience. The market – NOT THE GOVERNMENT – will determine what the most convenient car charger will be, and THAT will determine the standard going forward.
To assume that a dictated standard can be responsible for a product’s success is flawed economic thinking.
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I get why Coopersmith relates fax machines to electric cars, but there are many developments that have established one standard. He could have used any example pretty much. So I don’t get why it necessarily had to be fax machines, but I guess it works. Fax machines eventually developed one standard, and that’s what Coopersmith is saying will happen to the charging of electric cars. I feel like Coopersmith made a compelling argument especially with his toaster example. When everything is easy we don’t really think much about it, but when there’s not one set standard for something it becomes an inconvenience for people. Ultimately Coopersmith argues that, eventually, there will be one standard for electric cars because people enjoy convenience, and the electric car industry won’t progress if people aren’t buying them.
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Coppersmith in his article tells us, readers, why he believes that there are things in this world that we as a society take for granted. For example, he says that we can plug a toaster into an outlet and have no second thoughts whatsoever. Another thing we take for granted is that we put food in a microwave to heat it up for dinner and we don’t think about the consequences about, “what if the microwave goes out?” The history of the microwave was that it was built to cook food quickly, and now that microwaves have decreased in size, we now have them in almost every home and people soon forget that like anything else, a microwave can easily go out too.
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I agree with Juliannes post. The title and the article didn’t go together and could have said something about electric cars because that’s what he mainly wrote about. The title you chose that would be better for the article works. His main point is how fax machines help make the electric car and have advanced technology.
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I believe that the title “What fax machines teach us about electric cars” fits the article. The article began with addressing the issues that previous fax machines have gone through, focusing on how not all were compatible, just like electric cars at the moment. I think that Coopersmith does a good job at writing persuasively relating two things that have seemingly nothing in common and simply showing that we can solve problems we have today with solutions created yesterday.
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Yes, his title does. Coopersmith compares electric cars to fax machines because both things similarly have risks and benefits to them. In the 1960’s and 70’s, the fax machine was not compatible with other machines, making the marketplace for them grow very slowly. Today, the electric car marketplace is doing the same thing because of the technicalities with charging stations. This point makes Coopersmith’s argument very persuasive because it creates an analogy to compare electric cars and the fax machine and shows the similarities between both products. Coopersmith joins the conversation that new standard need to be invented in order for the electric car market to take off, just like the fax machine did. His choice of conversation makes his argument interesting to read and makes the reader think about how we can use the past to establish the electric car industry. The eventual success of the fax machine was due to its standards being royalty-free and not so restrictive as to prevent fax machine manufacturers from introducing other features. Finding this information was easy because Coopersmith uses connecting words to tie the information together. Historians may have studied topics such as this because history seems to repeat itself, so standards for today’s market for electric cars may improve over time. Researching past decades standards is worthy of research because it can help us improve today’s standards.
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According to Coppersmith, the two keys to the sucess of fax machines was making them royalty free and not preventing manufacturers from introducing new features. This was easy to find because the paragraph was opened with the statement “This standard found two keys to sucess.” Coppersmith says “First” and “Second” to clearly introduce his ideas.
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Coopersmith’s point is that the eventual success of fax machine standards was due to royalty-free universal compatibility and quality standards created by “competing manufactures who battled for a share of an increasing market” that were not restrictive to introducing other features such as faster communication. In other words, when the fax machines worked with each other, Coopersmith claimed that the consumers benefited from the fax machines, vastly expanding the market for them. The information on the two key factors was not hard to find in the article. Coopersmith elaborates on the two factors in the section of his article titled “Third time’s the charm.” Coopersmith uses an analogy for today’s electric cars and the plugs used to refuel them. He compares the history of fax machines to the struggle of the current market trying to develop universal standards for compatible electric car plugs. I never took into account the struggle of electric car owners to find a refueling station. In today’s world everything is made to be fast and convenient for humans. Electric cars are supposed to be up and coming but their growth is being limited because of the markets inability to create a universal plug.
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A historian would look into this to see how humans have advanced in their developments and this is worthy of research because it shows human progress which is part of history.
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Coopersmith’s title does live up to it’s promise which is, that the success of fax machines will set the standard for universal compatibility for electric cars improvement. Fax machines can teach us the uniform standard to be set to electric cars and it is persuasive because of how he clearly relates big businesses having fax machines and using them well was apart of a standard, so the only way electric cars will come up to par will be when they become apart of a standard.
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the title does not get anywhere close to living up to the promise of showing how fax machines can teach us about electric cars. yes it mentions both sides but is does not give any data that back it up. it just states how the fax machine had two different types and they could not communicate and he is tying that in with the electric car and how there is multiple chargers and that there only needs to be one. this is a weak artical, he needs to change his title to make a more effective point.
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His title does not live up to its promise. Other than the thought of “compatibility” and being “uniform” there is no connection between the two things. Fax machines do not teach us about electric cars at all. We can just compare how there needs to be a universal concept for charging. There’s a universal plug for outlets for any common household items, like a fax machine. It is not persuasive because it makes little to no sense and is far fetched.
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In reply to Alex P, I definitely agree. Society is stuck on gas powered automobiles and not much will change until electric cars become more popular.
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The two keys that made the fax machine successful were it was royalty free and the standard was not so restrictive as to prevent fax machine manufacturers from introducing other features – such as faster transmission. It was easy to find this information. He talked about the previous attempts to make the fax machine a success, and the paragraph were I got this information was named third time’s the charm. He uses the titles of the paragraphs to tie them together.
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I think the reason Coopersmith is joining the converstaion on whether electric cars are easy to use or not. He does not use an explicit “they say” to prevent name calling. This choice is effective because he can get his point across in a much gentler way. Instead of screaming at the car companies for not making a Universal car plug-in, he compares this situation to the fax machines. This could show the car companies what happened in the past and may encourage them to learn from that.
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Although this is a very interesting topic that approaches a fairly important topic, I find it kind of odd that a history teacher would spend so much time to research the history of fax machines for a analogy. His argument was very persuasive in the sense that in order to help the electric car movement, companies need to work together to create a charger that will virtually work for all of the cars. However, I do not understand why someone would waste so much time researching such a dull topic–the history of fax machines.
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Coopersmith’s title,”what fax machines can teach us about electric cars” does live up to his promise.Coopersmith starts out the article by discussing fax machienes and how unreliable they can be, however he mentions that electric cars can also be very unreliable because not every charge stations works for every car. In bringing this up he made his argument that both fax machines and electric cars have good and bad sides to them, and that is why standards are extremely important when creating electric cars. His argument was very persuasive because he gave very good exaples, facts, and supporting details to everything he said.
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I believe Coopersmith’s point is not a direct correlation between electric cars and fax machines. I also feel like his title should have been a different title.Although his reference with the fax machine was a success, I expected him to state a direct comparison between the two subjects instead of just persuading the reader to his beliefs.
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Anna, I kindly disagree, I believe that throughout his article he is able to make the reader precisely understand how the history of the fax machine industry can help progress the electric car industry.
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in a way, i do believe that coopersmith’s title lived up to its promise. he connected fax machines and electric cars by pointing out the need for standard chargers/plug-ins for the different brands of cars and how we could fix this problem like we did with the fax machines. however, this is really the only thing these two items can “teach” us. his argument was persuasive but at the same time i could argue back that the easier fix to the problem is that people just buy normal cars that run on gas.
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I think Coopersmith’s title did live up to his promise. The article is about how there needs to be some sort of standardization in the charging stations of electric cars. He relates that to how when fax machines first came out they weren’t standardized and they ran into a lot of problems. eventually they standardized the fax machines and everyone was able to use them and communicate together. I think his article was persuasive because he played to the readers motions a lot in the article. He talked about how we need to cooperate and it’s not fair for people with electric cars. When you make statements like that it plays to the emotions of the reader and makes them feel like they want to help you out as if you are the underdog and everyone is against you and all you want is peace and unity.
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Coopersmith’s title does relate well with his article. Coopersmith thoroughly compares how the fax industry relates to electric cars. He expresses that the fax machine business did not boom until there was one cohesive standard. He is stating that the electric car industry could learn a thing or two from the fax business. For electric cars to really take off, and thrive all companies need to have the same standard. Coopersmith is persuasive because he uses relevant examples to prove his point. Coopersmith is explaining that if all the chargers for electric cars had the same features, more people would be willing to invest in an electric car.
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Coopersmith’s title does live up to its promise because his discussion about fax machines did teach the reader about a certain aspect of electric cars. Fax machines teach us the importance of standards. Before different fax machines were able to communicate with each other, the sales were pretty low. Once they made any, and every, fax machine able to communicate with each other with no problems, there were more purchases. If electric cars were able to charge at all gas/charging stations, there will be more purchases of them as well. Coopersmith’s argument is persuasive because he uses a strong comparison to make sense of his point.
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I do not believe that Coopersmith’s title lived up to it’s promise because although fax machine’s took years to be compatible with one another the issue here is that charging of electric cars and the adapters being the same at charging stations. Yes there is a similarity between fax machines and chargers for electric cars compatibility but I do not believe that one could simply look at fax machines and say that fax machines can teach us about electric cars. The article was mainly about electric cars not being compatible at all charging stations. This article made very few references to fax machines.
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The key factors to the fax machine were that they were royalty-free (any company can adhere to the standard without paying a fee to the creators) and to not restrictive as to prevent fax machine manufacturers from introducing other features (faster transmission). I found this information but referencing back to where I had read it and then comprehended what Coopersmith had said into another part. Coopersmith using referencing and historical background to compare what he had researched and discover from previous years and what could happen in the near future,
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I do not think that the title of the argument corresponds with the meaning of the article. I feel that with this title there should have been more comparison between these two topics than was presents. Although the title was not very strong, I feel that he presented a very persuasive argument for why there should be a universal plug for electric cars. He uses references such as gas powered vehicles and being able to plug a toaster into any outlet to strengthen his argument. I think he puts up a valid argument, he just needs to add facts to back it up.
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The title does not meet the point that Summarize Coopersmith is trying to make. He gave no facts to back up his argument. He makes it clear that a fax machine is similar to a electric car by talking about how they both fax machines and electric cars have a big issue, one being it cant communicate and the other being there are to many chargers making it hard for someone to charge their car. If there was a different title I feel like it would help with his argument.
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Coppersmith’s research into this topic was not without reason. While I do not know his exact reasoning, it could be a number of things including owning one of these cars or simply wanting more people to get less environmentally hurtful cars. This topic is worthy of research because of the huge market that could open up because of cooperation between these companies. It could make electric cars just as accessible and useful as normal gas cars.
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While Coopersmith’s title is certainly catchy; it really does not correlate into the argument as much as I had assumed before reading the piece. As i reader I automatically assumed that the connection drawn between the two would be more technologically relevant. Instead it was more about the changes that the companies had to make more in a sense of advertisement as opposed to the make and models of the two inventions. I believe that his argument is definitely filled with extremely well thought out points making it persuasive and intriguing to the reader, but because of the title i left the article feeling a little let down that an electric car was not manufactured in the same way as a fax machine.
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His title does live up to the idea of using fax machines advancements to further improve electric vehicle universally. Electric vehicles can be the future of daily commute, but without the standard charging ports, they will never be as effective as possible. With the fax machines, they had a standard that was not too restrictive and allowed for change among each brand of fax machines but still sent universally. It was quite persuasive in telling the people it is time to put differences in technology aside and work together to make electric cars more efficient.
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Brianna I’m going to have to disagree with you. Just because fax machines were able to make it over the hump doesn’t mean electric cars will be guaranteed to as well. The current standard regarding automobile fueling is gasoline. Changing the standard from gasoline to electric charging seems to be a much more difficult goal than a simple fax machine.
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In response to James L. I do agree with the fact that the topic was worthy of research. Fax machines may not be as relevant anymore as a result of more instantaneous modes of communication, but electric cars are and will continue to grow as an industry throughout the US. Therefore the research done to compare how fax machines were successful to help the industry of electric cars is worthwhile.
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The two reasons the standardized fax machine was so successful are the fact that it was royalty free, which means companies could adhere to the standard without paying a fee to the standards creators, and the standard was not so restrictive as to prevent fax machine manufacturers from introducing other features such as faster transmission. Both of these factors were crucial to the standard fax machine’s success.It was very easy to find this information because it was set aside in a paragraph all by itself and stated explicitly. Coopersmith uses history and similarities between the standard fax machine and electric cars to tie all the information together.
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The success for fax machines was due to the fact that it is royalty- free, meaning that any company could adhere to the standard with not having to pay its creator with a fee. Second standard was to prevent fax machine manufactures from introducing other features,for example fast transmissions. This allowed competition through out companies on more than just price. I think these standards were easy to find because the way the paragraphs started, like when Coopersmith said “This key found two keys to its success”. I feel that Coopersmith used good analogies through out his article with evolving technology and groups of manufactures.
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Yes, Coopersmith’s title lives up to it’s promise that fax machines can teach us about electric cars because of the standards for both of the technology. Fax machines faced the same problems that electric cars face. There is not an international standard to be able to use or recharge them. Fax machines had no potential at first to be a useful technology because any other person could have a different standard and therefore people couldn’t use them. Coopersmith proves that when the International Telecommunications Union adopted the world wide standard people saw it as reliable and the industry sky rocketed. The problem with electric cars is there is not one way to charge an electric car. There is different kinds that only worked with certain cars. When gas is accessible to everyone why would anyone want to worry about running out of charge? Coopersmith’s point is that if electric cars would go to an international standard, then it could increase the market just like the solution did with fax machines. Coopersmith’s argument is persuasive because he connects the solution of the fax machines to a problem of electric cars and he presents a way that could possibly work.
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Coopersmith, a historian, might have studied the topic of fax machines because of the manufacturing process that it went through. He wanted to find a way to adapt uniform charging stations in order to make it more efficient for electrical cars. To do this, he needed to find proof that it would be beneficial and that is where the example of the fax machine came into play. I do believe the history of these standards is a topic worthy of research because the topic of fax machines supports his claim. As mentioned in his article, standardized fax machines allowed companies to compete on more than just price; they could compete on features as well. This resulted in a continuous wave of new and cheaper machines that attracted more user. If a standardized system of electrical charging stations were accepted, it could possibly yield the same factors.
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I agree with Jonathan Coopersmith’s thesis and main point of his article. I thought he did a good job using a direct historical example based of the common understanding that history repeats itself. His analogy is successful in proving that allowing the free market to be the sole determining factor in a standard can prolong the problem and be unsuccessful. He proves the validity of his analogy by directly comparing them: “Like fax machines, electric vehicles’ incompatibility reflected both evolving technology and groups of manufacturers promoting their own systems in hopes of dominating the market place.” He provides a conversational tone with directly stating a “they say.” He explains how fax machines were eventually successful because improved compatibility provided better communication unrivaled by other technology at the time. He compares this to the success of the standardization of household electronics but there are many other standardizations that promote efficiency including MLA formatting in our reading, heavy standardization of our highway systems as well as telephone networks.
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Technology has come along way and it has improved the way things work,you can access any information at the click of the button.
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I agree with Katie that the title does fit with what the author wanted to say. Coopersmith is essentially arguing that standards can make a market more expansive and profitable. Jonathan Coopersmith’s article is all about comparisons of the compatibility of different technology anywhere people go. If a piece of tech is only available for use at specific locations or specific times, nobody would even think to use it. Coopersmith believes that if there were certain guidelines to follow when making new technology, these guidelines would make the use of it convenient and possible. Nobody wants to use a device that can only charge at one place such as their home. He uses the example of a fax machine as an analogy of what modern day tech such as electric cars should follow. The product should be royalty-free and not restrictive. Coopersmith says that the two basic approaches to creating appropriate technology standards is done by allowing the market to decide or creating a consensus among participants. Knowing what the market wants and what the consumers want will eliminate many chances for flaws with the product itself. Getting the sales is easy through efficient advertising, but keeping customer satisfaction is what matters. If all technology corporations had set standards to follow when making machines, sales would not be as slow as they are today with electric cars. This is not to say that all electric car companies are suffering in terms of profit and sales. Tesla, for example, has been prospering because it has a set standard to follow, which is sharing its patents in order to encourage the expansion for electric vehicles. This company has even agreed to have its cars and charging stations compatible in order to meet China Charging Standards. The inclusion of Tesla’s course of action to meet the needs of customers as well as its profits is one of the many examples that support Cooperfield’s assertion that technology companies need standards in order to be able to operate efficiently in the market.
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