Electrical World, August 31, 1907, pages 391-392:
HOW ABOUT WIRELESS?
The strike of telegraphers now in progress, with the sending of messages seriously interfered with and the need, real or supposed, of guarding thousands of miles of lines against interference, shows that an inquiry as to the exact status of wireless telegraphy would now be particularly pertinent. There are divers companies with manifold installations, and at least a dozen kinds of alleged syntonic devices, and yet save for customary reports of incoming steamers, there is wonderfully little doing of which the public hears. Every little while the press reports tell of the marvellous apparatus of Prof. Dr. Von Pumpernickel by which the messages can be made to do figure-skating all over the empyrean, always dodging into the right window at the end of their stunt, yet somehow the steady work-a-day side of the matter still remains in the background. Some attempts at serious commercial transmission of messages over rather moderate distances have signally failed, and on the whole the last two or three years have been singularly unproductive except in prospectuses. Of these there have been many copies per wireless message sent unless we are sadly misinformed. Along the seaboard there has been some reasonably successful work, and occasional striking feats bear evidence that behind all the dubious experiments and more dubious financiering lies something that the world really needs.
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There is a great possibility lurking in the future, which has been hidden behind a sad lot of noisy humbug. It is high time that the serious workers in the field sunk their differences, scrapped their pet theories and came down to solid business. We know of no really great advance which has had so hard a lot. Of course, there are many inventors with systems to protect and theories to defend, both here and abroad, but the solemn truth is that they are industriously cutting each others' throats instead of advancing the art. It is a case where the greatest good can be attained only by working in harmony. Some steps have already been taken toward a consolidation of some of the various interests which should be productive of great good if carried far enough. There are many outstanding questions to be settled and an enormous amount of work to be done before the art gets fairly upon a commercial basis. Fighting will not bring the day of success an hour nearer. We are disposed to read the riot act to the whole contingent. Here we have one of the biggest things of the new century, a record of some wonderful achievements in long-distance transmission of messages, an almost unlimited field for marine usefulness and an unknown faculty for general work, which has failed of its mission thus far for petty and none too creditable reasons. Some day wireless telegraphy will come into its own. Just now perhaps the best work is being done under the auspices of various Governments for their own purposes. The Navy Department in this country has succeeded admirably within a particular sphere of operations, and is steadily extending the scope of its experiments. It really seems as if the private enterprise had fallen to the rear and governmental activity had pushed to the front. We hope for better things and wait patiently, but the period of exploitation seems indefinitely prolonged, and the procrastination grows tiresome.