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Invention

Fax

Electrical Engineering

Fax, short for facsimile and sometimes called telecopying or telefax, is the telephonic transmission of scanned printed material, both text and images, normally to a telephone number connected to a printer or other output device. The source does not give a single clean inventor and year for the fax machine in its lead, though its history section discusses Alexander Bain's early work. This description is adapted from Wikipedia contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0; changes were made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

Facts
Patent or First-Use Date
1843-05-27 1
Year
1843 1
Year of Alexander Bain's British patent for the Electric Printing Telegraph, the earliest fax-type device; the modern telephone-line fax machine (Xerox LDX) dates to 1964.
Significance
The fax machine became a fixture of office communication worldwide by the 1980s and 1990s before being displaced by email and other internet-based alternatives. 1
Connections

Associated With

In Field

Source Fax (Wikipedia)

Invented By

Source Alexander Bain (inventor) (Wikipedia)
Sources
1. Fax (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia
  • Lead section (entity-description)
    Fax (short for facsimile), sometimes called telecopying or telefax (short for telefacsimile), is the telephonic transmission of scanned printed material (both text and images), normally to a telephone number connected to a printer or other output device.
  • History > Wire transmission, Alexander Bain paragraph
    He received British patent 9745 on May 27, 1843, for his 'Electric Printing Telegraph'.
  • Lead section, second paragraph
    Initially a niche product, fax machines became ubiquitous in offices in the 1980s and 1990s.
  • In Field: Electrical Engineering, Categories
    Telecommunications equipment
View the Source
Alexander Bain (inventor) (Wikipedia)
Invented By: Alexander Bain, Lead section
Quote, Invented By: Alexander Bain, Lead section
He created the first fax machine, known as Bain's facsimile.
View the Source
Frequently Asked Questions

Did the fax machine really begin in the 1800s?

Its roots go back to Alexander Bain's 1843 British patent.

Its roots go back that far. Alexander Bain received British patent 9745 on May 27, 1843, for his Electric Printing Telegraph, which Wikipedia's history of fax discusses as early wire transmission work. Fax then remained a niche product for a long time before machines became ubiquitous in offices in the 1980s and 1990s.
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