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Radiolab

Series 9

Mixtape 3 - Cassetternet

Duration: 55 minutes

First broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 ExtraLatest broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 Extra

Radiolab is a Peabody-award-winning show about curiosity. Where sound illuminates ideas, and the boundaries blur between science, philosophy, and the human experience.

Radiolab Mixtape, a special 4 part series featuring the impact of the cassette tape

Radiolab Mixtape 3 Cassetternet: exploring how the cassette tape helped to create the internet.

In 1983, Simon Goodwin had a strange thought. Would it be possible to broadcast computer software over the radio? If so, could listeners record it off the air and onto a cassette tape? This experiment and dozens of others in the early 80s created a series of cassette fueled, analog internets. They copied and moved information like never before, upended power structures and created a poisonous social network that brought down a regime.

Radiolab examines how these early internet came about, and how the societal and cultural impacts of these analog information networks can still be felt today.

Radiolab Mixtape is reported, produced, scored and sound designed by Simon Adler.

From WNYC. First broadcast on public radio in the USA in 2021. Show less

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