Episode 29 - PCM, Origins of Digital Audio

Every day we are inundated with digital audio: phone calls, music, even this podcast. Digitized sound has become so ubiquitous that it often fades into the background. What makes this all possible is a technology called Pulse Code Modulation, or PCM. This isn't new technology, its roots trace all the way back to 1937. So how exactly did digital audio come into being well before the first digital computers?

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Important dates in this episode:

1937: PCM Developed by Alec Reeves
1941: Germany Cracks A-3 Code
1943: Bell Labs Develops SIGSALY(aka The Green Hornet)
1957: First PCM Synthesizer, MUSIC I, Programmed by Max Mathews