Kurt Cobaines Death And Impact On Fans Essays - Music, Grunge

Kurt Cobaine's Death And Impact On Fans Essays - Music, Grunge Kurt Cobaine's Death And Impact On Fans Its not fun anymore. I just cant take it anymore. The words that would later haunt the world are clumsily scribbled onto a pad of paper. The room grows silent and coldthen BANG! On April 7, 1994, the music world died with a single gunshot wound to the head. Kurdt Donald Cobain took away a music legend and left a void in the music world. When Cobain ended his life on that fateful day, he not only stunned fans, but also destroyed one of the most talented bands of all-time. The sad sense of loss that Seattle began to feel quickly spread to the rest of the country and to the world as well. The youth of an entire sub-culture was devastated. A few days after his death, 7,000 mourners gathered in Seattle to remember the musician. As Cobains widow, Courtney Love read her husbands agonizing suicide note, people lit candles, and threw burning toilet paper for the iconoclastic anti-hero. Although today some of the pain may have faded, the loss of Cobain and his band Nirvana is still being felt by teens across the country. Good men die young. Kurt was a great songwriter, musician and person. He has joined the ranks of great artists such as Jimi Hendrix, and the Nirvana legacy will be with us forever, expressed Ryan Runkewich, a Nirvana fan. The sediment is not only expressed by fans, but also by such famous musicians as R.E.M., Neil Young and the Cranberries who have all dedicated songs in Cobains memory. Before the boom of the phenomenon known as Nirvana, the Seattle music scene was most famous for its hard-rock blues. In 1988, the Aberdeen native along with Krist Anthony Novoselic and Dave Grohl began with a demo song entitled Big Cheese and captivated the hearts and souls of a forgotten generation that had yet to make a name for itself. Nirvana had the guts to express the emotions that young people were too afraid to display. The band and its ringleader Cobain truly became the vocal point for struggling teens. As the sixth anniversary of Cobains death quickly approaches, fans are afforded another painful year to reflect on his music, life and the very moment when everything ended. In fact, most fans can even remember what they were doing when they heard the news that Cobain was dead. When I heard, I was playing a video game and listening to the radio. I got real upset and my friends and I sat around all day listening to his music. I personally pay tribute to his on that dreadful day every year, said James V., a Cobain fan. From the dawning of the 90s grunge music era, Nirvana has been the undisputed leader of alternative music. The music was not only a part of life, but rather it was life for millions of teens searching for an outlet to express themselves. For that reason, the memory of Cobain and the Nirvana sound will never die in the hearts of fans. Inner-peace what Cobain wanted for everyone: If you die youre completely happy and your soul lives onIm not afraid of dying. Total peace after death becoming the someone else is the best hope Ive got.Kurdt Donald Cobain. If you have elements that I can add to this article let me knowI have lots of information and I have done a lot of research!! I am an expert J lemme know thanks Word Count= 594 Bibliography The male point of view: A look into the typical day of a high school male Once upon a time in a land far away, a young man named Adam began the chain of male species that would revolutionize into the dominant, chauvinistic sex of the 90s. From the first forbidden bite of the apple, to the masculine attitude prevalent in most men, the males thoughts have always remained the samesex, sports and more sex. Yes it is true the average male teenager thinks about sex four times a minute, but there is more to the mind of a guy. The following is a typical schedule of a teenage male, living through puberty, an impossible masculine complex and all of the other speed bumps thrown

Biography of Alice Creator, Lewis Carroll

Biography of Alice Creator, Lewis Carroll Born in 1832, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was the eldest boy of 11 children. Raised in Daresbury, Cheshire, England, he was known for writing and playing games, even as a child. An avid storyteller, Carroll enjoyed creating stories for children, and went on to publish two notable novels: â€Å"Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland† and â€Å"Through the Looking Glass.† In addition to his career as a writer, Carroll was also known for being a mathematician and logician, as well as an Anglican deacon and a photographer. He passed away in Guildford, England on January 14, 1898, just a few weeks before his 66th birthday. Early Life Carroll was the eldest boy of 11 children (the third child) born to his parents on January 27, 1832. His father, Rev. Charles Dodgson, was a clergyman, having served as perpetual curate at the old parsonage at Daresbury, where Carroll was born. Rev. Dodgson went on to become the rector of Croft in Yorkshire, and despite his duties, always found time to tutor the children in their school studies and instill in them morals and values. Carroll’s mother was Frances Jane Lutwidge, who was known for being patient and kind with the children. The couple raised their children in a small isolated village, where the children found ample ways to amuse themselves throughout the years. Carroll, in particular, was known for coming up with creative games for the children to play, and eventually started writing stories and composing poetry. When the family moved to Croft after Rev. Dodgson was offered a larger parish, Carroll, who was 12 years old at the time, started developing â€Å"Rectory Magazines.† These publications were collaborative compositions within the family, and everyone was expected to contribute. Today, there are a few surviving family magazines, some of which are handwritten by Carroll and include his own illustrations. As a boy, Carroll was not only known for writing and storytelling, he was also known to have an aptitude for mathematics and classical studies. He received awards for his mathematics work during his time at Rugby School, which he attended after his years at Richmond School in Yorkshire. It is said that Carroll was bullied as a student and didn’t love his school days. He reportedly stammered as a child and never outgrew the speech impediment, and also suffered from having a deaf ear, the result of a severe fever. As a teenager, he experienced a severe instance of whooping cough. But his health and personal struggles in school never seemed to affect his academics studies or professional pursuits. In fact, Carroll later went on to enroll at Christ Church College in Oxford in 1851 after receiving a scholarship (known as a studentship at the school). He earned his degree in mathematics in 1854 and became a lecturer of mathematics at the school, which was akin to serving as a tutor. This position meant that Carroll was to take holy orders from the Anglican Church and to never marry, two requirements that he agreed upon. He became a deacon in 1861. The plan was for Carroll to become a priest, at which point he could have married. However, he decided that parish work was not the correct avenue for him and remained a bachelor his entire life. Years later, starting in the early 1880s, Carroll served as his college’s Curator of its Common Room. His time at Oxford came with a small salary and an opportunity to conduct research in mathematics and logic. Carroll was also afforded the luxury of pursuing his passion for literature, composition, and photography. Photography Career Carroll’s interest in photography began in 1856 and he found great joy in photographing people, particularly children and notable figures in society. Among those that he photographed included English Poet Alfred Lord Tennyson. At the time, photography was a complex practice that required strong technical expertise, as well as great patience and understanding of the process. As such, it’s no surprise that the craft brought much enjoyment to Carroll, who enjoyed more than two decades of practice in the medium. His work included developing his own studio and amassing a collection of photographs that is reported to have once included about 3,000 images, though it appears that only a fraction of his work has survived over the years. Carroll was known to have traveled with his gear, taking photos of individuals and saving them in an album, which was his chosen method for showcasing his work. He collected autographs from the individuals he shot and took the time to show them how their images would be used within the album. His photography was only displayed publicly once, showcased in a professional exhibition sponsored by the Photographic Society of London in 1858. Carroll gave up his practice of photography in 1880; some say that the modern developments of the art form made it too easy to create an image, and Carroll lost interest. Writing Career The mid-1850s were also a time of development for Carroll’s writing career. He began composing a number of not only mathematical texts but also humorous works. He adopted his pseudonym of Lewis Carroll in 1856, which was created when he translated his first and middle names into Latin, changing their order of appearance, and then translating them back to English. While he continued to publish his mathematical work under his given name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, his other writing appeared under this new pen name. The same year that Carroll assumed his new pseudonym, he also met a four-year-old girl named Alice Liddle, the daughter of the head of Christ Church. Alice and her sisters provided much inspiration for Carroll, who would create imaginative stories to tell them. One of those stories was the basis for his most famous novel, in which he described the adventures of a young girl named Alice who fell into a rabbit hole. Alice Liddle asked Carroll to turn his verbal tale into a written work, which was initially titled, â€Å"Alice’s Adventures Underground.† After several revisions, Carroll published the story in 1865 as the now famous title of, â€Å"Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.† The novel was illustrated by John Tenniel. The success of the book encouraged Carroll to write a sequel, â€Å"Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There,† which was published in 1872. This second novel drew from many of the stories the stories that Carroll had written years earlier, and included many of his famous Wonderland characters, including Tweedledee and Tweedledum, the White Knight, and Humpty Dumpty. The novel also included a popular poem titled, â€Å"Jabberwocky† about a mythical monster. The nonsensical piece of writing has long puzzled readers and provided ample opportunities for analysis and interpretation from scholars. Famous Quotes from Lewis Carroll While many children’s books of the times were written with the goal of sharing moral lessons for children, Carroll’s work was reportedly written purely for entertainment purposes. Some say that Carroll’s writing includes hidden meanings and messages about religion and politics, but most reports support the notion that Carroll’s novels did no such thing. They were purely entertaining books that were enjoyed by children and adults alike, particularly with their nonsensical characters and occurrences and the intelligent ways in which Alice responded to the various situations she encountered. â€Å"Everything’s got a moral, if only you can find it.†Ã¢â‚¬Å"Contrariwise, if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.†Ã¢â‚¬Å"She generally gave herself very good advice (though she seldom followed it.)† Death His later years were taken up with mathematics and logic projects, as well as trips to the theater. Only a few weeks before his 66th birthday, Carroll fell ill with influenza, which eventually developed into pneumonia. He never recovered and died at his sister’s home in Guildford on January 14, 1898. Carroll was buried at the Mount Cemetery in Guildford and has a memorial stone in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

Choose from the 3 available topics Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Choose from the 3 available topics - Essay Example Despite the changes adopted in the representation structure, the policies used for women differ from that used in men. Men are given the chance to fight out with fellow men for the different representation position while women benefit from quota systems in which parties reserve special positions for them. The application of the principle of reservation and quota system has enabled women to represent the specific interest of their gender in the house. In Mala Htun article ‘is gender like ethnicity’, the idea behind the formation of group specific parties is evaluated. The author also looks at the dynamics involved in reserving seats using the quota system for women and the reservation of legislative seats for the minority groups (Htun 434). Different countries have different policies on representation and the use of reservation and quotas for special groups like women and ethnic minority. This system applies to all democratic situations whether completely religious like M uslim or catholic state, developed and developing countries among other identities. Most countries have legal requirements for this representation and this highlights the approach adopted by such countries when reserving different seats for its people. Countries that lack legal basis for reservation and quotas have different political arrangement, which allows for fair representation in parties and representative posts. The United States lacks a legal framework for representation of the minority or the women but uses a race conscious districting system that gives room for fair representation of all the races (Htun 434). In mature electoral democracies, states reserve special quotas within the political parties for women and legislative seats for the ethnic minority. The use of quotas and cleavages has been approached with a traditional perspective that fails to look at the implications and benefits of these representations. The author argues that the use of candidate quotas can only be significant within groups that have cross cutting interest while legislative reservation should be allocated to groups that have coinciding interests. Under the principle of use of quota for political party reservation, the law requires a specific number of slots to be left for women candidates during nomination. This is common in most democracies in which the law may require that a third of positions in all areas be reserved to women and that the ranking within these positions should alternate with men. The principle of quota system has significantly affected parties decisions and individuals picked to represent parties in certain districts (Dahlerup 214). The use of representation however affects the entire demography of an electoral system as it result into the creation of new electoral incentives and rules. These results into the creation of more than one set of electoral roll with special districts reserved for the minority groups. Under these principles, a party seeks to h ave a certain group of people who are subjected to a different set of conditions to be elected to the legislature (Htun 434). Strengths and weaknesses of the author’s arguments In this paper, the author attempts to highlight the differences between the types of presentations that border on the quota system and the representation within the legislature. Through this article, the author has critically highlighted the

Effect of Marriages on Crime Rates Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Effect of Marriages on Crime Rates - Article Example In this paper the authors through evidence are illustrating that marriage can reduce the crimes committed by an individual as it can involve the individual in social bonds. According to the authors the research done by them is however not accurate as all the figures in an individual's life cannot be kept constant and this restrains the authors to conclude authentically that marriage reduces the crime rates. However the evidence given by the authors supports the notion that rate of crime does get affected because of the bond of marriage. The authors hypothesize that getting involved in social bonds and activities may help one to avoid committing crime. According to the authors marriage is a social bond which inflicts social responsibility and compulsions on one individual which further diverts the individual from committing a crime. The change in routine is also marked as important by the authors as it helps to change the mood and passion of an individual. It makes one individual spend more time with his family rather than friends (Warr 1998: 183). Furthermore the monitoring activity done by the spouses is supposed to be helpful to divert one from criminal activities. The supervision done by spouses can help men to avoid committing any crime (Waite and Gallagher 2000: 24).

Capital Punishment Essay: Its Fair and Effective -- Argumentative Pe

Capital Punishment - It's Fair and Effective   Ã‚  Ã‚   Confronting head-on two of the most prominent objections to the death penalty is the object of this paper: Is the death penalty a miscarriage of justice? And Does it Deter Crime?    It's a miscarraige of justice. In a survey Professors Hugo Adam Bedau and Michael Radelet found that 7000 persons were executed in the United States between 1900 and 1985 and that 35 were innocent of capital crimes (1). Among the innocents they list Sacco and Vanzetti as well as Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. Although their data may be questionable, I do not doubt that, over a long enough period, miscarriages of justice will occur even in capital cases. Despite precautions, nearly all human activities, such as trucking, lighting, or construction, cost the lives of some innocent bystanders. We do not give up these activities, because the advantages, moral or material, outweigh the unintended losses (2). Analogously, for those who think the death penalty just, miscarriages of justice are offset by the moral benefits and the usefulness of doing justice. For those who think death penalty unjust even when it does not miscarry, miscarriages can hardly be decisive.    Is it a deterrent? Despite much recent work, there has been no conclusive statistical demonstration that the death penalty is a better deterrent than are alternative punishments (3). However, deterrence is less than decisive for either side. Most abolitionists acknowledge that they would continue to favor abolition even if the death penalty were shown to deter more murders than alternatives could deter (4). Abolitionists appear to value the life of a convicted murderer or, at least, his non-execution, more highly than they v... ...n, however just, of murderers. But although there is a lively discussion of the subject, not serious evidence exists to support the hypothesis that executions produce a higher murder rate. Cf. Phllips, the deterrent Effect of Capital Punishment: New Evidence on an Old Controversy, 86 Am. J. Soc. 139 (1980) (arguing that murder rates drop immediately after executions of criminals). 6 H. Gross, A Theory of Criminal Justice 489 (1979) (attributing this passage to Sir James Fitzjames Stephen). 7 Weems v. United States, 217 U.S. 349 (1910) suggest that penalties be proportionate to the seriousness of the crime - a common theme in criminal law. Murder, therefore, demands more that life imprisonment. In modern times, our sensibility requires that the range of punishments be narrower than the range of crime - but not so narrow as to exclude the death penalty.   

Composing an Impartial Jury & Balancing Multi-Racial Representations Essay

The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees the right to trial by jury in state court. This amendment makes the 6th and 7th amendments applicable to the states. The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution grants a criminal defendant the right to a trial â€Å"by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed. † The Seventh Amendment provides a similar right in civil cases. The United States Supreme Court has defined, an â€Å"impartial† jury as a jury drawn from a representative cross-section of the community in the district or division where the court convenes. The framers of the constitution sought to create an independent judiciary and to protect the people against arbitrary action by that judiciary. The right to be tried by a jury of his or her peers safeguards a person accused of a crime against a corrupt or overzealous prosecutor and against a compliant, biased, or eccentric judge. The requirement of a jury chosen from a fair cross-section of the community is fundamental to the American system of justice; it plays a pivotal role in ensuring impartiality. The first step in the process consists of the creation and maintenance of a master list from which the jury pool is drawn. This can include source lists such as voter registration, driver’s license, state income tax files, unemployment records, and public assistance rosters. The second step is the selection of the actual trial jury from the pool of citizens. Lastly is the instillation of the trial jury as a non-biased and fair representation of the defendant’s peers. Notwithstanding the Sixth Amendment’s guarantee of the right to an impartial jury, there are inherent flaws in the jury selection process. It is the second step that is most likely to be the downfall of the third. Randomly selected pools of potential jury members do not always accurately represent the entire community. These randomly selected pools often under represent both racial and ethnic minorities. The American Bar Association works to promote justice, professional excellence, and respect for the law. In doing so it has a natural stake in the selection of fair jury pools. The ABA is the largest voluntary professional association in the world. They provide many important resources including programs to assist lawyers and judges in their work, and initiatives to improve the legal system for the public. In line with their standards for the ethical practices of jury trials, the ABA has established two goals in regards to the juror master lists. The first is inclusion of all eligible citizens. The second is representation of all portions of the community, These goals often prove difficult to accomplish in practice. This paper will focus on three aspects of a process, which together constitute the definition, selection, and empanelment of a fair and impartial jury. Lastly it will summarize these points and then suggest a model to aide in overcoming the shortfalls evident in the current systems. Part I lays the foundation for what constitutes an impartial jury. Part II identifies general racial stereotypes jurors may hold about defendants and address the importance of combating those stereotypes to insure impartiality. Part III highlights the key players in the empanelment of an impartial jury and the need for collaboration among them during the voir dire process. The report will also discuss placing limits on the voir dire process, including the possibility of eliminating it all together. Part IV, the summary, proposes a two-point model that strives for both fairness and consistency. The intent is to preserve the role of the adversary system in jury selection. This should strengthen the Sixth Amendment’s guarantee of an impartial jury. I. DEFINING AN IMPARTIAL JURY The Sixth Amendment’s reference to an â€Å"impartial jury† has served as the basis for the broadly accepted definition of a jury composed of the defendant’s peers. Additionally, an impartial jury is one that will decide the case on the evidence and law given to them by the judge. This must occur even if they personally disagree with the law. The process should be free from the bias of either prosecution or defense, and the jury members should represent the class, race, and gender scheme of the community where the defendant resides. Racial diversity within a jury has been a favored method in which to bring about impartiality and the idea of procedural fairness. This understanding is based upon the statement that â€Å"diversity on the jury enhances its ability to consider a variety of perspectives in evaluating the evidence at trial, that ability is reduced when juries fail to reflect the diversity in the community from which they are drawn. † Although an adversarial process is an essential part of our legal system, the goal of empanelling an impartial jury may require more collaboration and less competition at the voir dire stage. A jury derived from a source that excludes certain people based on race is non-representative and thus unconstitutional. Racial, ethnic or other stereotypes can lead to bias and a lack of impartiality among the jury members. There have been several models used over the years to create a jury panel that accurately represents the community and offers impartial fairness. The Blank Slate model and the Merger model are amongst them. The â€Å"Blank Slate† model assumes that all potential jurors arrive in court with no knowledge of the case, prior expectations, preconceived notions, or particular dispositions. The court instructed potential jurists to set aside all personal experience on entering the courthouse. However, courts and other social scholars soon realized that it was not only impossible, but also unproductive to use jurors with no opinions available to them, aside from those presented in the court. It was recognized that â€Å"jurors come to the courthouse with a variety of beliefs and experiences, but assumes that each juror who is selected to decide the case will put aside any biases, group allegiances, or predispositions in order to decide a case impartially. † This model was also contrary to the selection of a cross-section of the community, lacking both diversity and cultural identifications. The United States Supreme Court observed, â€Å"Impartiality is a group, rather than an individual, characteristic. † This stance led to their approval of the Merger Model over the Blank Slate Model. The Merger Model focuses on the requirement that the pool of jurors itself needs to be a cross section of the community. It attempts to balance the need for everyday experience with the desirability of a blank slate with regard to the facts of the case. This model recognizes that while individual jurors may not be able to be impartial, the exchange of viewpoints and opposing opinions in the jury room will result in an impartial jury. This balancing factor recognizes and respects the differences in jurist opinions, which stem from uncommon life experience, but allows impartial compositions based on the checks and balances of a group system. Much as the ABA discovered concerning their stated goals, the model encouraged by the Supreme Court is more difficult to defend in practice than it is on paper. Opponents of the model argue that the courts can not achieve the selections of a representative cross section of the community. â€Å"A small sample of twelve or a few, even one that is randomly drawn, and particularly one that is molded by excused for cause and preemptory challenges, is unlikely to mirror the composition of the community on race, ethnic background, and gender. † A. The Venire The first step in composing an impartial jury is to ensure that the venire will draw from a cross-section of the community. Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote, â€Å"[w]hen any large and identifiable segment of the community is excluded from jury service, the effect is to remove from the jury room qualities of human nature and varieties of human experience, the range of which is unknown and perhaps unknowable. † Washington State selects jurors’ names at random from voter registration and driver’s license and â€Å"identicard† records. The use of voter registrations in the compilation of other states lists exclusively has created disparity. In a majority of other states, present jury selection procedures often result in juries composed predominantly of persons who are white, middle-aged, members of the middle and upper socioeconomic classes, and from suburban or rural areas. This results in the exclusion of African Americans, the poor, the young, and various other minority groups. The disparity created by use of voter registration is especially clear in the numbers of minorities represented on the lists. The sole use of these records is therefore tantamount to willful systematic exclusion. According to a 1980’s voting and registration report completed by the Bureau of the Census, only 35. 5% of voting age individuals of Hispanic origin in the United States registered to vote in the 1988 presidential elections. African Americans showed a higher rate of registration than the Hispanic population. However, in the United States they still had a lower registration percentage (64. 5%) than white voters (67. 9%). In areas where a sizeable minority population exists, as in California where the racial minorities together outnumber the total Caucasian population, voter registration lists are likely to be inherently under-representative of a minority populace.

The Tech That Ignited the Communication Revolution

The 19th century saw a revolution in communications systems that brought the world closer together. Innovations like the telegraph allowed information to travel over vast distances in little or no time, while institutions such as the postal system made it easier than ever for people to conduct business and connect with others. Postal System People have been using delivery services to exchange correspondence and share information since at least 2400 B.C. when the ancient Egyptian pharaohs used couriers to spread royal decrees throughout their territory. Evidence indicates similar systems were used in ancient China and Mesopotamia as well.   The United States established its postal system in 1775 before independence had been declared. Benjamin Franklin was appointed the nations first postmaster general. The founding fathers believed so strongly in a postal system that they included provisions for one in the Constitution. Rates were established for the delivery of letters and newspapers based on delivery distance, and postal clerks would note the amount on the envelope. A schoolmaster from England, Rowland Hill, invented the adhesive postage stamp in 1837, an act for which he later was knighted.Hill also created the first uniform postage rates that were based on weight rather than size. Hills stamps made the prepayment of mail postage possible and practical. In 1840, Great Britain issued its first stamp, the Penny Black, featuring the image of Queen Victoria. The U.S. Postal Service issued its first stamp in 1847. Telegraph The electrical telegraph was invented in 1838 by a Samuel Morse, an educator and inventor who made a hobby of experimenting with electricity. Morse wasnt working in a vacuum; the principal of sending electrical current via wires over long distances had been perfected in the previous decade. But it took Morse, who developed a means of transmitting coded signals in the form of dots and dashes, to make the technology practical.   Morse patented his device in 1840, and three years later Congress granted him $30,000 to build the first telegraph line from Washington D.C. to Baltimore.  On May 24, 1844, Morse transmitted his famous message, What hath God wrought?, from the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., to the B O Railroad Depot in Baltimore. The growth of the telegraph system piggybacked on the expansion of the nations railway system, with lines often following rail routes and telegraph offices established at train stations large and small across the nation. The telegraph would remain the primary means of long-distance communication until the emergence of the radio and telephone in the early 20th century. Improved Newspaper Presses Newspapers as we know them have been printed regularly in the U.S. since the 1720s when James Franklin (Ben Franklins older brother) began publishing the New England Courant in Massachusetts. But early newspaper had to be printed in manual presses, a time-consuming process that made it difficult to produce more than a few hundred copies. The introduction of the steam-powered printing press in London in 1814 changed that, allowing publishers to print more than 1,000 newspapers per hour. In 1845, the American inventor Richard March Hoe introduced the rotary press, which could print up to 100,000 copies per hour. Coupled with other refinements in printing, the introduction of the telegraph, a sharp drop in the cost of newsprint, and an increase in literacy, newspapers could be found in nearly every town and city in the U.S. by the mid-1800s. Phonograph Thomas Edison is credited with inventing the phonograph, which could both record sound and play it back, in 1877. The device converted sound waves into vibrations that in turn were engraved on a metal (later wax) cylinder using a needle. Edison refined his invention and began marketing it to the public in 1888. But early phonographs were prohibitively expensive, and wax cylinders were both fragile and hard to mass produce. By the turn of the 20th century, the cost of photographs and cylinders had dropped considerably and they became more commonplace in American homes. The disc-shaped record we know today was introduced by Emile Berliner in Europe in 1889 and appeared in the U.S. in 1894. In 1925, the first industry standard for playing speeds was set at 78 revolutions per minute, and the record disc became the dominant format.   Photography The first photographs were produced by Frenchman Louis Daguerre in 1839, using silver-plated metal sheets treated with light-sensitive chemicals to produce an image. The images were incredibly detailed and durable, but the photochemical process was very complicated and time-consuming. By the time of the Civil War, the advent of portable cameras and new chemical processes allowed photographers like Matthew Brady to document the conflict and average Americans to experience the conflict for themselves. In 1883, George Eastman of Rochester, New York, had perfected a means of putting film on a roll, making the process of photography more portable and less expensive. The introduction of his Kodak No. 1 camera in 1888 put cameras in the hands of the masses. It came pre-loaded with film and when users had finished shooting, they sent the camera to Kodak, which processed their prints and sent the camera back, loaded with fresh film. Motion Pictures A number of people contributed innovations that led to the motion picture we know today. One of the first was the British-American photographer Eadweard Muybridge, who used an elaborate system of still cameras and trip wires to create a series of motion studies in the 1870s. George Eastmans innovative celluloid roll film in the 1880s was another crucial step, allowing large quantities of film to be packaged in compact containers.   Using Eastmans film,  Thomas Edison and William Dickinson had invented a means of projecting motion picture film called the Kinetoscope in 1891. But the Kinetoscope could only be viewed by one person at a time. The first motion pictures that could be projected and shown to groups of people were perfected by the French brothers Auguste and Louis Lumià ¨re. In 1895, the brothers demonstrated their Cinematographe with a series of 50-second films that documented everyday activities like workers leaving their factory in Lyon, France. By the 1900s, motion pictures had become a common form of entertainment in vaudeville halls throughout the U.S., and a new industry was born to mass-produce films as a means of entertainment. Sources Alterman, Eric. Out of Print. NewYorker.com. 31 March 2008.Cook, David A., and Sklar, Robert. History of the Motion Picture. Brittanica.com. 10 November 2017.Longley, Robert. About the U.S. Postal Service. ThoughtCo.com. 21 July 2017.McGillem, Clare. Telegraph. Brittanica.com. 7 December 2016.Potter, John, U.S. Postmaster General. The United States Postal Service An American History 1775 – 2006. USPS.com. 2006.History of the Cylinder Phonograph. Library of Congress. Accessed 8 March 2018.