Third-generation wireless (the first two were analog and the current version of digital) can move data at 384 kilobits a second, six times the speed of a good computer modem.
When Assange turned sixteen, he got a modem, and his computer was transformed into a portal.
To upload the data to a computer, a patient holds a small wand over his chest that picks up the data and transmits it through a modem to a Medtronic computer bank. (Future versions will be totally automatic and transmit wirelessly.) For now doctors mostly use the device to perform routine checkups remotely or to evaluate the device after it fires up.
The first major electronic break-in occurred in 1982, when a group of hackers from Milwaukee infiltrated the Los Alamos National Laboratory computer network via modem.
The Net lets anyone with a computer and a modem compete mouse to mouse with mainstream media. (Drudge's publishing empire is the living room of his Hollywood apartment.) But many of the Net's would-be Woodwards and Bernsteins are journalistic novices and wouldn't think, say, to ask court or police sources to confirm a rumor.
Most voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) systems install on a home computer and require a special modem.
FedEx generally uses a GPRS cellular modem to upload data from a courier's handheld computer to the company's servers, allowing it to keep up-to-the-minute tracking information.
But as both improve and become more common, they will--like the modem before them--inevitably become required components in any computer on the market.
The early-adopter set has been playing with home networking for a few years, but now the technology is spreading to mainstream consumers, who want to split the fast Internet connection of a cable modem or digital subscriber line (DSL) among several PCs, and also share computer files and peripherals such as printers and scanners.
Shannan White met her ex-husband on a computer bulletin board in the 1990s when she still used a dial-up modem.
He came to her house, and armed with a modem, he set up an e-mail account and hooked her up to the university's computer system.
Whether it's phone wire used for dial-up and digital subscriber lines (DSL), or the coaxial cables that carry cable modem connections, these connections are a bottleneck between the carrier's big pipes and your bandwidth-starved computer.
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