Newspaper have been using facsimile machines to send photographs (wire photographs) since 1907, when a photo from Paris was wired to the Daily Mirror in London. In 1959, a Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun
(‘Morning Sun’), sent whole pages from its main office in Tokyo to a printing works at Sapporo 600 miles (960 km) away. Now it sends a complete copy daily by satellite link to London, where it is printed, for sale in Europe.
In recent years, technological advances have resulted in cheaper machines able to give good quality reproduction. Newspapers and business firms are not the only users. Police forces can send each other copies of fingerprints and photo fit pictures.
The earliest fax machines took about six minutes to transmit a document the size of an A4 typing sheet. Later machines cut the time by half. Modern machines take less than 30 seconds. They code the information digitally although it is transmitted as analogue (like sound-wave) signals. Machines available in the 1990s will both code and transmit digitally, cutting A4 sheet transmission time to four or five seconds.
Picture Credit : Google