It's a broad historical consideration of all types of communications systems and what has worked best over long stretches. The paper might look daunting at first, but I promise it will be an enjoyable read.
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Even if you only read the abstract, you should look at Andrew Odlyzko's paper from 2000, titled "The history of communications and its implications for the Internet". It can be found at http://www.dtc.umn.edu/~odlyzko/doc/history.communications0.pdf
It's a broad historical consideration of all types of communications systems and what has worked best over long stretches. The paper might look daunting at first, but I promise it will be an enjoyable read.