The 200-ton machine that streamed music by telephone

A closer look

Long before Spotify bled your wallet, Thaddeus Cahill built a 200-ton, basement-filling synthesizer that transmitted early electronic music over telephone lines. It was the world's first music streaming service, but it had a slight flaw: it used so much power that it bled into the Manhattan phone grid, interrupting important business calls with aggressive, robotic organ music. Naturally, the phone company was furious and eventually killed the project.