Bertolt Brecht, "The Radio as an Apparatus of Communication"

In our society, one can invent and perfect discoveries that still have to [...] justify their existence [...] Thus there was a moment when technology was advanced enough to produce the radio and society was not yet advanced enough to accept it. The radio was then in its first phase of being a substitute: a substitute for theater, opera, concerts, lectures, café music, local newspapers, and so forth. This was the patient’s period of halcyon youth. I am not sure if it’s finished yet, but if so then this stripling who needed to certificate of competence to be born will have to start looking restrospectively for an object in life.