[schubart]

> A message took over 17 hours to deliver, at 2 minutes and 5 seconds per letter by Morse code

A letter in Morse code is made of up to four “dits” or “dahs”. Why would it take more than two minutes to send one letter?

[joshuahaglund]

The signal was weak. An attempt at fixing the problem, boosting the voltage, caused the insulation to fail. Later cables added repeaters along the way to maintain the signal. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transatlantic_telegraph_cable#...

[pranjalv123]

You can read a transcript of the first conversations on the transatlantic telegraph[1]. Basically: the signal was very weak, they needed a lot of time between symbols, and they needed to repeat a lot.

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Report_of_the_Joint_Com...