Packet switching and distributed routing protocols.
That was my point, you just went back further in history than I did :p
Then your point is wrong. What's so novel about CPUs? We've had sand since the Earth was first formed!
I swear the tech industry has more luddites than the Amish.
The Amish are not luddites.
They are not capital-L official Luddites, but they could be classified as colloquial lowercase-L luddites.
Since when are cables such a unique idea? The telegraph is nothing more than a large number of fancy carrier pigeons as a service, which we've had since the 12th century at least.