We discuss moral panics, past and present, pretty frequently to make a key point: for all the fears you hear about today‘s technologies, there were similar (almost always unfounded) fears for new technologies in the past. And, in retrospect, almost all of them look silly. Among my favorites were when chess or the waltz were going to undermine society. However, the NY Times‘ archivist, Evan Sandhaus has an amusing example (via Mathew Ingram) concerning that time, back in 1878, when the NY Times editorialized against Thomas Edison‘s phonograph and aereophone, for the fact that they could destroy everyone‘s privacy.