<p><pre><code>  Although titled “Edison’s Telephonoscope” it is 
  not, in fact, a creation of Thomas Edison’s 
  at all (either realised or proposed) 
  but rather an imagining by Maurier...
</code></pre>
Can&#x27;t quite absolve Edison of guilt here. Maurier might have been repeating a rumor from the great man himself.  Edison was a master of FUD, claiming that he had things like 3D movies with sound running in the labs and predicting their imminent release, just to keep his competitors off guard.