Believe it or not, Wall Street's fastest form of broker-to-investor communication in the eighteenth century was through carrier pigeons. Things have come a long way since then. It's amazing to think that just twenty years ago, no one imagined how integral the Internet and computers would become to almost every aspect of life, including investing. Think of the speed and ease of modern-day online investing. In about five minutes, you can log on to your online account and put in a limit order for a certain stock.