It all started in 1934 as a made-up corporate moniker for General George Owen Squier's wired music transmission venture. The -ak bit was a tip of the hat to the made-up-word fame of Kodak. In 1922, General Squier--incidentally also the first passenger to ride in an airplane with the Wright Brothers and one of the pioneers of the U.S. Signal Corps--had started a company to utilize his patent on telephone carrier multiplexing for the transmission of music. The multiplexing process allowed for the transmission of many signals over one wire, and its contribution to networking remains a cornerstone of the Internet.