Then & Now: A Brief History of Typography

Then

You could claim that typography began when when the Greeks transformed picture representations (hieroglyphics) into the letter alphabet.
Old typography was considered an art. The work was done by hand in scriptoriums, usually by monks, who specialized in the art of creating text documents.
Typography was used for many types of documents such as church documents, legal documents, birth certificates, and more.
Choices in typography were easier to make, given the small selection of typefaces and fonts that existed. But, the choice needed to be final to avoid waisting time fixing errors.
The advancement of technology made the production of typography easier with the letter press, printing press, and eventually type writers and computers. The work was still tedious and done by hand for a long time.

Typography now appears in many every day aspects of life, such as advertising, branding, website design.
One of the biggest differences is the number of typefaces and fonts available today. There are now thousands upon thousands of options to choose from, and you have the ability to preview (via computer) a document before committing to a certain font choice.
Typography has taken on a whole new being with the technological advances making creativity faster, easer, and more accessible.
This also means that we're in a place, today, where most of the time we don't even stop to notice the typography of a document. We are so accustomed to the ways it is used to convey information that we fail to actually see the art in the type.