"This is a Borzoi book" --T.p. verso.

Includes bibliographical references (p. [323]-354) and index.

The rise. The disruptive founder ; Radio dreams ; Mr. Vail is a big man ; The time is not ripe for feature films ; Centralize all radio activities ; The Paramount ideal -- Beneath the All-seeing Eye. The foreign attachment ; The legion of decency ; FM radio ; We now add sight to sound -- The rebels, the challengers, and the fall. The right kind of breakup ; The radicalism of the Internet revolution ; Nixon's cable ; Broken Bell ; Esperanto for machines -- Reborn without a soul. Turner does television ; Mass production of the spirit ; The return of AT&T -- The Internet against everyone. A surprising wreck ; Father and son ; The separations principle.

As Wu's sweeping history shows, each of the new media of the twentieth century- radio, telephone, television, and film- was born free and open. Each invited unrestricted use and enterprising experiment until some would-be mogul battled his way to total domination. Explaining how invention begets industry and industry begets empire- a progress often blessed by government, typically with stifling consequences for free expression and technical innovation alike- Wu identifies a time-honored pattern in the maneuvers of today's great information powers

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