The Master Switch
Tim Wu, The Master Switch, 2010, Knopf
- Stuff about this:
Notes
- Wu draws inspiration for the thesis of the book from the concepts of Creative Destruction and the studies of Schumpeter
- this concept describes the way that industrial innovation in a capitalist systems tends to completely replace the previous status quo, in cycles of industrial growth
- Wu argues that this dynamic gets arrested by monopolists that have the economic and political power to stop the competition from even having the possibility of innovating in this way
- often controlling research and patents in their own labs and deciding when it is time to release innovation
- Kronos effect
- companies eating their prole to stop the innovation from hurting their business
- power struggle and humanity crave for imperial control
- Wu argues that the constitution did a good job in the last centuries in controlling this tendency in politics
- this in the US got translated to free market capitalism with great power being detained by single entities or capitalists with monopolies
- the main argument of the book is that the information market different from others is being more susceptible to monopoly control in what Wu calls The Cycle
- The Cycle
- all modern communications technology lived through it
- telephone, radio, cinema, TV
- the first years of the technology come with optimistic hopes for its effect on the human condition, great optimism and idealism over the open medium
- the openness doesn' t last
- big players argue that a single corporation can offer a much better product with a monopoly
- this comes with great control over what can get communicated over the medium
- big players argue that a single corporation can offer a much better product with a monopoly
- from somebody’s hobby to somebody’s industry
- from freely accessible lane to one strictly controlled by a single corporation or cartel
- from open to closed system
- does this apply to the web? nobody knows yet
- modern-day risks can be found in the attempts at vertical integration that for example Apple has been planning
- all modern communications technology lived through it
- great personalities Wu uses to construct his claim
- Theodore Vail with
AT&Tin long distance communications - David Sarnoff with
RCAandNBCin radio - Adolph Zukor with Paramount and its control over distribution outlets
- Theodore Vail with
- Common Carrier
- there are businesses so important to the correct functioning of our government and everyday life that must be free of bias and discrimination in their activity
- concept that Wu adapts to the information and communication industry with what he defines as Net Neutrality