The Master Switch

The Rise and Fall of Information Empires

By: Tim Wu

Narrated by: Marc Vietor

Length: 14 hrs and 11 mins

Publisher's summary

A secret history of the industrial wars behind the rise and fall of the 20th century's great information empires - Hollywood, the broadcast networks, and AT&T - asking one big question: Could history repeat itself, with one giant entity taking control of American information?

Most consider the Internet Age to be a moment of unprecedented freedom in communications and culture. But as Tim Wu shows, each major new medium, from telephone to cable, arrived on a similar wave of idealistic optimism only to become, eventually, the object of industrial consolidation profoundly affecting how Americans communicate. Every once-free and open technology was in time centralized and closed, a huge corporate power taking control of the master switch. Today, as a similar struggle looms over the Internet, increasingly the pipeline of all other media, the stakes have never been higher. To be decided: who gets heard, and what kind of country we live in. Part industrial exposé, part meditation on the nature of freedom of expression, part battle cry to save the Internet's best features, The Master Switch brings to light a crucial drama rife with indelible characters and stories, heretofore played out over decades in the shadows of our national life.

©2010 Tim Wu (P)2010 Audible, Inc

Critic reviews

“Wu’s engaging narrative and remarkable historical detail make this a compelling and galvanizing cry for sanity - and necessary deregulation - in the information age.” ( Publishers Weekly)

“This is an essential look at the directions that personal computing could be headed depending on which policies and worldviews come to dominate control over the Internet.” ( Booklist)

"There’s a sharp insight and a surprising fact on nearly every page of Wu’s masterful survey. Above all, Wu shows that each new communications technology spawns the same old quest for power." ( The Boston Globe)

"A brilliant exploration of the oscillations of communications technologies between 'open' and 'closed' from the early days of the telephone up through Hollywood and broadcast television up to the Internet era." (Forbes.com)

"My pick for economics book of the year." (Ezra Klein, The Washington Post)

Summary? Google is good, Apple is bad

After a long and well described historical analysis, the author finds a most simplistic conclusion. Here he lacks the analytic precision of the first 80% of the book. Can this result in today's world be so simple? Everyone to reflect on this thesis, please.

Excellent insight into communications industries

This book opens up the history of communications from the last few hundred years and elucidates where we are in a cycle that has become apparent. Important insight for anyone who values the Internet and cares about it getting better, not worse.

Completely Baffled

What did you like best about The Master Switch? What did you like least?

The human face 19th and 20th century inventors and their encounters with ambitious businessmen who could use government regulation to seize control of those inventors and developers efforts in the marketplace.

What did you like best about this story?

How well it revealed the blood, sweat and tears of these inventors and developers . . I felt as if I were there with them. I probably would not have ever known about them otherwise. I feel.

Which character – as performed by Marc Vietor – was your favorite?

The life of the inventor of the FM radio.

Do you think The Master Switch needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

Yes. Net Neutrality. Tim Wu could show how government regulators have done nothing but good over the past two centuries and therefore will keep man from destroying themselves with the freedom of the internet.

Any additional comments?

I listened to this book twice and then I discovered that the author of THE MASTER SWITCH is the Evangelist of Net Neutrality. TOTALLY BAFFLED and _______ _______. Some BitCoiners pointed me in the direction of this book. Can you guess why?

Great history of the ebb and flow of tech empires

You sometimes get blindsided, either serendipitously, as with Newton and the Apple, or negatively as with Steve Jobs booting from Apple, Although he rose like the Phoenix from his own ashes to rule again.

Good information but structure could be improved and it is a little dated now

Interesting information but I wish it would have been structured better. Instead of starting with, and spending majority of the book on, the history of different information industries rise and fall, I think it would have been more effective to start with where we are today with the modern information platforms fighting for dominance, before heading back into history to see how different information empires navigated similar struggles, before using that information to paint a picture of potential outcomes for this modern struggle and having a call to action on defending the open market system. Even though written pretty recently, this book can seem dated if you follow the Tech industry, especially with some of the companies change in values, culture, and operational objectives given emerging technologies like AI and changing market conditions, for example rising interest rates and the rush to secure market share in China and India.

Fascinating history and view into the future

This book contains some of the most interesting history about the technology of communication. From the telegraph to the internet, we, as a Democratic society, have strangled and then opened up these technologies to benefit the world.

Excellent analysis of the cycle of info monopolies

What did you love best about The Master Switch?

In depth history of the telegraph, telephone, am radio, fm radio, television, movies, and through the internet age

What did you like best about this story?

The history was fascinating, and so relevant to how our world exists today

What does Marc Vietor bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

Attitude & emphasis in his storytelling

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

How the information empires are completely interrelated - how decisions that have affected the telegraph systems 100 years ago affect the structure of the internet today.

Any additional comments?

Must read if you are interested in the internet, freedom, free speech, and business.

Original and brilliant new analysis

Amazing look at the repeating patterns of communications industry emergence and decline. Real inside stories of the people and processes behind the telephone, movie and internet worlds and the incredible commonalities between them.

What a Book!

Where does The Master Switch rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

One of the best.

Who was your favorite character and why?

The repetition of the histories of communications in America was much more important than any one character. I was astounded by what I did not know about the behind-the-scenes struggles, plots, people, impact and consequences related to each of the great media that so radically affected America.

Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

The most extreme reaction came from learning how ignorant I was of many of the things I have lived through.

Any additional comments?

Surely most readers of this book will be astounded, as I was, about the importance of each of the media revolutions experienced by America. The book also alerts us to the importance of correctly handling each of the great media. Read the book; you will be moved and informed.

Powerful

The way the world works and always will. Learn how to defend yourself against conglomerates by first understanding them.