
The Master Switch
The Rise and Fall of Information Empires
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Narrated by:
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Marc Vietor
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By:
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Tim Wu
About this listen
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.
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Cut off at the end of chapter 18
- By Penny posey on 09-25-19
By: Marc Randolph
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The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
- The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power
- By: Shoshana Zuboff
- Narrated by: Nicol Zanzarella
- Length: 24 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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The Age of Surveillance Capitalism is neither a hand-wringing narrative of danger and decline nor a digital fairy tale. Rather, it offers a deeply reasoned and evocative examination of the contests over the next chapter of capitalism that will decide the meaning of information civilization in the 21st century. The stark issue at hand is whether we will be the masters of information and machines or its slaves.
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Book Editors failed to trim the word count
- By Todd B on 07-14-19
By: Shoshana Zuboff
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Technopoly
- The Surrender of Culture to Technology
- By: Neil Postman
- Narrated by: Jeff Riggenbach
- Length: 5 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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In this witty, often terrifying work of cultural criticism, Postman chronicles our transformation into a Technopoly: a society that no longer merely uses technology as a support system but instead is shaped by it. According to Postman, technology is rapidly gaining sovereignty over social institutions and national life to become self-justifying, self-perpetuating, and omnipresent. He warns that this will have radical consequences for the meanings of politics, art, religion, family, education, and more.
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Error in recording
- By D. Cassidy on 04-30-15
By: Neil Postman
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Behind the Beautiful Forevers
- Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity
- By: Katherine Boo
- Narrated by: Sunil Malhotra
- Length: 8 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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In this breathtaking book by Pulitzer Prize winner Katherine Boo, a bewildering age of global change and inequality is made human through the dramatic story of families striving toward a better life in Annawadi, a makeshift settlement in the shadow of luxury hotels near the Mumbai airport. As India starts to prosper, the residents of Annawadi are electric with hope. Abdul, an enterprising teenager, sees “a fortune beyond counting” in the recyclable garbage that richer people throw away.
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An Antidote for Shantaram
- By Dr. on 06-14-12
By: Katherine Boo
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The Sovereign Individual
- Mastering the Transition to the Information Age
- By: James Dale Davidson, Peter Thiel - preface, William Rees-Mogg
- Narrated by: Michael David Axtell
- Length: 19 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Two renowned investment advisors and authors of the best seller The Great Reckoning bring to light both currents of disaster and the potential for prosperity and renewal in the face of radical changes in human history as we move into the next century. The Sovereign Individual details strategies necessary for adapting financially to the next phase of Western civilization.
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Unfortunately distopian for mosty of humanity
- By Phil on 09-29-20
By: James Dale Davidson, and others
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Capital in the Twenty-First Century
- By: Thomas Piketty, Arthur Goldhammer - translator
- Narrated by: L. J. Ganser
- Length: 24 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about the long-term evolution of inequality, the concentration of wealth, and the prospects for economic growth lie at the heart of political economy. But satisfactory answers have been hard to find for lack of adequate data and clear guiding theories.
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The Financial Times' Critique Doesn't Detract
- By Madeleine on 05-22-14
By: Thomas Piketty, and others
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Algorithms to Live By
- The Computer Science of Human Decisions
- By: Brian Christian, Tom Griffiths
- Narrated by: Brian Christian
- Length: 11 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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From finding a spouse to finding a parking spot, from organizing one's inbox to understanding the workings of human memory, Algorithms to Live By transforms the wisdom of computer science into strategies for human living.
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Great listen, just don't expect tips!
- By Adam Hosman on 08-07-17
By: Brian Christian, and others
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Technofeudalism
- What Killed Capitalism
- By: Yanis Varoufakis
- Narrated by: Yanis Varoufakis
- Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Technofeudalism says Yanis Varoufakis, is the new power that is reshaping our lives and the world, and is the greatest current threat to the liberal individual, to our efforts to avert climate catastrophe—and to democracy itself. It also lies behind the new geopolitical tensions, especially the New Cold War between the United States and China. Drawing on stories from Greek myth and pop culture, from Homer to Mad Men, Varoufakis explains this revolutionary transformation: how it enslaves our minds, how it rewrites the rules of global power, and, ultimately, what it will take overthrow it.
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The narration is literally the worst.
- By Shakeiad on 09-24-24
By: Yanis Varoufakis
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The Warmth of Other Suns
- The Epic Story of America's Great Migration
- By: Isabel Wilkerson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 22 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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From 1915 to 1970, this exodus of almost six million people changed the face of America. Wilkerson compares this epic migration to the migrations of other peoples in history. She interviewed more than a thousand people, and gained access to new data and official records, to write this definitive and vividly dramatic account of how these American journeys unfolded, altering our cities, our country, and ourselves.
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Superior non-fiction
- By Lila on 05-20-11
By: Isabel Wilkerson
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The Bitcoin Standard
- The Decentralized Alternative to Central Banking
- By: Saifedean Ammous
- Narrated by: James Fouhey
- Length: 11 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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When a pseudonymous programmer introduced “a new electronic cash system that’s fully peer-to-peer, with no trusted third party” to a small Online mailing list in 2008, very few paid attention. Ten years later, and against all odds, this upstart autonomous decentralized software offers an unstoppable and globally-accessible hard money alternative to modern central banks. The Bitcoin Standard analyzes the historical context to the rise of Bitcoin, the economic properties that have allowed it to grow quickly, and its likely economic, political, and social implications.
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Less Bitcoin, more old Austrian Economics Vendetta
- By Brian Considine on 07-19-19
By: Saifedean Ammous
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The Coming Wave
- AI, Power, and Our Future
- By: Mustafa Suleyman, Michael Bhaskar - contributor
- Narrated by: Mustafa Suleyman
- Length: 12 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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We are approaching a critical threshold in the history of our species. Everything is about to change. Soon you will live surrounded by AIs. They will organize your life, operate your business, and run core government services. You will live in a world of DNA printers and quantum computers, engineered pathogens and autonomous weapons, robot assistants and abundant energy.
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Click bait
- By Buyer on 09-11-23
By: Mustafa Suleyman, and others
Informative Story!
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This was one of the best books ever.
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Evolution where one goes we all go.
Overcome , resistance & victory.
Peace , love & joy.
Continue Growing.
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Where does The Master Switch rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?
Master Switch is a modern history book about the rise and fall of information and the technology (and people) that facilitated it. As a technologist I find it to be a required listen for anyone interested in technology and media with the hope that there are many lessons to learn.What did you like best about this story?
How Tim Wu takes the listener on a tour of the history of information technology and the communication empires that it spawned such as telephone, radio, television and now those that evolved from the internet and mobile spaces.Which character – as performed by Marc Vietor – was your favorite?
The depiction of Edison and David Sarnoff were quite interesting. However, it wasn't specifically due to Marc's narration.Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
The book is too dense to listen in one sitting. I found that I would listen to passages and then reflect on them later. There were a few chapters that I listened to more than once.Must listen for anyone in technology or media
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Good history, good current state
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Fantastic book, very well presented
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Tim Wu writes about man’s drive to acquire a master switch that controls how the public receives information. The first section of the book sets a table for understanding 21st century communication technology. Wu doggedly recounts a history of the communication industry. It may turn some listeners off but stick with it, Wu has something to say.
Ignorance of communication technology is everywhere. Consumers are more interested in what they can get than what they can change. Consumers have no interest in understanding the ones and zeros of programming. The general public would rather let someone else make product decisions and vote with their pocketbook when they are dissatisfied. The public does understand technology and could care less. “Show me the product and what it can do” and “Show me the money” are mankind’s arbiters of who gets the “Master Switch”.
Wu opens one’s mind but fails to come up with a plan that will change the internet’s trajectory.
INTERNET
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Fascinating history and view into the future
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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 ageWhat did you like best about this story?
The history was fascinating, and so relevant to how our world exists todayWhat does Marc Vietor bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?
Attitude & emphasis in his storytellingWas 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.Excellent analysis of the cycle of info monopolies
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Original and brilliant new analysis
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