The Media Monopoly

Despite the ever growing amount of media out there for our consumption, Bagdikian points out that fewer and fewer people control it. This is frightening. 

But what is more frightening is the threat that big business poses on the possibilities posed by the internet. The coercion of Napster into corporate hands is a key example of such a great service being destroyed by the financial and legal pressures of big business. The NMR posits that two way communication may one day be limited by big corporations. Indeed, many internet service providers like Time Warner Cable attempt to restrict the upload and download speeds of their internet users, as well as the speed at which specific sites are allowed to be uploaded. 

I argue that due internets primary communicative capability, these powerhouses of the capitalist system will have no option not only to keep the communication capabilities of the internet at a status quo, but will actually attempt to improve them. With phenomenons such as twitter and facebook, what people really want from the internet are social communicative capabilities. Since capitalists are in the game of making money, they have strong incentives at improving these services.