Privatizing the Internet Was a Mistake

Paris Marx is joined by Ben Tarnoff to discuss why the problems with the modern internet, including its excessive concentration in the hands of a few companies and the way its dominant firms shape our interactions to generate profit, find their root in the decision to privatize the network. To fix them, that needs to be changed.

Ben Tarnoff is the author of Internet for the People: The Fight for Our Digital Future and the co-founder of Logic Magazine. Follow Ben on Twitter at @bentarnoff.

• An excerpt of Ben’s book was published in the New York Times.
• Victor Pickard wrote about the history of public media in Democracy Without Journalism.
• Newt Gingrich and George Gilder, once featured by Wired for their visions for the internet, have now become big crypto fans.
• The United States has terrible broadband access.
• Major tech companies are buying up undersea internet cables.
• Tarleton Gillespie wrote about the politics of platforms and what the term suggests.
• Jathan Sadowski compares platforms to shopping malls.
• Tressie McMillan Cottom wrote about the predatory inclusion of the internet.
• Community internet has shown success in the United States, while provincial public telcos have a history of positive outcomes in Canada.

• The Forgotten Story of How Conservatives Shaped the Internet w/ Becca Lewis
• Will Google’s Monopoly Be Broken Up? w/ Rob Larson
• Does Banning TikTok Make Sense? w/ Shoshana Wodinsky & Daniel Greene
• How Amazon Reshapes Small Business to Serve Itself w/ Moira Weigel