Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction. A Fight with an Octopus -- Chapter 1. All Telephones Are Local -- Chapter 2. Visions of Telephony -- Chapter 3. Unnatural Monopoly -- Chapter 4. The Independent Alternative -- Chapter 5. The Politics of Scale -- Chapter 6. The System Gospel -- Conclusion. Return to Middletown -- Notes -- Index -- Acknowledgments
Summary
The People's Network reconstructs the story of U.S. and Canadian independent telephone companies which challenged the Bell System's market domination in the twentieth century, linking the fight to control telecommunications to dueling political philosophies: regional versus national identity, local versus centralized power