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CAPTIVE AUDIENCE

Name: CAPTIVE AUDIENCE
Author: Susan P. Crawford
ISBN: 978-0-300-15313-2

THE TELECOM INDUSTRY AND MONOPOLY POWER IN THE NEW GILDED AGE

by Susan P. Crawford ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 8, 2013

Important themes obscured by jargon-filled writing.

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A telecommunications policy expert draws parallels between today’s Internet providers and late-19th-century monopolies.

In most parts of the country, the choices for cable TV and/or high-speed Internet are extremely limited. This inherent lack of options, Crawford writes in her debut, “is the communications equivalent of Standard Oil.” For readers not well-versed in the history of monopolies and antitrust legislation, the author begins by detailing how monopolies arose in a number of industries (railroads, oil and steel among them) in the late 1800s and how President Theodore Roosevelt used the Sherman Antitrust Act to divide the Northern Securities Company railroad trust. Looking at the present day, Crawford claims that “all stages of the railroad story are repeated today in the context of Internet access.” As the country’s largest cable and Internet provider, Comcast is held up as a case study for all communications companies. Crawford examines Comcast in minute detail, from its founding to its recent merger with NBC/Universal. However, at times, this comes across as more grudge match than reasoned examination, particularly when the author takes swipes at Comcast’s founders and executives. “The Roberts family, like the Gilded Age families of the late nineteenth century,” effectively controls Comcast, and Crawford shoehorns in references to their Martha’s Vineyard home and penchants for playing squash. However, the author makes many important points. For example, Americans in large cities pay more money for slower Internet speeds than consumers in Japan or South Korea, while Americans in rural or poor areas are lucky to get high-speed access at all. This online inequity means “America will stagnate, while other countries rocket ahead.” Unfortunately, the book is continually weighed down by its prose. Loaded with technical details of Internet traffic and descriptions of federal regulations, Crawford's otherwise salient points become inaccessible to most lay readers.

Important themes obscured by jargon-filled writing.

Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2013

ISBN: 978-0-300-15313-2

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Yale Univ.

Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2012

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.