Back in the 1960s there was a rallying cry that defined a lot about
that decade, that cry was "Power To the People!!!"
If
the Internet is nothing else, it has been an exceptionally disruptive
force in terms of taking control away from old, established companies
and institutions and pushing the power, authority and control right
down into the laps of the customers. Don't like your Acme brand computer?
There are hundreds of others. Tired of Windows? Well, how about
MacOSX, or Linux? Don't like the Op-Ed pages in your local paper?
Start a blog.
The last everyday bastion of instutional control -- the telephone
itself -- has finally come clearly into the cross-hairs of the Internet
innovators.