Internet for the People

Ben Tarnoff is the best kind of visionary: deeply knowledgeable, intensely practical, and utterly committed to the transformation of an abusive and corrupt status quo. We are profoundly fortunate to have his fine mind focussed on reimagining the tools that have remade our lives. An extraordinary and urgent book. -Naomi Klein, author of No Is Not Enough The privacy-invading, throttled, and ad-filled Internet we have is not the Internet we deserve. But as Ben Tarnoff lucidly lays out, if we want to manifest the latent democratic potential of our communications infrastructure, we will have to wrest control from the privatizers and profiteers and transform the underlying political economy. Internet for the People provides an engaging and enraging account of how the online world was hijacked by corporate interests, excavating the past so we can envision and organize for a better future. Ben Tarnoff has done a public service writing this book. Now we need to get busy building the movements and popular power that can fight for an Internet in the public interest. -Astra Taylor, author of Democracy May Not Exist But We'll Miss it When It's Gone and The People's Platform. Tarnoff offers not only an eloquent and essential guide to the history of our capitalist internet, he also charts the myriad ways in which alternatives are emerging. A key book for imagining a better digital future. -Nick Srnicek, author of Platform Capitalism