In practice, the current media environment is a hybrid of the two scenarios. While the range of media options has expanded and the viewership of network broadcasting diminished, the age of big media is hardly over. Alternative media options fragment the audience, whereas most consumers watch at least some network programming. If the Internet consists of a billion people on a billion soap boxes, the power to define broadcast content is to determine which ideas will be the most widely circulated and most readily accessed. In such a context, it still matters who's making those programming decisions and still worth fighting to get alternative messages onto broadcast networks. Media concentration may amplify broadcaster's power by turning local radio, cable television, even the Web into relay stations for their content.

If Powell is right, then the Web expands access to national and international perspectives, cutting down on the role of geography in defining access to information. But what happens to local news? What happens when Clear Channel does to local television what it has already done to local radio? Researchers have found that the amount of local news diminishes when media outlets are owned by national rather than local companies. Fewer and fewer of us vote in local elections because we can't find even find the names of the candidates or where they stand on issues.

If Powell is right, the greatest diversity will exist in "pull" media, which we must actively search out; the least will be in "push" media, which reaches out and grabs our attention. The greatest diversity will exist in pay media, the least in free media. So, what percentage of Americans will be left out in the cold if, say, the bulk of children's and educational programming shifts off network and onto cable television?  Twenty-six percent of American children have no access to cable television. What percentage of Americans will receive little or no benefit from the media diversity represented by cyberspace? Only 45 percent of children from low-income houses (under $15,000 per year) have any access to the Internet and less than 25 percent have access from their homes.

If we give up on diversity in broadcast media in favor of Gilder's "first choice" media model, then pressure mounts for the FCC to help resolve such inequalities in media access. Don't hold your breath. Powell has cynically compared the Digital Divide to the "Mercedes divide," suggesting that in a capitalist culture, we can't always buy what we want. If we abandon our commitment to diversity in free broadcast media, we will enter an era of "first choice" media for those who can afford it and "no choice" media for those who can't.