Book · 2026 · Technology & Engineering
The Telephone
A New History
The Telephone by James Gleick has been mentioned in 1 episode across 1 podcast (1 episode recommends it and 0 episodes discuss it), through . Most frequently brought up by Robert Hackett (1 episode) and Sonal Chokshi (1 episode) on a16z Podcast (1 episode).
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- podcast
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- people
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- episode recommends it
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One of my favorite themes in the book is this contrast between centralization and decentralization and networks coming from the top down versus bottoms up from a grassroots perspective.
What they say about it
- Discusses stories and themes“favorite themes in the book”2
- Mentions historical anecdotes“anecdote you talk about in the book”2
The best things said about it
This is one of my absolute favorite parts of the book. It's so great, the stories.
I would just call out on what you write about in your book, when you were describing the difference between the telegraph and the telephone and why Western Union didn't get, they dismissed it as a toy.
There's an anecdote you talk about in the book where the then head of AT&T was actually a little relieved because they were boxed out of playing in the information revolution.
I love in your book how you describe Claude Shannon's contributions.
You can see the curation and the thinking he puts into it by how he organizes the book.
I was shocked. I did not know that until I read the book.
Why people recommend it
Every mention
Robert Hackett And even though in this case, yes, the government did break them up, there's an anecdote you talk about in… 1
Discussed
“And even though in this case, yes, the government did break them up, there's an anecdote you talk about in the book where the then head of AT&T was actually a little relieved because they were boxed out of playing in the information revolution, entering digital computing because they were defined as a common carrier back then.”
Sonal Chokshi And the definition of a network effect is a network becoming more useful the more users there are. 1
Discussed
“And the definition of a network effect is a network becoming more useful the more users there are.”
Discussed
“And I think the other thing I would just call out on what you write about in your book, when you were describing the difference between the telegraph and the telephone and why Western Union didn't get, they dismissed it as a toy.”
Discussed
“And you can see the curation and the thinking he puts into it by how he organizes the book. So even in this book, there's so many chapters that essentially are distilling this amount, a massive amount of research he must have done to come up with the right way to cover this topic.”
Mentioned on the show without a named speaker6
Recommended
“This is one of my absolute favorite parts of the book. It's so great, the stories.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 16:39
Recommended
“One of my favorite themes in the book is this contrast between centralization and decentralization and networks coming from the top down versus bottoms up from a grassroots perspective.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 19:54
Discussed
“Because you talk about, in the book, there's a whole chapter and even a little more devoted to them.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 37:56
Discussed
“And I love in your book how you describe Claude Shannon's contributions. And you describe how Shannon made a bridge between information and uncertainty, between information and entropy, and between information and chaos.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 42:50
Discussed
“You do say something interesting in your book. You quote Gerald Stanley Lee, who I don't even know who that is. But it was a quote at the beginning of one of your chapters.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 52:48
Discussed
“Did you get that from the book, though? Because I was shocked. I did not know that until I read the book.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 59:42
Other mentions (2: passing, ad reads, own books)
Plugged
“someone that we are huge fans of, James Glick, who is the author of a new book called The Telephone, A New History.”
Plugged
“And we are so excited about your new book, Now Out, The Telephone, A New History.”
Speaker a16z Podcast From the Telephone to Modern Computing | James Gleick 2026-11-14 Listen at 55:20