These are awfully broad and unsupported theses. The Church wasn't destroyed in the way you imagine (wish?); it persists today, and in fact makes uses of the Internet as much as you do. The printing press was revolutionary, but it didn't quite do all that radical democratizing you imagine, because only elites were literate.

And these "stark choices" didn't have to be made, and surely don't have to be made now with such reckless abandon -- this is just goofy giddiness about some tools that...um...produce 20 percent of voters reading political blogs?

Maybe the Internet threatens newsprint. But, hey, somebody still reviews *your book* in the Village Voice and somebody still reads it in a cafe rather than plugging into the Internet.

No, the technology itself makes things a little better (your blog comment on the New York Times website might get noticed and can be immediately posted, unlike the filtered letter to the editor), but human nature doesn't magically transform.

What's more troublesome in your book is your theory of groups, and your belief that there is something "better" about secretive, unaccountable, irresponsible wikis, as in Wikipedia. Give me responsible editorial boards with checks and balances, hey, give me the Church any day, which at least has some self-corrective mechanisms to address its scandals that are absent on Wikipedia.

One good thing about the new media is that it gives us a chance to scrutinize new-media elites like yourself, too.