A generation ago, a communications scholar named Ithiel de Sola Pool wrote "Technologies of Freedom: On Free Speech in an Electronic Age." Pool's book predicted a future of interconnected computers. ... networked computers would become the platform for new forms ... Pool also predicted that established players would resist this change. ... Lawrence Lessig, a Stanford law professor, picks up this story of the present resisting the future in "The Future of Ideas: The Fate of the Commons in a Connected World," a highly readable and deeply engaging sequel to his "Code and Other Laws of Cyberspace." In "The Future of Ideas," Lessig also sees dominant players exercising control through the law, technical standards and political might to resist the change that might otherwise take place."

EPIC's Mark Rotenberg reviews Larry Lessig's new book.