To hear some people tell it, we live in a sea of media dreck. These cultural pessimists imagine that we have descended into a latter-day dark age of mindless movies, inane TV, and cacophonous music. Technology, their thinking goes, has only given more people more access to more junk. The Internet, for instance, has brought gambling and pornography to nearly every home. Of course, this vision is absurd. The reality is that we live in a golden age of unprecedented cultural choice. There are more books in print than ever, for example, and they are more readily available thanks to suburban superstores and online booksellers. Movies and music from all over the world are similarly accessible, in varieties that boggle the mind-and at prices ranging from low to free. Caribbean steel-drum music? Iranian independent film? Gilligan's Island reruns? They're all no more than a few mouse clicks away, whether you live in the Manhattan in New York or the one in Kansas.
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