Nova: I do want to believe that technology can be a force for good. Unless and until we take those choices seriously, the frightening future is one that we're heading towards. What I wanted to do is tell the story of how we got here. When we think about power, technology and the tech industry, we're at really a critical choice point right now.

Nova: How has this industry, which maybe was founded in a lot of idealism, gotten to the... in many ways to the situation we find ourselves in? Well it didn't happen overnight. I think the path to now has been well marked and I think we've ignored signs along the way. So what I wanna do is bring you back to a conversation that is now well over 50 years old.

Nova: Over the past couple of years I conducted hundreds of interviews with historians and pioneers who helped create the digital world we live in today. My name is Paris Marx. I'm a writer and a critic of the tech industry. I've written for NBC News, Time Magazine, Jacobin and other publications.

Nova: After years of writing about the negative effects of technology, I realized there was a need to take a step back and understand that we haven't always been headed in the direction we find ourselves in now. That there have been alternatives. And in fact, the future we have now was not inevitable.

Nova: It's the choices that were made. What I discovered was a really clear picture of how tech has developed from the mid 20th century to the present day. And if you listen, I think you'll find as I did that a whole other world was possible then and is possible still.