We question whether the telephone is the right analogy. For one thing, the view of telephone access as a binary good – a good for which the critical distinction is simply whether one has it or not – is only appropriate to the last quarter of the 20th century. In the early and middle years of telephony, service varied in quality, some Americans connected through party lines and were thus unable to use the technology for confidential communication whereas others had indiv-idual connections, and long-distance service rates were discriminatory (Fischer 1992). In the first part of the 21st century, the rise of cell phones, palm pilots, and other devices that blur the distinction between telephones and computers are re-differentiating telephone access.