Chapter Six-

“Since organizations with a large stake in an existing technology are likely to try to preserve their investment- in today’s idiom, they are reluctant to “cannibalize” their current business-any policies or legal decisions that give them influence over the new medium may retard its introduction.” [Page 193, Paragraph 1, Line 2]

Because most of the large businesses invested in the telegraph system for communication purposes it became important for the business to preserve the system. These same businesses had no investment in the telephone company so they were not willing to bring in the new technology to replace what they already owned. They were the first ones to try to stop progress; corporate heads did not want to spend money on innovations in the communication sector of there business because all the money invested on the previous innovation in communication would go to waste.