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While it is quite natural for us to be drawn to the new potentialities wireless fidelity (Wi‐Fi) represents, we should give pause and place it within its proper context and take a long‐term view of the phenomenon. One of the repeated shortcomings of the research on new technologies has been that the researchers have time and again studied them in isolation. A new technology does not strike roots and grow on a virgin ground. Instead, it encounters a terrain marked by old technologies. The new technology’s growth then is shaped not only by its own potentialities but also the opportunities and restraints created by the systems based on old technologies. In order to expand the perspective beyond Wi‐Fi to those that preceded it, this paper draws on the framework provided by Infrastructure Development Model (IDM), which delineates eight stages through which infrastructure networks (railroads, telegraph, telephone, and others) typically go in their development, to study its emergence.

The purpose of this paper is to chart the evolving internet‐mobile internet relationship in Japan.

The approach takes the form of a case study.

The original i‐Mode‐based model for mobile internet in Japan was largely an ordered system except for relatively marginal unofficial web sites, which unlike official web sites were not listed on the browser, where an element of chaos reigned. The introduction of Google search engine changed the ecosystem by giving the unofficial web sites new visibility.

The interface between the internet and its wireless extensions is a potential source of powerful influences both ways and needs to be watched.

The paper looks at the little studied interface between the chaotic internet and its mobile extensions, largely ordered systems, to see whether the chaos of the internet will spill over to its mobile extensions or whether the order of the latter will march on to the former.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how visionary system architects wean the development of a new technology away from the seductions of the path of least resistance – a complementary relationship with the entrenched system.

The paper draws on two cases wherein critical players started pursuing visions of a full‐fledged system while the technology was still an appendage to an established one: Theodore Vail and the development of the Bell telephone system; and the US Navy and the development of wireless telegraphy. Vail's interests were of a commercial nature, securing competitive advantage over Western Union and future rivals. The US Navy's interests were of a geopolitical nature, overthrowing Britain's monopoly on trans‐oceanic cable telegraphy.

The pursuit of system benefits requires long‐term thinking. In terms of day‐to‐day actions it requires a persistent effort against the seductions of a complementary relationship or the path of least resistance. Vail was compelled to form a separate organization – AT&T – to maintain focus on system formation in the face of short‐term distractions. The US Navy pushed for rules against cross ownership of cable and wireless and opposed international treaties that clubbed the two technologies into the same category, as it wanted the latter to develop independently of the former.

The failure of anticipation, in the case of network technologies, is largely rooted in our inability to see beyond the path of least resistance. Drawing on strategies employed by Vail and the US Navy to wean the development of a new technology away from the path of least resistance, the paper alerts us to possibilities other than the seemingly obvious ones.