It's the eternal story of trying to get a leg up.

A recent book about real competition, not all of it strictly on the up and up, was "The Flash Boys" by Michael Lewis. It involved the uncovering of a scheme to place stock trades through electronic means ahead of legitimate traders by placing copies of their trades through faster electronic pathways, thus gaming their plays.

A recent movie which I don't believe is based on real events, but I found absorbing while I was watchine, was "The Hummingbird Project" about a competition to establish a fast data line from Kansas City to New York City. It had Salma Hayek, Alexander Skarsgård, and Jesse Eisenberg.

And I heard a very intersting story from my extended family about a ne-er do well who made his family proud when he became a telegraph operator, only to undo some of that pride when he used his skills to promote crooked stock trading via electrical means. We're talking Morse code in this case!

I don't think we've heard the last of this type of story. Because it's not really a new story.