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The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

economist.com

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Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#121

Post by ersii »

Noseshine wrote: post #113
ersii wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hm, I do like products with nutritional data. But isn't the non-regulatory solution here to just not buy products without nutritional data if so? I mean, I'd certainly contact my favorite brands and request that. If they won't hear me, then maybe there's a local alternative that could?

Did you check out the "lemon market" theory? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

I have now and I fail to make a connection to the argument that I was making. Could you elaborate in which way you think it's applicable?

My argument was that the non-regulatory/voluntary solution would be for customers to demand from manufacturers/sellers to provide nutritional data, else they'd contact/buy from another manufacturer/seller.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#122

Post by ersii »

mbillie1 wrote: post #22
throwaway729 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gvien the forum we're on, it's worth pointing out that today's white collar laborers are capturing one or two orders of magnitude less of the value they're creating than the blue collar workers of 1990's detroit. 360 billion* divided by 1.2 million = 300000 "per employee". Typical salary to 40,000ish-100,00ish range for laborers/engineers. The disparity in those numbers isn't so bad at all. Conversely, 1 trillion div…

Don't think you needed a throwaway for that, that's a cogent point.

When it comes to opinions or facts in sensitive subjects (such as anything related to taxation) - to be able to discuss freely you actually need a throwaway account.

A lot of people only down vote when they disagree to some content or questions and leave the questions and discussions somewhere else.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#123

Post by distances »

sjdchid wrote: post #119
hvidgaard wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is possible to make a schema such that you can add whatever you want. And this only applies to exporting the data anyway.

Ok, so you can export it, but only in a format that is useful to a programmer.

Yes, I didn't mean it would have to conform to a standard of any kind. You'd get the data; it would be up to you (or a service you choose to use) what to do with it.

Of course this wouldn't lead to any magical inter-operation of services, but that wouldn't be the point anyway.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#124

Post by tchock23 »

convolvatron wrote: post #108
convolvatron wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I run a very small business metal fabrication facility in one of the most regulated and socialist of cities in the US, San Francisco. We deal with hazardous chemicals, highly flammable gases and markedly unsafe working conditions. Me and the rest of the people like me get an inspection once a year from the fire department to make sure minimum standards are kept (to ensure the safety of firefighters if they ever enter…

EDIT: if i pay someone more than $600, i have to file a 1099. sorry - all of this seems quite irrelevant, but personally i'm tired of having people claim that the small businessman is being repressed by excessive regulation and government tyranny. The small businessman is being repressed by the state of the market and the large businessman.

Somewhat related, but in my experience advising hundreds of small businesses over the past few years the worst (performing) are the ones that blame excessive regulation and government tyranny as a reason for their lack of progress.

It's rarely/never that from the independent perspective of the advisor to the company...

Not to turn this into a political discussion, but these same small business owners share a similar political leaning and are mostly parroting the canned narrative they hear on their respective talk channels...

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#125

Post by distances »

sqeaky wrote: post #95
distances wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All data associated with my user account, perhaps with some kind of a schema if applicable. Other services could then implement data import features for this, or for just the part of the data that concerns the service they are providing. Basically, it should be clear that all data connected to a person is irrevocably theirs. Any provider can build services for taking advantage of the data -- but it'd be the user's ri…

Standards happen so slowly. By the time people agreed on what should be in this, that agreement would be antiquated. We need something like what happened with OpenID and Oauth. OpenID may be gone, but one company made a few bucks on it and OAuth is largely inspired by it. Someone needs to find a way to make a buck moving profile data around in a meaningful way then that becomes a de-facto standard that gets copied an…

What standards? For sure there can't be any standard that would lend itself to all of the various ways your data is used and stored.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#126

Post by distances »

RobertoG wrote: post #44
jsprogrammer wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What type of data are you wanting to move? Would you just want a huge movable block of space that you could mount somewhere?

Whatsapp history from Iphone to Android for starters would be nice.

I'd be fine with getting my data out. Importing would be a plus, but that can't obviously be required from a business.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#127

Post by amelius »

aub3bhat wrote: post #110
throwaway729 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gvien the forum we're on, it's worth pointing out that today's white collar laborers are capturing one or two orders of magnitude less of the value they're creating than the blue collar workers of 1990's detroit. 360 billion* divided by 1.2 million = 300000 "per employee". Typical salary to 40,000ish-100,00ish range for laborers/engineers. The disparity in those numbers isn't so bad at all. Conversely, 1 trillion div…

You can't divide market capitalization by number of employees and compare that with "yearly" salary figure. A better comparison would be to divide revenue by number of employees.

At least explain why this is not a good first-order comparison.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#128

Post by Noseshine »

ersii wrote: post #121
Noseshine wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you check out the "lemon market" theory? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Market_for_Lemons

I have now and I fail to make a connection to the argument that I was making. Could you elaborate in which way you think it's applicable? My argument was that the non-regulatory/voluntary solution would be for customers to demand from manufacturers/sellers to provide nutritional data, else they'd contact/buy from another manufacturer/seller.

    > But isn't the non-regulatory solution here to just not buy products
    > without nutritional data if so?
The point is the consumer does not have as much power as you think. Because consumers act as individuals and not as a group (prisoners dilemma etc.), consumers do not nearly have as much information as the seller, for a consumer the particular issues is one of millions he's supposed to take care of (save the rain forest by buying these but not these, be politically active here and here and here and again and again and again, inform yourself about these 1,000 products that you regularly buy, etc. etc. etc.).

So the race to the bottom and offering the lowest common denominator is what happens, not "competition ensures we get the best". Customer choice and competition between sellers are only two among many many more forces. It works in the simplistic model of how "capitalism" is supposed to work because - it's a model.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#129

Post by crdoconnor »

WalterBright wrote: post #114
arca_vorago wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"today's white collar laborers are capturing one or two orders of magnitude less of the value they're creating than the blue collar workers of 1990's detroit." Which is why the problems associated are much more about the macro-economy than they are about silicon valley. The middle class is being gutted before our very eyes while the elite gobble up more and more of the "created value" through the power of technology.

Wealth isn't zero sum. Creating something of value doesn't take anything away from anyone else.

>Wealth isn't zero sum.

It is sometimes. The profits "earned" by Wall Street are nearly always zero sum, for instance. They are not making other people richer.

Re: The rise of the corporate colossus is a giant problem

#130

Post by ilaksh »

See urban dictionary entry for technopoly.

Centralization is a big problem whether you have a mainly cooperative system like communism or a competitive one as in capitalism.

Decentralizing technologies can help us get systems that are distributed, diverse, and free to evolve but also capable of holistic measurement and operation.

Such as bitcoin, ethereum, NDN, swarm, Namecoin, 3d printing, etc.

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