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“Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

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Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#81

Post by secfirstmd »

scarface74 wrote: post #71
redm wrote: post #53

I think the key point here is not whether Google is abusing its effective monopoly willingly, its that it exists at all. There may be alternatives, but not viable ones. Try not supporting Chrome or ignoring Chrome requirements such as security mandates, you will go out of business. You can say these are 'good' for the consumer but the fact that Google has the ability to unilaterally change the web itself is partially…

Whats the viable alternative to Google Search? Sure you can use Bing as a customer, but if you're a website operator you HAVE to stay on Google's good side. (not always easy to do) Or you can not base your business on the fickleness of Google's search algorithms. Ben Thompson (stratechery.com) posts one article per week publically and charged $100 a year for his newsletter. The only time he gave numbers, he has over…

Hmm forking Android and turning the ecosystem into a complete mess around stuff like security updates. To the point were a lot of people, including myself, are considering buying a Google device purely to ensure some sort of longevity.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#82

Post by zzzzzzzza »

wildmusings wrote: post #58
ng12 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does Google's search monopoly lead them to self-driving cars? This is why I question the Google vs Bell comparison. It seems to me Google wins because they are really, really good at producing technology, not because they have a systematic first-comer advantage.

> How does Google's search monopoly lead them to self-driving cars? This is why I question the Google vs Bell comparison. It seems to me Google wins because they are really, really good at producing technology, not because they have a systematic first-comer advantage. I don't think you can really call self-driving cars a win for Google at this point. It looks like they might be beat to market by actual car companies,…

No, "waymo" is "way" ahead. I'll see myself out.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#83

Post by ouid »

tuna-piano wrote: post #77

The term "Natural Monopoly" has a special meaning besides just the common definition of both words, which is missing from this discussion, but is in my opinion the most interesting topic of discussion. Basically all software fits the economic definition of "Natural Monopoly". Natural monopolies exist in situations where the fixed cost is large and the marginal (per-customer) cost is small. In these situations, it onl…

>Bing seems pretty close in search quality, but yet few switch over.

a) Why would anyone switch if they are both equal and both free?

b) Most people use chrome. Most people don't change their default search engine.

c) As much as people pretend to hate Google, they actually hate Microsoft a lot more, and for good reason. Microsoft operates on bad faith far more frequently than Google does, most of their business decisions seem to revolve around the question "How do we leverage product A to force the user to use our product B?" whereas Google's anticompetitive behavior has always been more passive.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#84

Post by cat199 »

arthulia wrote: post #11
FussyZeus wrote: post #2

I've worked hard at distancing myself from Google. It seems their motto "Don't be Evil" has about as many asterisks behind it as they can manage. Every product they design seems to be built from the ground up to enable data collection, and every advertiser they partner with seems to have build plausible deniability into every aspect of the "product" they claim to deliver. I can't point to anything in particular, but…

Google officially dropped the "Don't be Evil" motto a while back and picked up Alphabet's "Do the Right Thing" motto, which seems a lot more subjective.

... also not dripping with nearly as much ironically smug techie narcissism.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#85

Post by rjmunro »

This article annoys me.

"YouTube makes $9 billion in annual revenues, but artists earn more from the sales of vinyl records than online streaming"

It's a useless comparison. Perhaps the vinyl industry is worth more than $9 billion. Not all of YouTube is music streaming. More artists are on YouTube than release vinyl. A single artist that has vinyl releases and has videos on YouTube may earn more from the vinyl, but there are many more artists on youtube who don't sell vinyl.

The article is good and has a valid points, but it's important to put comparisons you can actually compare.

Then "... Levon Helm, who was forced to put on a series of concerts at his home at the age of 70, while dying from throat cancer, in order to pay his medical bills"

Sounds like a story about medical bills / lack of insurance, not a story about digital music sales. Plenty of other people get throat cancer and aren't famous enough to put on concerts to pay the bills.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#86

Post by praneshp »

secfirstmd wrote: post #81
scarface74 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whats the viable alternative to Google Search? Sure you can use Bing as a customer, but if you're a website operator you HAVE to stay on Google's good side. (not always easy to do) Or you can not base your business on the fickleness of Google's search algorithms. Ben Thompson (stratechery.com) posts one article per week publically and charged $100 a year for his newsletter. The only time he gave numbers, he has over…

Hmm forking Android and turning the ecosystem into a complete mess around stuff like security updates. To the point were a lot of people, including myself, are considering buying a Google device purely to ensure some sort of longevity.

I just finished having a heated argument with friends living in India (that work at investment banks, so not exactly old people with some calling device in hand).

A bunch of them were complaining that Uber is being bad, requiring camera permissions, etc. The newer androids have nicer permissions systems, requested at runtime. But they are running Android 5* because the shiny turd of a phone they got supports only that, but looks awesome. AOSP is good and all, but I'll never buy anything that is not a Google device unless I magically have free time to root it and run an OS I trust (which might or might not exist).

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#87

Post by scarface74 »

secfirstmd wrote: post #81
scarface74 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whats the viable alternative to Google Search? Sure you can use Bing as a customer, but if you're a website operator you HAVE to stay on Google's good side. (not always easy to do) Or you can not base your business on the fickleness of Google's search algorithms. Ben Thompson (stratechery.com) posts one article per week publically and charged $100 a year for his newsletter. The only time he gave numbers, he has over…

Hmm forking Android and turning the ecosystem into a complete mess around stuff like security updates. To the point were a lot of people, including myself, are considering buying a Google device purely to ensure some sort of longevity.

Google only guaranteed support for two years. Not exactly what I would call "longevity".

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#88

Post by sfifs »

redm wrote: post #53

I think the key point here is not whether Google is abusing its effective monopoly willingly, its that it exists at all. There may be alternatives, but not viable ones. Try not supporting Chrome or ignoring Chrome requirements such as security mandates, you will go out of business. You can say these are 'good' for the consumer but the fact that Google has the ability to unilaterally change the web itself is partially…

This appears to be a common misconception that monopolies are bad from a public policy standpoint.

For public policy, the existence of a monopoly is neither here nor there. Monopolies are problem ONLY IF their operations causes negative economic effects to consumers - typically by raising prices. Indeed in many cases (eg. Transport, Infrastructure) a monopoly is actively granted in return for guaranteed availability and pricing.

In Google's case, it would be very very difficult for any lawyer to show how their actions actively hurt consumers - note consumers, not businesses.

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#89

Post by [deleted] »

scarface74 wrote: post #71
redm wrote: post #53

I think the key point here is not whether Google is abusing its effective monopoly willingly, its that it exists at all. There may be alternatives, but not viable ones. Try not supporting Chrome or ignoring Chrome requirements such as security mandates, you will go out of business. You can say these are 'good' for the consumer but the fact that Google has the ability to unilaterally change the web itself is partially…

Whats the viable alternative to Google Search? Sure you can use Bing as a customer, but if you're a website operator you HAVE to stay on Google's good side. (not always easy to do) Or you can not base your business on the fickleness of Google's search algorithms. Ben Thompson (stratechery.com) posts one article per week publically and charged $100 a year for his newsletter. The only time he gave numbers, he has over…

[deleted]

Re: “Google Is as Close to a Natural Monopoly as the Bell System Was in 1956″

#90

Post by rayiner »

stingrae wrote: post #51
panabee wrote: post #15

It would be great to see more balanced discourse on monopolies, especially in a software-dominated world. Most analyses and articles fixate on the costs of monopolies. Let's assume the worst of Google and conclude they abused their search monopoly. Innovation in search was stifled. Competitors were damaged and achieved only a fraction of their potential. For instance, Yelp might be worth $15B instead of $3B in a worl…

Pre-breakup, Bell Labs produced a very large percentage of the scientific/engineering breakthroughs that power our modern world. The breakup arguably changed Bell Labs, hurting its ability to hire talent as well as its access to resources.

The Xerox monopoly also produced a large percentage of the breakthroughs that power modern computer technology. It went into rapid decline after an antitrust settlement forced it to hand its patents over to Japanese competitors.
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