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Where Warren’s Wrong

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Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#101

Post by product50 »

chj wrote: post #22

The author is nitpicking. Warren may be wrong about the history of bing and google, but that's not really important. She's 100% right about Amazon, and the author conveniently forgot to mention. Most people in tech industry always strive to build monopoly and dominance. In their eyes, Warren's idea is of course insane. But viewing from another point, in order to protect competition and small businesses, her proposal…

You need to get into specifics vs. trying to just provide your general view. The author you are claiming is nitpicking is Ben Thompson - the most prolific tech strategist of our times. And look at your response which offers nothing interesting at all. Do you have any suggestions on how to make these breakups happen given all the nuances and challenges? And please get into details vs. pretending they are not important.

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#102

Post by root_axis »

cm2187 wrote: post #33
chj wrote: post #22

The author is nitpicking. Warren may be wrong about the history of bing and google, but that's not really important. She's 100% right about Amazon, and the author conveniently forgot to mention. Most people in tech industry always strive to build monopoly and dominance. In their eyes, Warren's idea is of course insane. But viewing from another point, in order to protect competition and small businesses, her proposal…

Actually amazon is the one that I would say doesn't have a monopoly. It doesn't have a monopoly in the retail space (far from it), nor in the cloud hosting (let alone server hosting) business, nor in online streaming (music/tv). Google on the other hand has close to a monopoly on search (and browsers). Facebook on social medias.

The typical antitrust concerns around monopolies don't really apply to google (currently). Google hasn't used its position to create barriers to entry for competitors, it is only that google has a reputation for producing a superior product in this domain. I've also heard some argue that google has a monopoly on advertising eyeballs, but this is clearly false (i.e. there are lots of platforms that make a lot of money by selling eyeballs)

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#103

Post by scarface74 »

After reading through all of the comments, I don’t see how many of the same people who worry about the power of private companies are okay with giving the government more power - the only entity with the legal right to take your property, life, and liberty.

I’m much more afraid of government power than private corporations.

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#104

Post by y4mi »

throwawaymath wrote: post #86
gamblor956 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is not, not has it ever been, the legal definition of monopoly.

What is the legal definition of a monopoly? As a followup, should that definition remain the legal definition of a monopoly? Do we need a modern appraisal of that definition?

A monopoly is when there is no competition. There can be seller and buyer monopolies.

While having a huge market share is a given in such a situation, it's nonetheless not the definition

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#105

Post by jklinger410 »

fcarraldo wrote: post #47
replicatorblog wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems like the weakest part of the argument — Walmart, Kroger, Walgreens, Costco, and every other major retailer has a similar program. All use sales data to determine what sells best and copy it. I did this for a decade, designing store brand medical devices for all the major retailers. There are plenty of legitimate critiques of Amazon. The "private label" one is by far the weakest.

Walmart, Kroger, Walgreens and Costco are not marketplaces, they're retailers, and they have contracts with suppliers and pay distributors to purchase goods to resell to consumers. Amazon is a marketplace where any retailer can list their goods for sale. I believe Warren's argument is that Amazon is abusing their position as the marketplace platform owner by listing their own goods at prices that undercut marketplace…

How is a platform different than a retail space?

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#106

Post by jmrobertson »

phillmv wrote: post #69
jmrobertson wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, so imagine separating Apple/Google totally from its current oversight position, and having a totally open app store. Like the world _just_ got past learning not to click 'download here!' on a browser, and that was after 20 years of the internet. I'd be open to alternative proposals, but separating the App Store with no replacement is not a secure solution by any means and causes more problems than it solves, a…

I don't understand why people should not be permitted to go to netflix.com to install the netflix app, or to twitter.com etc etc

that gets into interesting Human-Comp Interaction discussions, but a good place to start is that the HCI dynamic of mobile/tablet platforms is totally different (deliberately) from that traditional approach to browsers. So I guess it could be done, but relying on that approach undermines a lot of what make mobile platforms 'mobile platforms.'

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#107

Post by Cyclone_ »

If she's complaining about those companies using private information for profit she'll be quite surprised once she learns what happens on the internet. Many political campaigns use some sort of data mining operations.

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#108

Post by jmull »

anon0000 wrote: post #14

Noticeably absent from Warren's target list is Comcast. IMHO, they are more anti-trust than any of the tech companies she is targeting. Comcast also happens to be the 15th biggest donor to her campaign. https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/contributors...

> Comcast also happens to be the 15th biggest donor to her campaign.

Alphabet happens to be number 9 on your list, so what's your point?

The "Comcast" amount is $31K out of over $8 million, and is 100% from individuals, not Comcast itself.

You're implying Warren has been bought-off in some way, but your own link clearly refutes that.

Will you explain?

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#109

Post by jklinger410 »

almost_usual wrote: post #39
chj wrote: post #22

The author is nitpicking. Warren may be wrong about the history of bing and google, but that's not really important. She's 100% right about Amazon, and the author conveniently forgot to mention. Most people in tech industry always strive to build monopoly and dominance. In their eyes, Warren's idea is of course insane. But viewing from another point, in order to protect competition and small businesses, her proposal…

We’re going to see more and more defensive content come out and it’s only going to help Warren. Strategically she’s positioned herself well, she could easily be the most publicized democratic candidate because of this topic alone.

It's a sad state we're in that instead of talking about the most important monopolies, we're only able to talk about the ones with the most brand recognition.

Re: Where Warren’s Wrong

#110

Post by shadowtree »

scarface74 wrote: post #103

After reading through all of the comments, I don’t see how many of the same people who worry about the power of private companies are okay with giving the government more power - the only entity with the legal right to take your property, life, and liberty. I’m much more afraid of government power than private corporations.

Try not paying a mortgage and see what happens. Banks can take away a lot, starting with your credit score. And without government, you'd not even have any recourse.
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