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Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

nytimes.com

31–40 of 309 posts

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#31
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Same deal with office. Excel? I'm in the finance world and I can say with confidence that they've got 100% market share. We use google sheet too. Every day even....for tracking everyone's QuizOfTheDay scores. Great track but not even close to Excel replacement.

That means Microsoft has a better product, that doesn't mean it's a monopoly.

Those two are not mutually exclusive.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#32

In my career, first it was IBM, the unstoppable juggernaut that was going to take over the world. Then it was Microsoft, and everyone forgot about IBM. Then it was Apple, and everyone forgot about Microsoft. Before IBM, it was RCA. Everyone has forgotten about RCA. It's like in retail. First it's Sears, the unstoppable juggernaut that will take over the world. Then it's Walmart, and Sears is bankrupt. Now it's Amazon…

For both IBM and Microsoft, I would argue that anti-trust cases at least contributed to their fall from the top.

https://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/15/business/us-vsibm.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor....

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#33
post #3

Not MS? They're all kinda up to the same shenanigans really

Double jeopardy?

In case this isn't a joke, double jeopardy in the United States applies only to criminal cases, and two antitrust cases against one company need not necessarily be the same offense.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#34

In my career, first it was IBM, the unstoppable juggernaut that was going to take over the world. Then it was Microsoft, and everyone forgot about IBM. Then it was Apple, and everyone forgot about Microsoft. Before IBM, it was RCA. Everyone has forgotten about RCA. It's like in retail. First it's Sears, the unstoppable juggernaut that will take over the world. Then it's Walmart, and Sears is bankrupt. Now it's Amazon…

It's practice, not just theory. There's a good reason companies are effective at a certain scale and beyond that it's an impending disaster.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#35
post #3

Not MS? They're all kinda up to the same shenanigans really

Can you provide even a single current example? Or just jumping on the MS-bashing bandwagon 'cause it's fun? Apple, Facebook, and Google all have current practices that are questionable. Pointing fingers are companies that have already paid their dues is just useless noise.

Is regulation really "one and done"? MS got fined (repeatedly) around 2000 so they're done with regulation?

They at least have shady sales tactics.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#36

In my career, first it was IBM, the unstoppable juggernaut that was going to take over the world. Then it was Microsoft, and everyone forgot about IBM. Then it was Apple, and everyone forgot about Microsoft. Before IBM, it was RCA. Everyone has forgotten about RCA. It's like in retail. First it's Sears, the unstoppable juggernaut that will take over the world. Then it's Walmart, and Sears is bankrupt. Now it's Amazon…

For both IBM and Microsoft, I would argue that anti-trust cases at least contributed to their fall from the top. https://www.nytimes.com/1981/02/15/business/us-vsibm.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor... .

IBM's fall happened long after the anti-trust action against them. It's Microsoft that tipped them over, not government regulators, and IBM made one disastrous mistake after another, starting with the PS/2.

While MS was convicted of anti-trust, there wasn't much of any action taken against them. The reasons for them slipping would make for an interesting book.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#37
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anything, their efforts in search and cloud compute delayed or muted the case for monopolistic behavior by others as they can point to MS and say, see, they are competing against us successfully, we’re not the big bad monopolists some claim us to be.

How ironic that they once bailed out Apple to use as their own lightning rod.

They invested $150 million in non-voting stock from Apple, at a time when Apple had $1.2 billion in cash reserves. As part of that Microsoft agreed to support Office on Mac for five year, and Apple agreed to drop their long running lawsuit against Microsoft alleging Microsoft copies the look and feel of Windows.

Apple's business was struggling a bit at the time, but with those cash reserves they were a long way from needing bailing out.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#38
post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Same deal with office. Excel? I'm in the finance world and I can say with confidence that they've got 100% market share. We use google sheet too. Every day even....for tracking everyone's QuizOfTheDay scores. Great track but not even close to Excel replacement.

That means Microsoft has a better product, that doesn't mean it's a monopoly.

Better product for sure. But that doesn't mean it's not a monopoly.

>That means Microsoft has a better product, that doesn't mean it's a monopoly.

Actually that's the text book definition of monopoly.

Monopolies are thus characterized by

* a lack of economic competition to produce the good or service - nobody else is making commercial spreadsheet tools

* a lack of viable substitute goods - all the other stuff (google sheets, openoffice) isn't workable in practice

* high monopoly price well above the seller's marginal cost - a MS office download costs MS near nothing...selling price is still sky-high.

There are crazy network effects at play which create near insurmountable barriers to entry. Another sure sign of a monopoly vulnerable to monopoly pricing/profits.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the left, populist economists calling for Big Tech to be broken up for monopoly and tax dodging. From the right, culture warriors calling for regulation so their chosen avatars of free speech are not de-platformed. From the bottom, consumer advocates angry at the privacy abuses of large corporations, not to mention increasingly shoddy quality caused by lack of competition. From the top, as you mentioned- tech co…

Holy smokes, since when did interest in our constitutional rights of free speech become a "right" thing? It seems like the "From the right" should be "right-wing belief that tech platforms push left-wing biases", true or not, that is their gripe.

Since a while. I'm definitively not a right-winger, but I increasingly have to align myself with folks whose speech I hate in order to defend free speech against folks I agree with on issues. Too many on the left are gleeful at the thought of deplatforming any and all of their detractors.

Re: Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

#40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the left, populist economists calling for Big Tech to be broken up for monopoly and tax dodging. From the right, culture warriors calling for regulation so their chosen avatars of free speech are not de-platformed. From the bottom, consumer advocates angry at the privacy abuses of large corporations, not to mention increasingly shoddy quality caused by lack of competition. From the top, as you mentioned- tech co…

Holy smokes, since when did interest in our constitutional rights of free speech become a "right" thing? It seems like the "From the right" should be "right-wing belief that tech platforms push left-wing biases", true or not, that is their gripe.

> tech platforms push left-wing biases

That's half of it. The other half is suppression of right-slanted content. The issue is monopoly status + pushing one side + suppressing the other side.

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