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Antitrust Troubles Snowball for Tech Giants as Lawmakers Join In

nytimes.com

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

#181

Post by chiefalchemist »

fyoving wrote: post #95

Allow me to temper some of the glee exhibited in the comments and even in some of the reports but a key line here is: "The divvying of antitrust enforcement does not mean that the agencies have opened official investigations" It is worth keeping in mind that antitrust enforcement in the US doesn't care about whiny competitors but if the enduser and customer is harmed and it doesn't appear to be the case when it comes…

> "...he US doesn't care about whiny competitors but if the enduser and customer is harmed..."

It's difficult for me to imagine the Justice Dept being able to argue that "customers" were harmed...using services that were free.

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

#182

Post by Nasrudith »

bitxbit wrote: post #126

I realize this is probably not a popular opinion but Amazon, Google and Facebook are natural monopolies in the businesses they operate in. That is to say the optimal market structure in almost all internet businesses is high concentration with a single organization controlling +80% of market share. So breaking up these organizations doesn’t necessarily solve the problems we are facing today. This is not an antitrust…

Those markets are pretty "winner takes most". Not quite sure if I would call it a monopoly per say as anyone can compete but few can scale close.

I would expect most would agree the network effect serves them well - although all may fall in the face of a new competitor who actually manages to be "better" - especially if they do something stupid.

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

#183

Post by SomeOldThrow »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #181
fyoving wrote: post #95

Allow me to temper some of the glee exhibited in the comments and even in some of the reports but a key line here is: "The divvying of antitrust enforcement does not mean that the agencies have opened official investigations" It is worth keeping in mind that antitrust enforcement in the US doesn't care about whiny competitors but if the enduser and customer is harmed and it doesn't appear to be the case when it comes…

> "...he US doesn't care about whiny competitors but if the enduser and customer is harmed..." It's difficult for me to imagine the Justice Dept being able to argue that "customers" were harmed...using services that were free.

> It's difficult for me to imagine the Justice Dept being able to argue that "customers" were harmed...using services that were free.

C'mon, not offering any choice in how you pay for the service is inherently anti-consumer behavior. It's certainly not free, and they certainly never offer the consumer any insight into exactly how they are paying for it.

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

#184

Post by bduerst »

studentrob wrote: post #170
root_axis wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds to me like you're just disregarding anything that doesn't fit your narrative of "both sides support NN". A bunch of subreddit posts are not evidence of anything except the trends of a reddit bubble, however, if you're using subreddit posts to justify your position, I don't understand how you can cherry-pick a single post as evidence, but reject an entire page of posts as "manufactured propaganda". I don't thin…

I shared aggregated statistics calculated across a whole subreddit's history to make my point. That is a fair basis for discussion.

You cherry picked a deleted comment from a troll subreddit to act as an indicator of the entire Republican party stance on Net Neutrality.

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

#185

Post by dralley »

studentrob wrote: post #125
dralley wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Netflix is nowhere even remotely close to being a monopoly.

I agree that Netflix dominating does not make them a monopoly. No more than Google or Facebook.

Netflix is far less critical, and has far less marketshare (as a proportion of the general population), and far more competitors than either Google or Facebook.

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

#187

Post by noelsusman »

fyoving wrote: post #95

Allow me to temper some of the glee exhibited in the comments and even in some of the reports but a key line here is: "The divvying of antitrust enforcement does not mean that the agencies have opened official investigations" It is worth keeping in mind that antitrust enforcement in the US doesn't care about whiny competitors but if the enduser and customer is harmed and it doesn't appear to be the case when it comes…

Replace "big tech" with "big banks" and this is almost word for word what I hear from my friends on Wall Street.

The fact is that these are some of the most powerful companies in the world. Tech has skated by with a tiny fraction of the scrutiny that similarly powerful industries get. You say that it doesn't appear customers have been harmed by these companies, but maybe it doesn't appear that way because nobody with any power has bothered to look.

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

#188

Post by nerfhammer »

klipt wrote: post #177
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't think that's really an anti-trust problem What kind of problem is it then? High prices being maintained by a purposeful conspiracy of existing owners to constrain supply sure sounds a lot like an antitrust problem. > It's a matter of giving the majority of residents/voters what they want, even if it's bad for them in the long run. But it's not necessarily bad for them . They make more money by monopolizing…

> What kind of problem is it then? Regulatory capture?

That's hardly mutually exclusive with cartel behavior

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

#189

Post by scarface74 »

RcouF1uZ4gsC wrote: post #32
WalterBright wrote: post #27

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... .

The anti trust case had nothing to do with MS losing dominance. It is still dominant on the desktop.

- it lost the browser war because it basically disbanded the team for years

- it lost the mobile market because they tried to do Windows everywhere.

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

#190

Post by scarface74 »

studentrob wrote: post #45

Unsurprising. The government needs to appease the public after killing net neutrality. And, now that ISPs don't need to follow net neutrality, the regional broadband monopolies are free to zero-rate their own video services like AT&T openly does [1]. Next they can throttle Netflix, charge them a premium, and pass costs to the consumer without taking any sort of financial hit for doing so. [1] https://potsandpansbyccg…

Net neutrality was never imposed on cellular networks.

Besides all of the carriers offer unlimited data these days anyway.

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