Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#101

Post by durnygbur » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:01 PM UTC

leetcrew wrote: post #100

durnygbur wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon from Europe's perspective: - IT - an average employer at best including salaries, extremely competitive workplace, offices in most expensive cities, I don't think they offer any equity - warehouses - they were wrecked by German unions and opened 4 warehouses in Poland serving exclusively German market and burdening the brand new EU-funded highways, as if they were shunning from complying with the German labor…

if having a warehouse in germany is so unattractive that it's better to put them in poland and ship everything across the border, isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? edit: okay, that was a bit glib. but isn't complaining about this sort of thing at odds with the idea of an integrated european economy?

> isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon?

On top of unions and a desperate neighbour, Germany has saturated retail market including world's 5th biggest Schwarz Gruppe who certainly are not happy with a new foreign competitor, but that's a topic for many dissertations.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#102

Post by torben-friis » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:06 PM UTC

pwim wrote: post #72

mettamage wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. Who'd that be? Not familiar with dating apps' company histories. I tried them but I'm experiencing much more success with old-fashioned dating. Tech hasn't disrupted dating for the majority of people, I think. [1] [1] Because I know quite a few people that don't get any success out of it either, while they do get some success with old-fashion…

Match Group owns and operates several online dating services including Tinder, Match.com, Meetic, OkCupid, Hinge, and PlentyOfFish. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Match_Group

are all of those used? I'm not American, but here tinder seems to be the only option whatsoever (aside of the lgtb alternatives).

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#103

Post by pwinnski » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:06 PM UTC

pyrrhotech wrote: post #89

durnygbur wrote: post #27

Facebook platform is evil and no one doubts it at this point. Amazon is predatory for everyone - merchants, warehouse employees, IT employees, job candidates. Google screwed the recruitment irrevocably and what's worse every minor shop attempts to copy their processes. Microsoft temporarily plays the nice guy. Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. All together pay minuscle taxes. .…

Amazon is not predatory to me. It has greatly improved my life from a convenience and cost perspective. They also recently raised their wages for all warehouse employees such that it's one of the best places to work for unskilled labor in many locations. Amazon has made many small time merchants rich through their platform, and it's software engineers are among the highest paid in the industry, so I have to strongly…

The US House committee that spent 18 months investigating cataloged an extensive report[0] on Amazon's predatory ways, and reading it one quickly realizes that not everyone feels warm and fuzzy toward the company as you do.

There's a lot.

The section on Amazon begins on page 248, and is very readable.

[0] https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_dig...

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#104

Post by bart_spoon » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:07 PM UTC

kemiller2002 wrote: post #93

durnygbur wrote: post #27

Facebook platform is evil and no one doubts it at this point. Amazon is predatory for everyone - merchants, warehouse employees, IT employees, job candidates. Google screwed the recruitment irrevocably and what's worse every minor shop attempts to copy their processes. Microsoft temporarily plays the nice guy. Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. All together pay minuscle taxes. .…

Personally, I think we should rephrase this. Facebook is not evil in and of itself. Facebook's management is evil. Amazon's management is predatory. Microsoft is good (at the moment), because they have leaders at the helm that are taking notice of how to do things in a more ethical manner. We need to start assigning blame to people to start correcting the problem. It's too easy to just pass of blame and say "Well, th…

I think that you'd be hard pressed to make the argument that the Facebook platform itself, not just the management, is a purely net negative influence on society. Perhaps its original form, where people simply connect with their friends and share updates and photos, is, on paper fine, but it hasn't really resembled anything like that. It is entirely engineered around hacking people's attention spans in order to push advertising, and the methods it uses for doing so involve intense data collection and destroying user privacy. It has greatly contributed to the breakdown of political discourse in the US and around the world and by nature of its construction promotes extreme views and hyperbolic clickbait. The same criticism applies to Twitter.

You can at least make some kind of defense of the products and services that Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple provide. Probably Google as well, though perhaps their case is weaker. But in my opinion, there isn't a defense to be made at this point regarding the virtue of Facebook or Twitter, neither as corporations, nor as platforms. The world is worse off because of their existence.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#105

Post by srsQtho00 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:08 PM UTC

pyrrhotech wrote: post #89

durnygbur wrote: post #27

Facebook platform is evil and no one doubts it at this point. Amazon is predatory for everyone - merchants, warehouse employees, IT employees, job candidates. Google screwed the recruitment irrevocably and what's worse every minor shop attempts to copy their processes. Microsoft temporarily plays the nice guy. Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. All together pay minuscle taxes. .…

Amazon is not predatory to me. It has greatly improved my life from a convenience and cost perspective. They also recently raised their wages for all warehouse employees such that it's one of the best places to work for unskilled labor in many locations. Amazon has made many small time merchants rich through their platform, and it's software engineers are among the highest paid in the industry, so I have to strongly…

Serious question: is convenience for others the only bar we have to step over before enabling a certain type of utilitarian role?

Precisely quantified utilitarianism is the way? Quantified by who? Is our math, purposefully constrained for consistency, the right tool for that job?

What long term impact on those workers and society does creating so many low-effort monotonous jobs have?

Is there an upside besides expansion of low effort consumption and criticism of real effort?

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#106

Post by indymike » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:09 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #48

jkw wrote: post #25

Facebook has been unable to stop new entrants: Pinterest, Snap, Tiktok, Twitter - All global and multi billion dollar companies, and still growing. More to come are: Telegram, Discord, Houseparty, Clubhouse Plus global competition from: Wechat, Weibo, Line Social networks come and go. The space is a lot more whimsical than people think. Remember Friendster, MySpace, AIM. A new challenger will emerge every 3-5 years.

> Remember Friendster, MySpace, AIM. A new challenger will emerge every 3-5 years. I honestly laugh whenever I hear people still bring up those early social media companies as evidence that social media heavyweights somehow come and go. None of those companies ever came near the global reach of FB. A quick Google search gives a peak user count of MySpace of between 75 and 100 million, for FB it's 2.7 billion. Those c…

Facebook was really the winner of generation one of social networks. Friendster and Myspace were the first movers, but there were a ton of social networks born in that timeframe.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#107

Post by zrth » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:09 PM UTC

kemiller2002 wrote: post #93

durnygbur wrote: post #27

Facebook platform is evil and no one doubts it at this point. Amazon is predatory for everyone - merchants, warehouse employees, IT employees, job candidates. Google screwed the recruitment irrevocably and what's worse every minor shop attempts to copy their processes. Microsoft temporarily plays the nice guy. Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. All together pay minuscle taxes. .…

Personally, I think we should rephrase this. Facebook is not evil in and of itself. Facebook's management is evil. Amazon's management is predatory. Microsoft is good (at the moment), because they have leaders at the helm that are taking notice of how to do things in a more ethical manner. We need to start assigning blame to people to start correcting the problem. It's too easy to just pass of blame and say "Well, th…

> Facebook is not evil in and of itself. Facebook's management is evil.

Sarcastically this make me want to reply that John the ripper was not evil. John the ripper's brain was evil.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#108

Post by driverdan » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:12 PM UTC

kemiller2002 wrote: post #93

durnygbur wrote: post #27

Facebook platform is evil and no one doubts it at this point. Amazon is predatory for everyone - merchants, warehouse employees, IT employees, job candidates. Google screwed the recruitment irrevocably and what's worse every minor shop attempts to copy their processes. Microsoft temporarily plays the nice guy. Then we have this whole dating thing entirely owned by one media hegemon. All together pay minuscle taxes. .…

Personally, I think we should rephrase this. Facebook is not evil in and of itself. Facebook's management is evil. Amazon's management is predatory. Microsoft is good (at the moment), because they have leaders at the helm that are taking notice of how to do things in a more ethical manner. We need to start assigning blame to people to start correcting the problem. It's too easy to just pass of blame and say "Well, th…

> Microsoft is good (at the moment)

Are they though? Windows 10 "telemetry" seems pretty evil to me.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#109

Post by jasonv » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:14 PM UTC

leetcrew wrote: post #100

durnygbur wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon from Europe's perspective: - IT - an average employer at best including salaries, extremely competitive workplace, offices in most expensive cities, I don't think they offer any equity - warehouses - they were wrecked by German unions and opened 4 warehouses in Poland serving exclusively German market and burdening the brand new EU-funded highways, as if they were shunning from complying with the German labor…

if having a warehouse in germany is so unattractive that it's better to put them in poland and ship everything across the border, isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? edit: okay, that was a bit glib. but isn't complaining about this sort of thing at odds with the idea of an integrated european economy?

Reno is in the same spot. The number of Tesla, Walmart and Amazon trucks clogging I-80 at all hours of the day is astonishing. It also clogs the highway and impedes traffic. I wish they could put a toll or ban trucks from 7am to 7pm so people can get over the hill without tracking trains of trucks. Not sure how this could be solved without an effort of some kind, but as far as o can tell, there are zero policies guiding their behavior.

Re: Facebook is a monopoly that buys, copies, kills competitors: antitrust committee

#110

Post by kerrsclyde » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 2:16 PM UTC

bredren wrote: post #98

dhyreueu wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're not addicted to Facebook you just don't like that the social landscape is changing. Calling people was terrible compared to the convenience of social media, sure it was more intimate but most people aren't looking for intimacy in every interaction they have with their friends. A lot of the time they just want to shoot the breeze. People like memes, seeing what trendy garbage with avacado on top their friends…

There are very real reasons to consider Facebook a threat that have nothing to do with projections of "it just isn't for me." Facebook embraced Q Anon and turned it into a gold mine for engagement. Facebook is directly responsible for the growth of that conspiracy and made the United States much worse as a result. Facebook did this by feeding a culture of fear, suspicion and bigotry in the guise of belonging, communi…

Myanmar!