Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

mattstoller.substack.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 108 posts

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#91

Post by solarkraft »

WalterBright wrote: post #25

Notably absent of is any recognition that we live today in a very global marketplace. FAANG companies are all American. If they are broken into pieces by the US government, what if that just provides opportunity for non-US companies to now fill those ecological niches? The end result will be the US anti-trust action accomplished nothing but enabling foreign replacements.

Your weirdly omits any reasoning for why you think that is the case.

One possible reason may be integration, which definitely is a factor for Apple, but Google’s is so hideously bad it might as well not exist.

For consumers it’ll be better whether or not the competitors are from the US (as an EU citizen I’d like to see some local options).

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#92

Post by pedalpete »

WalterBright wrote: post #25

Notably absent of is any recognition that we live today in a very global marketplace. FAANG companies are all American. If they are broken into pieces by the US government, what if that just provides opportunity for non-US companies to now fill those ecological niches? The end result will be the US anti-trust action accomplished nothing but enabling foreign replacements.

We need to get away from this nationalist perspective. All of these companies are global companies, both in where their products are designed/developed, as well as where there users are.

You wouldn't pit one state against the other and say "we need to keep California founded monopolies in place or else Oklahoma might end up replacing them".

We're all in this world together. Yes there are cultural differences, but we need to shift our mentality to a global one.

I know some people will call foul on China, but remember they sued Alibaba for monopolistic practices https://www.cnbc.com/2021/04/09/china-fines-alibaba-in-anti-... - all is not as it may seem on the surface.

Recognition on my part there are other issues to consider in China and many other countries, which is why we're looking to Philippines, Sri Lanka, Mexico and other location for our company. Legislation is slow, action is faster.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#93

Post by peytn »

pedalpete wrote: post #92
WalterBright wrote: post #25

Notably absent of is any recognition that we live today in a very global marketplace. FAANG companies are all American. If they are broken into pieces by the US government, what if that just provides opportunity for non-US companies to now fill those ecological niches? The end result will be the US anti-trust action accomplished nothing but enabling foreign replacements.

We need to get away from this nationalist perspective. All of these companies are global companies, both in where their products are designed/developed, as well as where there users are. You wouldn't pit one state against the other and say "we need to keep California founded monopolies in place or else Oklahoma might end up replacing them". We're all in this world together. Yes there are cultural differences, but we…

> You wouldn't pit one state against the other and say "we need to keep California founded monopolies in place or else Oklahoma might end up replacing them".

That’s totally something my local leaders would say. States compete for business here.

Practically speaking, my vote influences how US companies operate more than it influences how foreign companies operate. Therefore, all else being equal and since monopoly implies no other choices, I’m more invested in the companies I interact with being American rather than, say, Chinese.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#94

Post by Supermancho »

WalterBright wrote: post #25

Notably absent of is any recognition that we live today in a very global marketplace. FAANG companies are all American. If they are broken into pieces by the US government, what if that just provides opportunity for non-US companies to now fill those ecological niches? The end result will be the US anti-trust action accomplished nothing but enabling foreign replacements.

> FAANG companies are all American.

If it were more profitable to be based in another country, they would be. As it is, the stability of the US and the porous byzantine tax laws, corruptible politico, et al make the US ideal.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#95

Post by ksec »

stephc_int13 wrote: post #12

This is clearly needed, even if late, considering that antitrust laws are not a new thing. There is hope, we tend to forget after only a few generations, but if politicians are moving now this is because the collective opinions about big tech progressively shifted during the last decade. I might be naïve, but I think that HN played a role. And of course this is not over yet.

>collective opinions about big tech progressively shifted during the last decade

Big Tech is still relatively speaking a very new thing. There are enough people who just had their first smartphone in 2015. So not really a decade.

>I might be naïve, but I think that HN played a role.

I wish that was true but it is not. Purely from US side of things, EPIC and DHH probably done more damage than anything else.

Although Big Tech had all the problems sitting in front of them for years but they were not sensitive enough to view those as problems. Remember the biggest problem of anything is to first admit it is a problem. EPIC and DHH lit a fire and set on a chain reaction. Those who previously were too afraid to speak now wrote to congress for help. Those complains piled up, congress think of it as possibly a non-issue to reaching a certain threshold being a big issue.

My personal opinion is the ban of Parler and silencing of Social Media was also another big thing, whether you agree or disagree with it. I mean it is pretty bad when EU hate Trump but also speak out for Trump about silencing him. It is a problem because Politics is Power, big tech decided to flex their muscles and show who is really in power. And you get bet this doesn't sit well not just with politics in US, but politician across the world.

I think most people often forget, Republic, Democracy and Rule of Law, all of these were set up because of Power balance. And it is pretty clear Big Tech crossed the red line. And now there are enough political interest and business interest ( from small competitors ) to fuck them up.

And it is also why all the discussions about monopoly are quite meaningless. It is about power, and AntiTrust is exactly about the abuse of power.

I dont actually agree with breaking them up, but it is a good threat to use. And I also dont know how to go forward other than some form of regulation. But regulation are often good intention with bad consequences.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#96

Post by cryptica »

creato wrote: post #48
cryptica wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because this tired old argument has been made far too many times. These companies have become bloated and become a liability to the US and the dollar... Soaking up all the newly printed money and wasting it on bureaucracy whilst depriving everyone else from capital. Monopolizing user attention for the benefit of other aging, rotten, decrepit, bureaucratic corporations. They were producing big nominal gains through ho…

I think this is a pretty absurd take. These companies are highly profitable and highly visible to the average person, but in terms of revenue, they aren't outliers among the largest companies. They aren't disproportionately impacting "the US dollar".

They are highly profitable because they have an oligopoly over consumers. Consumers are forced to use them and other companies are forced to do business with them. For no other reason than a lack of alternatives. The reason that there are no alternatives is simply because they cannot compete financially... But if they could play on a fair/even playing field, the alternatives would almost certainly win.

Their high visibility is why they are able to soak up fiat from the economy. When the Fed did the trillion dollar stimulus packages, it went straight into these highly visible stocks.

These companies seem to be running a kind of money laundering operation at this stage. I suspect they found a way to keep borrowing large amounts of money from banks in perpetuity and then circulate that money among themselves to pay off each other's debts to inflate revenue numbers (maybe they use shell companies or corporate partners). It seems that there's something not right going on financially speaking. They're not playing on an even playing field as other companies. They shouldn't be profitable but they are; simply because they have an unfair advantage due to having special access to the centralized money printers.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#97

Post by tsimionescu »

zsz wrote: post #78
dundarious wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm highly skeptical of that prediction. The EU are hardly slouches with respect to anti-monopoly actions. Chinese and Russian companies are subject to intense fear-mongering (not that every criticism is invalid) and are unlikely to take the place of FAANG. And I don't foresee other Asian, African, Middle-Eastern, or companies from UK or the Americas achieving huge monopolies before actions could be taken against the…

Chinese entities seem to be treated like a special case / emerging market/industry, by even the most senior E.U. member states. This is in contrast to the U.S. / U.S. entities, which are viewed / treated as a mature (i.e. low/no-growth) market. The linear outcome of this ongoing state of informal submission is a rise in effronteries / audacious behavior at the official, international level, such as https://www.thegua…

Well, US official policy is that they do not recognize the authority of the International Criminal Court, or any other international court, over US citizens or the US state. This has been seen with a few trials for war crimes, most notably the trial they lost (and ignored) for mining Nicaragua's ports, a clear violation of the Geneva convention, an explicit war crime.

As an EU citizen, whether I'm kowtowing to Chinese or US imperialism is not all that different. Sure, I'd much rather live in the US than China, but in recent history, US influence outside their borders has been much, much worse for those under their heel than has Chinese influence.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#98

Post by tsimionescu »

WalterBright wrote: post #25

Notably absent of is any recognition that we live today in a very global marketplace. FAANG companies are all American. If they are broken into pieces by the US government, what if that just provides opportunity for non-US companies to now fill those ecological niches? The end result will be the US anti-trust action accomplished nothing but enabling foreign replacements.

I would never have expected such jingoistic comments to be so popular. Instead of praising American law makers for taking an ineterest in the welfare of the internet and global culture, even at a theoretical risk to their own hegemony, you judge them as misguided and lament their short-sightedness?

Also, as a believer in the free market, shouldn't you welcome competition, both national and international, as a means for everyone to become better at this?

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#99

Post by tsimionescu »

ignoramous wrote: post #6

> The ACCESS Act mandates that big tech firms have to make their systems open to competitors and business rivals, in the same way that AT&T customers can talk to T-Mobile customers, or users of different email systems can communicate with one another. Okay, this is plausible, but it can turn into all kinds of mess as federated systems aren't simpler to design, build, or operate. For example, how would Signal inter-co…

> Okay, this is plausible, but it can turn into all kinds of mess as federated systems aren't simpler to design, build, or operate. For example, how would Signal inter-communicate with e2ee intact with say, Facebook Messenger? They'd have to do a matrix.org style bridges, which is going to be super tricky to maintain, at their scale. Hardware is doomed: USB-C for all inter-connects...

I think the fact that federated systems are harder to design and maintain is exactly the reason we need legislation enforcing this. It is extremely important for the benefit of humanity that communication between us is not beholden to one private company. This is basically where we are with Facebook at the moment, for the majority of the Earth's population (except China). For example, if you get banned from Facebook and whatsapp, in large parts of the world you will unable to communicate online with friends and businesses.

Re: Why Did Congress Just Vote to Break Up Big Tech?

#100

Post by heed »

Jcowell wrote: post #76
ignoramous wrote: post #6

> The ACCESS Act mandates that big tech firms have to make their systems open to competitors and business rivals, in the same way that AT&T customers can talk to T-Mobile customers, or users of different email systems can communicate with one another. Okay, this is plausible, but it can turn into all kinds of mess as federated systems aren't simpler to design, build, or operate. For example, how would Signal inter-co…

>> > The nondiscrimination bill is intended to ban the ability to big tech firms to preference their own products, the way Google substitutes its own reviews for Yelp reviews, even if Yelp’s reviews are better. Oh god please no. I’ve been waiting years for Apple Maps to lose drop the gosh forsaken existence that is Yelp into a burning sun.

They’ve started to:

https://www.macrumors.com/2021/04/22/apple-maps-ratings-plac...

Post reply on HN