What products or services does Meta sell on FB marketplace?
Not only does the article cover this, there's links to further coverage about Meta's involvement in the "more context" section.
Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
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Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#12Earlier quoted context omitted.
Could the left hand sell said data to market research analysts first, before the right hand buys their reports?
Well, yes, and that's not some circumvention of measures like this, but the intent of these sorts of anti-competitive laws. Amazon can use the same data they've been using all this time, but they must not put themselves in a special position in acquiring that data. If they want to publish their sales data for free or for a price that they themselves pay, that's fine, as long as others can also get the data.
Wouldn't selling it, perhaps not be particularly fair. Like, couldn't they sell it at a price that would eat up all potential profits from the company using the data. But it'd be fine since they could run that segment of the company at a loss to bolster profits in other parts of the company?
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#13sad that el reg is also doing this: "In Amazon's case, the e-commerce giant used vendors' sales figures to decide which items it should sell, and how much to price products to get an edge over everyone else. The internet behemoth also promoted its own products with its Buy Box feature and it further cut into retailers' margins by charging extra costs if they wanted to use Amazon's Prime delivery services, the CMA sai…
The Reg’s usual cynical attitude is probably warranted here.
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#14Every single grocery store uses data to curate and prioritize house brand products.
Somehow this is lauded in the food industry, but demonized in the tech industry.
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#15Dumb government. Higher prices and less variety for you.
Why can’t they just let adults buy and sell the way they want to?
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#16There's a really interesting analogy here with the LLM platforms that both are a vendor to companies that use their APIs, but also potentially compete with those companies as well as they evolve their offering over time. It would be interesting to see if this kind of regulation could be applied in that context as well.
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#17Dumb government. Higher prices and less variety for you. Why can’t they just let adults buy and sell the way they want to?
> Why can’t they just let adults buy and sell the way they want to?
Perhaps we should all go and (re-)read the history of Standard Oil just to refresh our memories of what it looks like if we were to let that happen?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Oil_Co._of_New_Jersey...
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#18There's a really interesting analogy here with the LLM platforms that both are a vendor to companies that use their APIs, but also potentially compete with those companies as well as they evolve their offering over time. It would be interesting to see if this kind of regulation could be applied in that context as well.
This is why I don't understand new LLM start-ups. They hope their low-hanging integration or LLM-flavor-of-the-day fruits do not attract attention long enough.
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#19So basically, Amazon is not allowed to look at what products are selling well on Amazon before they decide which products to make. However, Amazon is still allowed to sell products, and presumably market research firms are going to give them the same results, more or less. So what did this accomplish, really? It seems like some UK lawmaker is up for reelection and wants a feather in their cap.
It strikes me as very similar to the ever present conflict of interest in the securities world between clients and broker-dealers.
A business like Amazon’s retail one is quite like the latter, and I would be totally unsurprised to see more and more legislative pressure applied to force them to segregate if not choose between their ‘agency’ and ‘prop’-type franchises; especially outside the US. Stuff like the EU’s DMA are just first steps; in securities trading a lot of this stuff sails into criminal rather than civil law.
Re: Brits make Amazon, Meta stop using third-party data to undercut rivals
#20Every single grocery store uses data to curate and prioritize house brand products. Somehow this is lauded in the food industry, but demonized in the tech industry.
It’s not lauded. Suppliers hate the power the big supermarkets have over them. But stores’ data is probably down the list after the payment terms they dictate, not being paid, and payment for in-store product placement etc