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Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

paulefou.com

411–420 of 684 posts

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, I think the free market will take care of this on its own.

Just like it took care of adding plastics and PFAS to the ocean, yea? Sometimes regulation is needed

In theory, if this was considered a big enough problem, yes - the market would resolve this. And by "big enough problem" we have to remember that market-driven economies respond to market demand forces.

Plastic in the ocean is definitely a huge problem, but it's not a market problem - not yet. When consumers are willing to pay to get plastics out of the ocean, hundreds of companies will appear eager to solve the problem.

There's a comment above (@pdpi: "At what timescale?") that identifies the issue at hand. In this case (and in a lot of cases) we need regulation because market demand to solve this isn't fast enough (or may never exist)

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#412
post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you mean because those 'small Internet service providers' would be included in his 'larger than $MARKET_SHARE' group, or because it would mean no one was kicked out of the incumbent services and therefore there would be fewer new customers available?

I mean because a company tends to explode from "smaller than $MARKET_SHARE" to "larger than $MARKET_SHARE" in a discontinuous fashion. So since a company can't really predict when it will happen, every company providing service would need to prep from the ground up to provide the described level of relatively non-automated high-touch support this proposal describes. It'd raise the cost to build a startup. ... not to…

I think this limitation is an artifact of the fact that the proposal is an idea being tossed out on social media. A real law would have some sort of grace period. That grace period could be chosen arbitrarily, it should be set such that any well-run company would have time to respond.

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#413

IMO, if your market share is bigger than ${some number}, you shouldn't be able to deny service without a documented reason, it should have some sort of time-to-live (i.e 1 year), and there should be an appeals process. In a functioning marketplace, companies would be naturally incentivized to care about customers but that stops working in uncompetitive industries (which currently describes most of the economy).

You're almost there. Companies that aren't competitive should be broken up.

broken up how and to what end? if you review definitions of antitrust and monopoly, you'll find they really do not apply to the dynamics at play with consumer internet services that displace existing decentralized norms and enjoy majority market share due to network effects.

not saying there isn't a problem, but maybe trying to shoehorn 19th century solutions onto 21st century problems isn't the answer.

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who decides which “markets” a company is in and measures their market share in those markets? How is market share measured? Is Tinder a dating service or social media company? If Facebook starts offering a dating feature in app and becomes the biggest player in the dating space, which market is facebook in? Both? If both, does all of facebook's market cap/DAU/whatever metric we settle on to measure market share get f…

A democratically elected government. Look, there is no such thing as a "natural market" that can keep the power of the actors in it in check. The internet was the closest thing to a perfect market that has ever existed and all it has produced is overpowered monopoly after overpowered monopoly. If we want a free society, we don't get that by handing power over to the markets. We get that by building the most responsiv…

In the US, "People, elected and held accountable by citizenry at large" found that banks were "too big to fail." They did not restrain "the power of the actors in [the market] in check." What makes you think it'll be different this time?

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#415
post #64
post #30

From Tinder's ToS: > Tinder may terminate your account at any time without notice if it believes that you have violated this Agreement. Upon such termination, you will not be entitled to any refund for purchases. > For residents of the Republic of Korea, except in the case [...], we will without delay notify you of the reason for taking the relevant step. They openly say in advance that they'll ban users who they thi…

I would definitely try to file a charge back with my bank, they sometimes exercise their own discretion on egregious cases like this and might be worth a shot.

Contacting Apple would likely lead to a refund. No need to go to the trouble of doing a chargeback. This is one of the reasons developers don't like Apple's IAP policies: developers have no control over whether Apple decides to give a refund (or not).

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#416
This is actually wonderful (for him). Tinder is terrible. There's not enough space for a real profile (that nobody reads anyway) so everyone just goes based on pictures and humorous quips, leading to everyone becoming a stereotype. There's definitely no more than 6 different kinds of profiles on Tinder.

Go make friends in person and meet dates through normal social interactions. Sounds crazy but it has an impressive track record.

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would it mean to break up Tinder? How do you partition a company that only has one product?

Partition it geographically. If they want to compete in certain cities/regions/countries where the user base exceeds a certain number, they must spin off subsidiaries for that area. I can't imagine people looking for a date on the other end of the country outside of very specific circumstances.

It's pretty common to use Tinder for hook ups during holidays

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#419

IMO, if your market share is bigger than ${some number}, you shouldn't be able to deny service without a documented reason, it should have some sort of time-to-live (i.e 1 year), and there should be an appeals process. In a functioning marketplace, companies would be naturally incentivized to care about customers but that stops working in uncompetitive industries (which currently describes most of the economy).

Who decides which “markets” a company is in and measures their market share in those markets? How is market share measured? Is Tinder a dating service or social media company? If Facebook starts offering a dating feature in app and becomes the biggest player in the dating space, which market is facebook in? Both? If both, does all of facebook's market cap/DAU/whatever metric we settle on to measure market share get f…

Facebook has dating functionality

Re: Tinder just permabanned me or the problem with big tech

#420
post #348

IMO, if your market share is bigger than ${some number}, you shouldn't be able to deny service without a documented reason, it should have some sort of time-to-live (i.e 1 year), and there should be an appeals process. In a functioning marketplace, companies would be naturally incentivized to care about customers but that stops working in uncompetitive industries (which currently describes most of the economy).

What if spammers outnumber honest users 10:1? I don't think there's a simple solution to any of this.

They could validate their users first.

Oh no! Then they can't fake growth.

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