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Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

nytimes.com

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Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#431

Post by rustyboy »

mal10c wrote: post #401

I ran across two quotes by Warren that caught my attention: > "unwind tech mergers that illegally undermine competition" > "I want a government that makes sure everybody — even the biggest and most powerful companies in America — plays by the rules" The word "illegally" in the first quote really set off my alarm bells. What have large companies like Amazon, Google, FB, etc. done that is considered illegal in this reg…

> "illegal"

because Amazon uses their non-retail business profits to identify high selling items, produce them themselves, sell them at a lower price (because they have all the data also), and finally steer customers to those products. They're the market place and a player. This new idea isn't well defined in law, but using your profits from one company to undercut another area is illegal.

> "by the rules"

is the same idea as "illegal", and even if they're not, the point she's trying to make is the fact they are not breaking rules should be setting off alarm bells because...

> "but why is that a concern of the government?"

because America loves the free market, and big business is the enemy of it.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#432

Post by delfinom »

Despegar wrote: post #429
skrebbel wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would this work in practice though? Eg Amazon. Bezos is a major shareholder. Imagine splitting AWS from the retail arm, which I guess would be a sensible split point. If Bezos controls both, then what would really change? I'm not critical to the idea nor supportive - I'm just curious to learn more.

Did you read her proposal? There would be a structural separation from distribution and first party goods. Just like railroads couldn't own interests in the commodities they were transporting, Amazon couldn't operate a market place and also own private label brands. https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big...

So what about Walmart who does double Amazon in revenue AND has their own private label brands? They have so much retail power they are known to get manufacturers by the balls and make manufacturers accept the cost they want instead.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#433

Post by sleepysysadmin »

kevinmchugh wrote: post #374
sleepysysadmin wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Twitter decides tomorrow to ban the right-wing from their platform. They absolutely legally can. If you watch the recent Joe Rogan video with Tim Pool and Jack Dorsey. They didn't realize they were slowly banning the right-wing and allowing left-wing terrorists to stay on Twitter. They absolutely didn't realize they were doing this and they are going to look at fixing this. The government however could come in and…

The company twitter has set its terms of service. That is speech. What you're suggesting is eliminating the corporation's ability to do speak in that manner. Do you believe the US government has the ability to simply prohibit speech by corporate entities? Is it in accordance with free speech principles for a federal government to prohibit certain types of speech?

By forcing freedom of speech onto twitter for example. I don't see how that would be restricting their speech.

Personally I see this as something that will come eventually. However, I don't think that's what Twitter should do.

My idea is that twitter should act more like the united nations. You create a 'diplomatic immunity' type of account that people can request. It can be something like:

Minimum 50,000 followers.

Account history of 1 year.

If approved you can no longer edit or delete your posts; but you also cant be kicked off twitter or other be harmed by rules of twitter.

this by itself will solve the problem that twitter has.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#434

Post by walterbell »

Despegar wrote: post #429
skrebbel wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would this work in practice though? Eg Amazon. Bezos is a major shareholder. Imagine splitting AWS from the retail arm, which I guess would be a sensible split point. If Bezos controls both, then what would really change? I'm not critical to the idea nor supportive - I'm just curious to learn more.

Did you read her proposal? There would be a structural separation from distribution and first party goods. Just like railroads couldn't own interests in the commodities they were transporting, Amazon couldn't operate a market place and also own private label brands. https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big...

Relevant text:

> ... legislation that requires large tech platforms to be designated as “Platform Utilities” and broken apart from any participant on that platform. Companies with an annual global revenue of $25 billion or more and that offer to the public an online marketplace, an exchange, or a platform for connecting third parties would be designated as “platform utilities.” These companies would be prohibited from owning both the platform utility and any participants on that platform. Platform utilities would be required to meet a standard of fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory dealing with users. Platform utilities would not be allowed to transfer or share data with third parties.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#435

Post by delfinom »

will_brown wrote: post #112
sleepysysadmin wrote: post #16

To what end? "illegally undermine competition?" She is inferring that Google/Amazon/Facebook are committing anti-trust crimes? What proof does she have? >Companies would be barred from transferring or sharing users’ data with third parties. That can be done without breaking them up. I don't think she realizes that splitting up amazon and amazon basics will do little to nothing. There are other things that can be done…

>I don't think she realizes that splitting up amazon and amazon basics will do little to nothing. I think amazon : amazon basics is a great example of antitrust/unfair monopoly the same as google search : almost all consumer facing google products. Both amazon and google search are the dominate online market leaders in their respective categories. In amazons case they unfairly use their market position to begin offer…

> gives their in-house service priority in search results over existing market incumbents and self bids on google search advertising for key industry terms to drive up costs of advertisers to keep in business.

It would help if the competition in hotel booking, Expedia, Orbitz, ETC weren't all literally owned by a single fucking company now. The sites are entirely rigged against the user.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#436

Post by ztratar »

cooooooffffeeee wrote: post #422
mal10c wrote: post #401

I ran across two quotes by Warren that caught my attention: > "unwind tech mergers that illegally undermine competition" > "I want a government that makes sure everybody — even the biggest and most powerful companies in America — plays by the rules" The word "illegally" in the first quote really set off my alarm bells. What have large companies like Amazon, Google, FB, etc. done that is considered illegal in this reg…

You're high if you think someone can compete with Amazon out of their garage now. Hell, you can't even sell a product on Amazon without a good chance that Amazon will just slap their Amazon Basics logo on it and undercut you to death. Similar to Wal-Mart many of their competitors are dead because they optimized their supply chain. No one gets that kind of access out of their garage.

And if Amazon is broken up, whoever thinks the US will still win the global E-commerce market against Alibaba is also quite high.

The rules are changing. We need to think about the geopolitics here as well. We need US companies to win global markets in an era of increased competition.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#437

Post by walterbell »

Gpetrium wrote: post #314
mabbo wrote: post #97

There's precedent to this in the USA. The US Government once passed regulations that caused one of the largest companies in America to break up into three smaller companies. Today those, three companies are entirely independent, employ over 400,000 people combined, and have a combined net work of over $400B. Those companies are Boeing Aircraft (153k employees, $244B market value), United Technologies (202k employees,…

One of the perceived risks of breaking up the tech giants is that they will be at a competitive disadvantage to their foreign peers. The degree of competitive risk at the time of Boeing's split was perceived as lower. As long as Americans are ok with losing some areas of advantages, they should move forward.

There are other regulatory tools to level the playing field with foreign companies.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#438

Post by ortusdux »

mywittyname wrote: post #269
ortusdux wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We also broke up Ma Bell back in 84 and it looks like they are on their way to fully reuniting as an even larger monopoly. https://i.imgur.com/rMFqmbt.jpg https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/03/att-time-warner...

That's a different failure. The government should have never allowed for the subsequent mergers.

I agree. I don't understand the point of temporarily busting monopolies. With Bell, forcing them to diversify seems to have only made them stronger.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#439

Post by chrischen »

psadauskas wrote: post #211

How about going after Comcast and Verizon first, the actual tech monopolies ? I already don’t use Facebook, I buy things online from places other than Amazon, and have email accounts that aren’t hosted by Google. However, all of that goes over Comcast’s network because that’s my only viable choice for Internet service. Also, while FAANG occasionally do things I don’t approve of, they don’t actively lobby congress for…

Saying Google == email is a bit naive. Google is search, and the internet starts with search. They definitely have a monopoly on search and it's what's essentially powering almost all of Google revenue right now.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#440

Post by ABCLAW »

uerobert wrote: post #345
JohnFen wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The trend in broadband has been more competition. I'm not in SV, but this is 100% not true in my area. Where I live, my choice for broadband providers consists of Comcast. There is no alternative, nor is there any sign that competition is coming.

Why do you think that is?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_allocation_scheme

Only that you don't need an agreement to make it happen. Tacit understanding works just as well.

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