Stopped reading after the first 3 paragraphs which were made up entirely of bitching about the arrogance of selected silicon valley billionaires, none of whom have anything to do with any companies that could ever be called a monopoly. I suspected that this was the author's real motive, as is usually the case with journalists coming after big tech. If they really cared about monopolies, then they would have been writing about the destructive monopolies / oligopolies in many other industries that have existed much longer than the 10 years or so that Google and FB have been large powerful companies. It's a shame because Google's monopoly position in search is a real issue that deserves real discussion, not just the usual hit piece from another bitter journalist.
Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
51–60 of 335 posts
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#52Stopped reading after the first 3 paragraphs which were made up entirely of bitching about the arrogance of selected silicon valley billionaires, none of whom have anything to do with any companies that could ever be called a monopoly. I suspected that this was the author's real motive, as is usually the case with journalists coming after big tech. If they really cared about monopolies, then they would have been writ…
You should keep reading. It gets a lot better.
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#53Instead of trust busting these companies, the libertarian answer to them would be to invalidate their patents.
Google partially remains a search monopoly because of its search patents - of which it has many. If the state invalidates its patents and then moves out of the way, other competitors will naturally become successful.
There is no need to break up companies. Just take away some of their state-imposed advantages like patents.
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#54We should consider technologies a public good once they go over some threshold of users, they should then eiter be nationalized or regulated as public or broken up.
So then what if social networks capped the number of users at 1 below that threshold? For example, if nationalization occurs at 1 million users, what if all social networks limited the number of accounts to 999,999?. Personally I think that would be awesome. Imagine if every town, city, and borough of very large cities had their own independent social network or networks.
> [W]hat if all social networks limited the number of accounts to 999,999?
That's interesting. It opens the door to the possibility that social networks might pay people to leave, in order to open spaces for more long-term-valuable customers.
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#55Trust busting can seem like it’s anti free market, but when a company has a monopoly on a network it stops functioning as a company and basically becomes a government. The problem with Facebook/Amazon/Google is that they have a monopoly on a specific information network, for Facebook the social graph, internet discoverability for Google, and online shopping for Amazon. It’s similar to if a single company owned the ro…
> and online shopping for Amazon Not just shopping, but also AWS. It is functionally impossible to use the internet and not patron Amazon because of the ubiquity of AWS. It's not a monopoly because there are technically competitors, but the sheer scope of AWS reach makes consumer choice a practical impossibility. I do nearly all of my internet shopping away from Amazon, only resorting to it when there's no other choi…
I was surprised by this too, but AWS only has 32% of cloud market share https://www.parkmycloud.com/blog/aws-vs-azure-vs-google-clou....
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#56I wrote this [1] four years ago. It shows how to break up FAANG by making their biggest asset, their data, transparent and regulated. And you would get a check from it.
Imagine your consuming history on Amazon in a company by itself, you own dividend-paying shares, and if you don't like their policies, you can take the data elsewhere, or keep it private.
Anyone who wants to use it, including "Amazon" itself, has to pay Amazon Data for it, and they can only use it for approved purposes, all public.
The history of the Internet in FAANG becomes a regulated asset, like a power plant. The "free market" would make much better use of all this data than FAANG itself does now. They are bloated bureaucracies who don't even realize what they have.
Would FAANG scream? Sure, but they would own massive (but not controlling) shares of the FAANG Data companies, so as Larry Page says in my "interview" it works out well for them, too.
[1] https://issuu.com/stanfordchaparral/docs/parody_119_3-4/17
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#57> Wu argues that the very bigness of present-day companies — especially those in the tech sector — does not just harm consumers, but that it also threatens innovation and undermines the power of government.
Absolutely. The fact that the government's power is being subverted should not be lost going forward with any related discussions. Along the same lines, The Media's status quo is also being banged up. These well established power bases aren't going to surrender without doing battle.
Mind you, I'm not defending Big Tech. Having recently read the robust and extremely thorough "The Age of Surveillance Capitalism" I'd be foolish to pick sides.
https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/living-und...
The arc of the point is, viewing current events with a 20th Century lens is foolish at best. There is a lot going on. Some of it obvious, but far more is covert / stealth.
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#58Trust busting can seem like it’s anti free market, but when a company has a monopoly on a network it stops functioning as a company and basically becomes a government. The problem with Facebook/Amazon/Google is that they have a monopoly on a specific information network, for Facebook the social graph, internet discoverability for Google, and online shopping for Amazon. It’s similar to if a single company owned the ro…
What I want addressed is how we can bust these companies without making the experience worse for consumers or making things less efficient. A railroad that'd require a toll every mile because you split one company into hundreds wouldn't be viable. If I had to visit multiple web pages to get the same result as a google search, that'd also be bad. Amazon online shopping has a "monopoly" almost purely because the monopo…
I have come to a conclusion lately that there is no free lunch. You either optimize and increase risks (of system becoming monopoly like rail roads in the past, or busting like mortgage companies in 2007-8, government becoming tyranny, something like that) or you pay for inefficiencies. I think the free market is really about finding a balance between optimizations and risks. If the company is too optimized and carries significant risk - eventually, it will bust. If the marker is not efficient because of transactions volume - a larger company will inevitably emerge (and if it continues to grow - eventually bust)
EDIT: what really worries people about monopolies is that it takes more than a generation to see these companies bust. And to, again, optimize it, we come up with antitrust laws... But any optimization, in my opinion, costs risks and never is free (as in lunch).
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#59Trust busting can seem like it’s anti free market, but when a company has a monopoly on a network it stops functioning as a company and basically becomes a government. The problem with Facebook/Amazon/Google is that they have a monopoly on a specific information network, for Facebook the social graph, internet discoverability for Google, and online shopping for Amazon. It’s similar to if a single company owned the ro…
To piggy back on your comment...
Free markets only exist because of regulation.
It's regulation that allows actors to participate in good faith, and not get smoked by the huge whales and owners of exchanges, etc.
Re: Trust-Busting as the Unsexy Answer to Google and Facebook
#60Trust busting can seem like it’s anti free market, but when a company has a monopoly on a network it stops functioning as a company and basically becomes a government. The problem with Facebook/Amazon/Google is that they have a monopoly on a specific information network, for Facebook the social graph, internet discoverability for Google, and online shopping for Amazon. It’s similar to if a single company owned the ro…
"when a company has a monopoly on a network it... basically becomes a government." A monopoly functions like a government. Or inverted: a government functions like a monopoly. I find both angles interesting.
Generally a government is the entity with a monopoly on force. That is why things like drug cartels or the mafia are so poisonous to the body politic.