Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon • Hacker News Board

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#81

Post by monetus » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:13 PM UTC

treis wrote: post #49

chadmhorner wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the general theory is that if we allow them to continue getting bigger and swallowing up all potential competitors, we’re basically saying these four or five companies will run everything, forever.

I think that wildly overstates the influence these companies have. Amazon is trivial to avoid. Just don't shop there or at Whole Foods. Facebook is a bit trickier because you might be forced there by a social group and they have a huge web of trackers. Google is really the issue. They are dominant in search, browser, and maps, and they're half the mobile duopoly. It's very difficult to avoid using their products enti…

Avoiding Amazon would also mean avoiding all aws services, not letting your data hit their infrastructure.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#82

Post by el_cujo » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:14 PM UTC

endofcapital wrote: post #2

Here we go, buckle up. With the amount of power democrats are likely to consolidate in the next few elections there could be some serious movement on this if it becomes a priority for the party. I think the big three are way too powerful and need to be broken up, but doing so intelligently is a tricky problem that I don't have much faith in government tackling. Zuckerberg integrating all the services yesterday seems…

At this point in the campaign, I think people are just throwing out ideas to see what sticks. If this idea becomes super popular on, say, twitter, then it will probably enter into the rotation of things she talks about at rallies and become part of her platform. If it doesn't really catch on, I could see it not being brought up again.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#83

Post by helen___keller » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

0815test wrote: post #27

Enforcing the use of open, federated, interoperable standards when they're technically feasible would be a lot more productive than the crude approach of simply breaking up the companies. To the extent that there is a competition concern it's due to network effects, and open, interoperable standards would go a long way towards resolving these. Even for Amazon, it's only the "UX"-related company that needs to be broke…

This would require a level of vision & planning we're not likely to see from political leaders, but I agree this is the best take here.

If the goal of antitrust action is to keep the free market competitive, I think a better way to achieve this than enforcing a breakup of big companies is by legally requiring standards for open protocols that allow for competitors to interface with each other and compete on their service quality rather than their network size.

How this would be done is a hard question without an easy answer. But breaking apart Facebook from Whatsapp isn't going to make it any easier for a new social network or a new messaging app to break into the space. Typically new social products can only enter a saturated market by targeting a niche and then expanding (e.g. Signal on a privacy/security focus or Discord on a gaming focus). Enforcing some level of open protocol makes it possible to try a new product without customers giving up because "oh but my friends aren't on here"

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#84

Post by sct202 » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

nck4222 wrote: post #43

jsutton wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For starters, Amazon provided a marketplace platform for third parties to sell goods. They then gathered data on which items sold the best, created their own line of products based off this data, and crushed their customers-turned-competitors using their massive advantage in economies of scale.

FWIW, while I agree this a problem, large box retailers (Whole Foods before the Amazon acquisition, Walmart, etc) are well known for doing this as well. So if that's the line you draw, it extends further than just tech giants.

It's a little bit different though, because Amazon has 2 streams of how they get products: Amazon can buy branded from vendor and control price and selection, or those same vendors could list directly on Amazon (as FBA) and the vendor controls price and selection.

Pop sockets got in a fight recently with Amazon, because they wanted to stay FBA in order to have better control of selection and pricing, but Amazon was trying to force them into a more traditional vendor role.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#85

Post by vlangber » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

gipp wrote: post #69

tobr wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By definition, since it's owned by Google. You can apply the same logic to any proposed split.

Not really; chrome and Android are far more independent. YT is integrated at every level from infrastructure on up. It depends on Google-internal libraries which are in turn integrated with other parts of the infrastructure... It would pretty much amount to a full from-scratch rewrite of almost the entire product. Moreover, I'd question whether other providers even have the available public resource capacity to suppo…

Or give both Youtube and Google ownership of the affected code, and let them develop separately from the split.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#86

Post by nukeop » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

all2 wrote: post #66

untog wrote: post #14

Comparisons will be made to Microsoft and Internet Explorer but to me the really crucial part of this isn't market dominance in the "what app are you using" sense, it's data. Facebook, Google and Amazon really do have an unprecedented amount of data on us. And keep vacuuming up more and more of it. Facebook should never have been allowed to buy WhatsApp (and maybe not Instagram though I'm less concerned about that on…

> Companies with an annual global revenue of $25 billion or more ... Hiding revenue is something multi-national corporations do really well. If I ran a company that had a platform as described, and we were approaching the 25bn mark, I'd find ways to make sure we never crossed that line. Losing IP to what would become a 'public utility' would discourage me from ever trying to develop beyond the 24.9bn mark.

Ok, works as intended.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#87

Post by matchbok » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:15 PM UTC

Shivetya wrote: post #51

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…

She has no proof, she does not need any. this is typical politician using FUD to scare the populace into letting them take actions which in the end only go to bolster their own campaign coffers and personal riches. With the upcoming Presidential campaign you can expect politicians tripping over each other using jealously and fear to get people to plea for action. Amazon is not a Standard Oil by any measure as they ha…

That's not how antitrust works. At all.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#88

Post by untog » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:16 PM UTC

sgjohnson wrote: post #63

While I agree that we should break apart giant companies (and not just Amazon, telecoms too), the first large entity that we should break apart, is the government. The only way to stop monopolies from forming is by getting rid of legislation that heavily benefits large businesses.

I'd argue that the government is already broken apart and is in fact a cautionary tale of how doing so can lead to waste and paralyzed decision making. With the House having a Democratic majority, and the Senate and Presidency being Republican, no-one realistically expects anything is going to get done. Add to that mix the layers of state and local government before it gets to the road outside your house that's in need of paving... I think that government is broken up more than enough already.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#89

Post by shawn-butler » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:17 PM UTC

travisoneill1 wrote: post #19

What is the alleged anti-competitive behavior? The article doesn't mention it. It sounds like she is calling for their breakup merely for being big and powerful, and if that were cause enough to break up an entity we would logically start with the government.

Perhaps not the government itself which exists within strict constitutional boundaries, but the same logic should apply to the major political parties with hard caps on the amount of incoming donations over which they have to "structurally separate" from the electoral process.

Whatever that means.

Re: Elizabeth Warren Proposes Breaking Up Tech Giants Like Amazon

#90

Post by occamrazor » Fri, Mar 08, 2019, 3:18 PM UTC

all2 wrote: post #77

sgjohnson wrote: post #63

While I agree that we should break apart giant companies (and not just Amazon, telecoms too), the first large entity that we should break apart, is the government. The only way to stop monopolies from forming is by getting rid of legislation that heavily benefits large businesses.

> ... the first large entity that we should break apart, is the government. If you're talking about the United States of America, it is already broken apart. By design we have three distinct branches, due process, and free speech/press.

Not to mention 50 constituent states, each of which has in turn legislative, executive, and judiciary branches.