Google, Facebook, Amazon May Be ‘Antitrust Situation’
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
Times the word “monopoly” appears in the article: 0
It’s worth repeating: The Sherman Antitrust Act does not apply only to actors in monopoly positions. Antitrust actions may be taken against businesses engaging in anticompetitive behavior or otherwise restraining trade, even if they don’t control the entire market.
modern has annotations of beneficial progress
If you're going to be pedantic, at least be correct.
Now why do I think they deserve Sherman Antitrust investigations (and IANAL).
All of them have control over people's different dimensions of data that nobody has.
- Amazon: With acquisition of Whole Foods they control retail like nobody. Yes, Walmart is trying to make a dent. So does best buy. But they have pretty much monopoly over e-books business when it comes to publishing. Apple already had eBooks settlement.
- Google: They make or break Internet with control over gateway (Chrome), Search (gatekeeper, and promoting their own content) and monetization (Google Doubleclick/Adx is majority of share in ad-tech market for on-walled garden s, good luck competing against it). Given their control and 1B users across multiple platforms they constantly engage in anti-competitive behavior. Read about rise of header bidding and how AdX used to anti-competitive in ad-tech. Google's ad-tech division needs to thoroughly investigated over anti-competitive behavior.
Secondly, Android is free but Google has iron grip over Android using play store. I think gated App Stores are inherently anti-competitive and not in best interests of users and developers. OS should allow multiple app stores and DoJ should go after this. Fortnite already tried to highlight this issue.
Facebook - I think Facebook might be spared as for social they are not the only platform. But given their data scandals
Apple - As I said app stores are inherently anti-competitive. Same thing applies here like Android.
Anyway, these companies can make or break business with their anti-competitive practices. As discussed in another comment, Sherman Antitrust Act doesn't apply in monopoly positions but against businesses that may stifle overall competitive behavior. I strongly believe these companies are even more scarier in telcos as they are wolves in sheep's clothing and always try to play nice.
I think this is undeniable in practice, but Google could claim that because Android also has F-Droid and the like, it allows multiple app stores.
That’s sad I can’t agree with Trump on this because I know that he’s doing it for completely the wrong reasons. He sees them as political enemies and he wants them suppressed/controlled. I don’t believe he actually cares how big they are. That’s just the excuse.
This isn’t a “stopped clock is right twice a day“ thing.
You could come up with other reasons that I don’t necessarily agree with, say “tax dodging“, that I wouldn’t mind. If I agree with the goal and reason is just, even if it’s not my reason, that could be fine. There was something relatively small Trump did that I agreed with on these lines, though I don’t remember what it was.
This is a pure authoritarian threat. You don’t tie my line so I’ll find some justification to make you’re life hell.
"Of the 1m green cards (permanent residence visas) issued [in the US] each year, only 15% are granted because of the applicants' skills, notes John Dearie of Startups USA, a pressure group; in Australia the figure is 68%."
[1] https://www.economist.com/briefing/2018/08/25/governments-ne...
Except that to him and his supporters, "merit" is really just code for "skin color". They don't want Hispanics, period. To the point where they are apparently willing to go after natural-born Hispanic citizens on the sketchy basis that they might be fraudulent (of course actually bothering to investigate isn't necessary).
https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/world/the_americas/us...
Peoples over romatezised history of Anti-Trust is ridicouluse. It was mostly a way for buissness that were outcometed based on price to try to use government power to their advantage.
The fist state level Anti-Trust law was basically butchers who were angry at the invention of the frozzen rail transport and slaughterhouses.
And when you want to talk about Anti-Trust on the internet you should actually know how it is applied today.
Anti-competetive actions are simply not going to make an Anti-Trust case. An Anti-Trust case requeres clear harm to consumers.
So if Whole Food would triple its prices because nobody else can compete in that market then you might have an Anti-Trust case.
Most of your list is simple "Things I dont like".
Microsoft is still pushing Bing, and I think Yahoo exists; and both of those providers also provide free email services (some under different brand names).
Apple competes on entire phone platforms, and Android as an operating system for phones is provided free to enable a market place across several different manufacturer's devices; that is likely what's saving //Apple// as a monopoly for mobiles.
Amazon for shopping... the Whole Foods horizontal integration may be problematic. I think it depends on how different platforms and services are broken up. It would probably be OK with the correct kind of regulation to ensure that it isn't used as an unfair competitive advantage. In that respect I think Walmart might also have issues.
What I think might improve things is more consumer protections, particularly in the form of requiring reasonable cost access to paid support (even for products that are otherwise free). We've heard of users being locked out of their contact address and account data far too often, even for paying or previously paying users.
Google partly defeated Microsoft's phone platform just by keeping their services away from it. It's difficult to imagine any less powerful player having any chance.
Think of modern consumer applications and how much they depend on technology from Google, Apple, Amazon or Microsoft.
They can at many points enforce incompatibility for business reasons. That should probably be disallowed (car makers couldn't really prevent after market companies from producing compatible parts).
If they dod not restrict web access then what they did is perfectly fine.
Google acted terribly towards Windows Phone, breaking Youtube and anything else 3rd party devs or Microsoft wrote for Windows Phone. Google Maps for mobile browsers was pretty awful until Google was sure that AT&T and Verizon were done selling Windows Phones
Even if you sign up for an alternate email service, the fact that Google controls so many email accounts means that it is still going to get to read many of the emails sent from Yahoo / Hotmail to Gmail.
Building a video hosting site costs a lot less than billions. Unless you have YouTube's traffic, you don't need their capacity.
My belief is that A) we do need common platforms but B) the monopoly platforms are unfair and C) decentralized technologies can provide common platforms that aren't controlled by monopolies.
So what I think would make sense would be for drivers or even self-driving car companies to use decentralized protocols to make one large network and platform. That platform is open source and decentralized and used by many competing companies that want to provide transportation services. This allows companies access to a large pool of drivers and riders and a core technology implementation, but does not relinquish control to one company, so we can preserve competition and fairness.
But they have lots of advisors to help them understand that and recommend good policies.
Also the policies are based on real issues in the law and attempt to correct them.
Trump is a self-styled expert in everything (ESPECIALLY business) and doesn’t seem to like outside counsel if it contradicts him.
I can’t think of much in the way of “spite laws” that Bush or Obama tried to push. There was the rattling over encryption, but that was about it.
Trump has a very strong history going after anyone who disagrees with him or he thinks (correctly or not) makes him look bad.
Those two factors combined make all the difference in the world to me.
Rather than break them up, force them to compete with each other in each other's dominant market. And then if we get a super giant then break it up.
Forgive me but... how is that better than getting companies to spin off divisions or to simply not do anticompetitive things? Google is marginally better than Facebook, and what you're suggesting seems to be a switcharoo between two turd sandwiches where effectively nothing changes. Facebook could compete in the video space(god help us), but that doesn't mean we're going to get better video services.
Much more urgent would be antitrust inquiry into consumer credit systems. Mortgage applicants are at the mercy of an opaque, antiquated credit score apparatus. While a majority of small businesses, professional services, and merchants prefer to be paid in check or cash in the US. For large transactions, this is a headwind against efficient commerce. The fee structure is simply too dashed high.
FICO’s Lock on Mortgage Credit Scores Comes Under Fire
https://www.wsj.com/articles/ficos-lock-on-mortgage-credit-s...
It's not an opinion about Google has tweaked its search, just the scope.
We just don't know how big or small google search altering goes. They already proved during the 2016 US elections Google removed negative searches for Democrats. Would really be helpful if someone collected all the google search manipulations. Google at least lets you know if something is removed if its torrent link.
I've run into multiple Youtube search issues where I know a video exists, but can't find it easily or at all. Normally its just a dozen pages down. Even with exact titles searches, it can sometimes be extremely difficult.
I think this is an example of Trump saying the right things for the wrong reason. If you just remove the 'because they don't like me' from his rhetoric, there could be a valid argument there.
That was my point, you can't say they don't modify search results as a blanket statement.
If you're not, it'll tell you about the Pyramids.
He shifts focus from a more general issue that could have much wider effects and directs it into the Trump Vortex where everything is either pro-Trump or anti-Trump and you have to pick a side and that's what it's all about. That is why I think his rhetoric is so destructive - Trump will be gone 2-6 years from now, maybe even sooner, who knows, but Google will likely be around much longer than that.
Anyway, I dislike how everyone's forgotten how to actually communicate and stay in touch and just assumes that everything and everyone exists on Facebook (as one of the GTAs spoofed: "Life Invader").
A monopoly of...?
They key part of a "monopoly" claim is defining the market. Facebook has a monopoly communications? No. Does it have a monopoly on online communications? No. Does it have a monopoly on mobile communications? No.
Does it have a monopoly on social interactions? No. Does it have a monopoly on online social interactions? No. Does it have a monopoly on social networks? No. Does it have a monopoly on online social networks? No.
Does it have a monopoly on ads? No. Does it have a monopoly on online ads? No. Does it have a monopoly on online ads in social networks? No.
Does Facebook have a monopoly on serving ads in an online social network that is blue-themed? No.
Does Facebook has a monopoly on a on serving ads in an online social network that is blue-themed and has a feed? Not even that!
Does Facebook has a monopoly on a on serving ads in an online social network that is blue-themed and has a feed and is owned by a Harvard dropout? Yes.
That is the complication of a monopoly claim, you need to define the market. If you define it too narrowly, you'll always have a monopoly. If you define it too broadly, you'll never have a monopoly.
No, monopoly absolutely depends on the definition of the market. If you define the market as "online human communication" Facebook doesn't have a monopoly. If you define the market as "online human communication with a feed that uses shades of blue and is owned by a Harvard dropout" then facebook has a monopoly.
> In terms of e.g. network lock-in facebook doesnt have an alternative.
Sure it does. You can talk to people, call people, send a letter, post a notice on a bulletin board, use an online forum, send an email, use an email group, post it on Google+ (it still exists), send a snap, dm on twitter, post on twitter, post on Hacker News, etc.
It entirely depends on how you define the market.
Ask a representative sample of 'random' people
* For an alternative
* That still exists
* That they actually considered using within the last year
Twitter as a specialized platform is in somewhat a similar area, however people can just group chat on several other platforms and if you re-framed the question like this people could probably come up with things they would or already use as an alternative.
"If [THING] suddenly went out of business, what would you use instead?"
There are plenty of opportunities for all of those options.
Consider, for example, the Cola soda market. There are countries in which Coca-Cola holds 95% or more of the market share for Colas, or even for sodas.
Does that make it a monopoly? No. Because Colas are just one type of soda drinks, and soda drinks are just one type of drink.
If Coca-Cola disappeared and there was no other Cola drink available, Cola drinkers would drink a lemon-flavored drink, or fruit juice, or just plain water.
So your definition doesn't work, exactly because you didn't define the market.
And hey, this isn't just my opinion, it is how monopoly is defined in economics. Particularly regarding something that we haven't talked about yet, which is monopoly pricing. There is no monopoly pricing in any market that Facebook operates. Quite the opposite, actually, ad prices have been going down continuously.
It is always interesting to see people in HN trying to recreate economics from first principles.
The article is mostly about POTUS's statement and opinion, not a detailed view of whether there are antitrust violations.
This is 100% “Trump says X“. That’s the only reason this is an article, literally because he said it.
So to remove that from the headline seems very disingenuous.
(Yes, others have suggested the monopoly/abuse of power angle before, but that’s not why we’re discussing it today).
I said: “Facebook‘s biggest competitor is the US government.”
I feel that’s even more true now, and the same comment applies to Google and Amazon. It’s not a coincidence these firms have massive lobbying efforts.
Sent from my $100 Android phone bought off Amazon through Google Chrome after my friend told me about it on Whatsapp.
Alex Jones never delivered that type of value to me and you are free to listen to his content on his website, which I do from time to time.
Ask '90s Microsoft that.
If anyone ever makes replacements to Android and Whatsapp that are better, I will use them, even if they are North Korean or Siberian or whatever they may be.
90s Microsoft certainly was a big monopoly that has now faced a lot of competition.
But I, as a freeloader, sure did write a lot of essays in Word. I just never paid for a copy.
That line of thinking falls on the EU end of the spectrum, where they value market competition versus the US where they look at things just through the consumer lense. It's hard to say which is better.
Unfortunately that’s not the motivation behind this story. So doesn’t really seem worth discussing now.
I'm not joking, don't be surprised if some consortium of right-wing businesses start getting subcontracting rights over this stufff
Oh, definitely. That's the one thing I trust him to be competent at.