Given the fundamental differences between corporations and governments (and the span of control they have over people’s lives) I do not believe this analogy can be used for any useful inference.
It’s almost as if this example with app stores is an incredibly specific, narrow example, and government control in this way is incredibly broad in impact (I.e. life or death, end of the actual world etc).
Did any of that make any sense?
I disagree with that line. I feel like people are desperate for there to be a difference based on some 9th grade civics class, or because an animated anthropomorphic piece of paper sang to them about bills in elementary school.
The British East India company had the power to jail and kill, for centuries.
The Head of the Executive Branch is the CEO of government agencies.
Anything is possible.
> Originally chartered as the "Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East-Indies"
It was not. It did not answer to Parliament, only to its shareholders. It has the best of both worlds though, because many powerful MPs were shareholders. So they got govt protection without govt oversight.
The statement was written with the lens of very different goals (corporations maximize profit within the context of selling goods and services where governments - usually, serve the people sufficiently to maintain control & power over its people by being “great leaders”).
Corporations usually sell goods and services, but do not have control over individuals most fundamental rights including those of freedom, health or even life - like governments often do. Corporations also rarely have militaries nor are the final backstop for when disagreements occur.
Your example is interesting because it compares probably the most government like corporation to ever exist (the Dutch East India Company) and the most “nurfed” head of state by most metrics to ever exist (I.e. the least powerful relative to power of the nation - the American President, while being the head of the largest economically and most powerful country, role by role is quite restricted and limited in scope and control by design of the founding fathers).
And yet in the U.S., your health care and pension is often tied to your employment at a corporation. For some people, for example those on work visa, having employment in a particular corporation is tied to living in the same country.
Vice versa, a democratic government has less control over your life than you might think.
And if we look at things like free speech - I can freely criticize the government but criticizing the corporation is often difficult.
What do you mean by this?
Google is a smoking pile of dumpster fires filled with turds.
Should I now expect Google agents to come to my house and disappear my family and I?
If it has the power to jail and kill, that'll make it much more like a government than you like to admit.
US slave trading firms were government agencies folks.
I'm sure we can find some modern example if we dig deep enough.
1) Head of Executive branch is limited by law (constitution, etc). CEO is not limited
2) The Raison d'être of government, at least de iure, is to do good for its citizens, while the raison d'être of corporation is to make money.
That makes them very different - not a lot of people would object to removal of nonproductive employees or customers, but many would (I hope!) object removal (through whatever means) of "nonproductive" citizens.
The enormous power that these two global corporations - Apple and Google - have over the livelihoods of so many developers and content producers is unprecedented. Each of them can wipe out the value of your professional skills over night.
For many people these corporations are without alternative. It's no longer a voluntary business relationship.
In Apple's case, the side-loading ban interacts with authoritarian government in a way that clearly threatens human rights. But at least on that particular issue consumers still have a choice.
Are the big Chinese tech companies independent of their government? And are the US companies exploring bidding for tiktok etc doing so because the US government is coercing them?