- Microsoft Word — Google Docs? Apple Pages? Zoho Docs? OpenOffice?
- GitHub — GitLab? sourcehut? Bitbucket? Gitea?
- Facebook — Twitter? Instagram? TikTok? SnapChat?
The thing about Git is that it's free software. Anyone can run their own server for very little money. If you get banned from the railroad, you can't just get your own train.
The value comes from the network.
This: "GitHub shouldn't be allowed to deny me service because I want to use it" isn't a fair paraphrasing of my argument. I don't think it's likely that github would ban me specifically.
My argument is Microsoft (and Google, Facebook, etc.) shouldn't be allowed to cancel/bankrupt/ostracize competitors, critics, political opponents, or others they don't like. That means we should all be able to access those platforms under equal RAND terms.
If Microsoft is allowed to play dirty, the major impact on me is indirect, in that we will have fewer checks-and-balances in society (people and organizations will be afraid to criticise them), less competition, less innovation, more political corruption, etc.
Antitrust hasn't kept up with technology. In this case, though, we developed perfectly good mechanisms (and learned what happens without them) a century ago.
> Antitrust hasn't kept up with technology.
(a.k.a robert bork and the "its not consumer harm if prices keep going down" school of thought with regard to anti-trust)
With Standard Oil, prices didn't go down, except in the very short term. Monopoly can seek out higher profits once monopoly is obtained.
The pricing of LinkedIn, of dating web sites (almost all now owned by match.com), and of many other services is astronomically high, mostly because they can.
> many other services is astronomically high, mostly because they can
Also, use a private account for private stuff, if that wasn't obvious