So what would the opposite of this look like? What software could we make for renters that would increase their market power?
There's literally nothing that software could do to enhance their market power. The most you could do is help them to communicate about who the worst actors are, to try and level out the information asymmetry. But everyone still needs housing and there's still only so many units - someone is going to end up a tenant of the extractive landlords, whether we all know they're extractive or not. It's not like tenants of slumlords don't understand that that is their situation, it's poverty keeping them there, not a lack of market data.
Ah, so that's why YouTube content is mostly from the television companies that were powerful around the year 2000. And also why long distance telephone calls are the same price and most of the revenue is being captured by AT&T. And e-commerce, of course, is dominated by the same companies that ruled the malls in the 1990s.
Most of the examples you've listed are just changing hats (and others aren't power structures - long distance rates are not a power structure). Amazon wasn't around in the age of malls? Okay, sure, but is "malls/department stores, but really big, and online" really a different arrangement than before, or the same thing with more centralization? I view that as a consolidation of power among broadly the same group of people (American corporations & investors).
This is a special case of, "technology solutions don't solve social problems." Technology improves and gets cheaper, no contest. That doesn't mean I can write software that will change my relationship to society anymore than I can write software that makes my computer levitate.
If you're interested in proving me wrong, it seems to me that the counterargument wouldn't be an example of technological change, but a theoretical framework that would enable you to analyze a social problem or power structure and come up with a piece of software that would radically alter the outcome, with results better than chance. Obviously it wouldn't be reasonable for me to demand a fully developed theoretical framework from you in a casual conversation, so I'm happy to concede I may be mistaken if presented with a convincing seed or intuition that framework could be crystalized from.
Alternatively, I'd absolutely concede I was wrong if presented with a convincing hypothetical piece of software that would radically change the relationship between tenants and landlords.
You don't have to do any of that of course, I'm not trying to move goalposts, I'm trying to point out where my argument might be vulnerable in the interest of good faith, and because I'd love to be wrong about this.
That's a very convenient way to make entirely unfalsifiable claims. Any contradictory evidence? Just more entirely unimportant exceptions.
> long distance rates are not a power structure
Ah, right, except for the fact that they were maintained by a monopoly. And that was broken up mainly due to advances in technology demonstrating that society would function just fine when it wasn't a monopoly, plus a moment history where people believed in regulation as useful.
> If you're interested in proving me wrong
Not particularly. I'm just interested in you not immediately shitting on the exploration of possibilities by making overblown, unevidenced claims and then voluminously handwaving away evidence to the contrary. Maybe let it breathe a bit.
I'm sorry you felt I shat on your idea. I was actually very interested in it. My contribution to the conversation was critical, but not intended to be dismissive. I thought it was a great question and a topic I'm interested in & think about often. So I formed a substantive comment expressing my thoughts on it.
I'm sorry this was a frustrating experience for you. If there's something I could have done differently (other than just stay silent) to make it more clear that I thought this was a good discussion or to be clearer, please let me know, and I'll consider it going forward.
I've noted this previously using Charles Perrow's description in Complex Organizations (1972, 1985), here:
<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31254795>
The idea that technology is not socially or politically neutral, and specifically that it very often acts as a power multiplier, is widely understood, if not particularly accepted among HN's commentariat.
See Langdon Winner, "Do Artefacts Have Politics" (1980) <https://web.archive.org/web/20110626114826/https://innovate....>
Some HN discussion here: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9321090>
I agree that tech often acts as a power multiplier, but I think that's because it is typically deployed by those who have power and want more. That doesn't mean that contra-power uses are impossible, which is the claim that I think is pretty suspicious.
How did they do it? The major companies asserted “increasing central control over the creative process”[352] through deliberate creation and extensive promotion of new groups, long-range contracts for groups, and reduced autonomy for producers. In addition, legal and illegal promotion costs (drug payola to disc jockeys, for example) rose in the competitive race and now exceeded the resources of small independents. Finally, the majors “have also moved to regain a controlling position in record distribution by buying chains of retail stores.”[353] The diversity is still greater than it had been in the past, and may remain high, but it is ominous that the majors have all the segments covered. As an executive said, “Columbia Records will have a major entry into whatever new area is broached by the vagaries of public tastes.” But for a concentrated industry, the “vagaries of public tastes” are not economical; it is preferable to stabilize and consolidate them. This would be possible through further control over the creative process and marketing.
That is:
- Market concentration, when disrupted, eventually re-emerged.
- The result was that "'vagaries of public tastes' are not economical", and that media power prefers to direct rather than follow these.
- That numerous mechanisms for subverting public preference and market mechanisms emerged.
Those with power virtually always want more, particularly when viewed through that favourite economist lens, expressed preferences. But there are market structures in which those powers are capable of expressing that desire, most especially in monpolised media, and those in which they are not ... usually small-scale businesses with low barriers to entry and high mobility costs. Classic exemplars are personal and on-site services (plumbing, electrical, hair and nail salons, much healthcare), commodities which are not easily light-weighted, such as milk, concrete, and structural stone, high-touch services, and the like.
Understanding that there are economic segments which do repeatedly manifest with highly-centralised monopolies, such as recorded music, broadcast media, and software and online services, is a useful and powerful mental model, in my experience.
In the case of real estate, the underlying commodity (land) is not portable, but it correlates strongly to other non-portable phenomena (employment, residence, education, general services, recreation & entertainment, education), and frequently extracts much of the surplus value of those attributes for itself, without having meaningfully contributed to their provisioning or existence in the first place.
E.g., we put together a rental listings platform that is free and comprehensive, so we have a lot of eyeballs for renters in the market. Could we organize them? Could we push for member discounts? Could we penalize landlords found to be using market manipulation software?