Surprised that HN has this sort of myopia in tech history. Are things really different this time? Standard Oil, U.S. Steel, Bell, IBM, Microsoft, AOL Time Warne

Surprised that HN has this sort of myopia in tech history. Are things really different this time? Standard Oil, U.S. Steel, Bell, IBM, Microsoft, AOL Time Warner. Cries for antitrust action are often a bellwether for organic disruption. A lot of the discussion here is about how to "organically" break the trust via regulatory changes such as repealing CFAA, more scrutiny around acquisitions, etc. It's not possible to understand the first order effects (let alone second and above) of regulation. Doing so without using the mighty/crude hammer of antitrust would presume that one knew how to organically disrupt these companies. "Oh! If only other people were to prevent Google from making all of these acquisitions we would have more competition in search!" "If only small companies could build 'third-party apps' legally!" Once you substitute out the ever-wise HN commenter with a member of our legislature does the absurdity of these statements become clear. Can we at least have the humility to say that we don't know how to disrupt these companies? There is already a massive profit incentive in the form of the net profits to be competed for. The answer to the question "How do you beat Google?" is for the market to answer. Before trying to come up with a regulatory solution, it's worth stepping back and realizing that if you knew exactly how to beat Google, you'd hopefully try and do it.