8 ms·

What is the alleged anti-competitive behavior? The article doesn't mention it. It sounds like she is calling for their breakup merely for being big and powerf

What is the alleged anti-competitive behavior? The article doesn't mention it. It sounds like she is calling for their breakup merely for being big and powerful, and if that were cause enough to break up an entity we would logically start with the government.

untog 8y ago
The Medium article[1] mentions a couple - Google prioritizing their reviews above Yelp in search results, Amazon copying third party products that were successful on its marketplace. [1] https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big-tech-9ad9e0da324c https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big...
- axaxs 8y ago
  RE Amazon... how is this much different than say, store branded items from a grocery or WalMart, or quasi store brands(ie brands mainly only sold in WalMart, like Brahma boots or Ozark Trail)?
  - jhall1468 8y ago
    It's 100% the same thing which is why this entire argument is so weird to me. This has been going on for decades.
  - mywittyname 8y ago
    The difference comes down to market share. It's fine to sell store brands if you have 10% of the market because there's plenty of competition. Vendors who refuse to deal with you can do just fine by working with your competitors. Amazon is approaching 50% market share. They are close to becoming the place for online commerce. So when they compete with vendors by offering similar products, the vendors are effectively put out of business. Just like with MS and IE. The issue wasn't so much that MS offered IE with Windows so much as the fact that 95% of computers came with Windows, so bundling IE was putting other software providers out of business.
- travisoneill1 8y ago
  A quick search for a local restaurant shows yelp as the top hit. Google shows a info box to the side with their own reviews. I don't see a problem with this, and I can't imagine it being illegal. Companies are allowed to cross-promote between their services. Changing this would go far beyond tech companies.
- fatnoah 8y ago
  > Google prioritizing their reviews above Yelp in search results This is one reason I use Google. I can view all Google review w/out downloading an app. I'd classify Yelp reviews in browser search as nothing more than an ad.
jsutton 8y ago
For starters, Amazon provided a marketplace platform for third parties to sell goods. They then gathered data on which items sold the best, created their own line of products based off this data, and crushed their customers-turned-competitors using their massive advantage in economies of scale.
- nck4222 8y ago
  FWIW, while I agree this a problem, large box retailers (Whole Foods before the Amazon acquisition, Walmart, etc) are well known for doing this as well. So if that's the line you draw, it extends further than just tech giants.
  - sct202 8y ago
    It's a little bit different though, because Amazon has 2 streams of how they get products: Amazon can buy branded from vendor and control price and selection, or those same vendors could list directly on Amazon (as FBA) and the vendor controls price and selection. Pop sockets got in a fight recently with Amazon, because they wanted to stay FBA in order to have better control of selection and pricing, but Amazon was trying to force them into a more traditional vendor role.
    - jhall1468 8y ago
      Right, and Walmart only allows products in its store under their terms which is far more restrictive, so I'm failing to understand how this model is worse for competition than Walmart's. And what happened with PopSockets didn't quite work that way. They were already a vendor on Amazon, and they wanted to remove themselves as a direct vendor and designate a single reseller as their "approved" FBA on Amazon. So they wanted to change the terms of the agreement, Amazon said no, and that was that.
  - giarc 8y ago
    Perhaps grocery stores have done well to keep their brands on lower shelves and not end cap their own stuff. Amazon brands will often appear first in the list of results, which would be akin to putting Great Value products front and centre on all Walmart shelves.
andrit 8y ago
well, the element that corrupts government should be removed and a govt for the people restored. Just breaking it up is as anti productive as just breaking up a company, if the company isnt breaking any laws. Govt is a different type of entity than a corporation and as enlightening as the comparison might be, a thought exercise is all that comparison should really be.
geofft 8y ago
There's a difference, at least on paper, between the government and corporations: the government is big and powerful, but (in a republican society) is accountable in some way to the people and society as a whole. Corporations are also big and powerful, and (in a capitalist society) accountable only to a majority of their shareholders. So there's a reason to believe that you cannot have corporations serve the public interest without either breaking them up to limit their power or fundamentally redefining what it means to be a corporation, but you can have government serve the public interest while remaining big and powerful. If the federal government followed the views of the American public to the detriment of career politicians, we'd say, "Great, you're actually doing your job." If Amazon followed the views of the American public to the detriment of career managers, we'd be very confused. (That said, breaking up the government sounds like a fine plan too, I just don't think it needs to be first)
- travisoneill1 8y ago
  In theory. But in fact it is the opposite. Companies are accountable to their customers above all else, and the government to its voters. If the IRS makes a mistake with your taxes and Amazon makes a mistake with your order, which of these would scare you more?
  - geofft 8y ago
    I'm talking about accountability to society. I'm only a customer of Amazon in very limited ways (I own a Kindle that I received as a gift, which I buy a book for once every few months, and I spend about $30/month on AWS of which $29/month is a VM I should really decommission), but that doesn't change the ways they impact my life - their influence on the book market, the literally-everything-else market, the cloud computing market, their purchase of Whole Foods, their presence as an employer in my city, etc. None of those worries are a worry about Amazon making a mistake with my order. So I'm a lot more worried about Amazon than the IRS - I feel the IRS is in fact accountable to me in a way which Amazon isn't.
shawn-butler 8y ago
Perhaps not the government itself which exists within strict constitutional boundaries, but the same logic should apply to the major political parties with hard caps on the amount of incoming donations over which they have to "structurally separate" from the electoral process. Whatever that means.
clarkmoody 8y ago
She's a politician. She doesn't need logic behind her statements. Rather, she's tapping into progressive sentiments and trying to ignite her base during primary season.
aluminussoma 8y ago
The government is already being dis-intermediated. You could look at this as the government eliminating their competition. These companies have more revenue and cash on hand than many countries. Looking at the Bay Area, Google and Facebook are taking the lead on repairing and improving infrastructure because the government can't do it alone anymore.

untog 8y ago

The Medium article[1] mentions a couple - Google prioritizing their reviews above Yelp in search results, Amazon copying third party products that were successful on its marketplace. [1] https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big-tech-9ad9e0da324c https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big...

axaxs 8y ago
RE Amazon... how is this much different than say, store branded items from a grocery or WalMart, or quasi store brands(ie brands mainly only sold in WalMart, like Brahma boots or Ozark Trail)?
- jhall1468 8y ago
  It's 100% the same thing which is why this entire argument is so weird to me. This has been going on for decades.
- mywittyname 8y ago
  The difference comes down to market share. It's fine to sell store brands if you have 10% of the market because there's plenty of competition. Vendors who refuse to deal with you can do just fine by working with your competitors. Amazon is approaching 50% market share. They are close to becoming the place for online commerce. So when they compete with vendors by offering similar products, the vendors are effectively put out of business. Just like with MS and IE. The issue wasn't so much that MS offered IE with Windows so much as the fact that 95% of computers came with Windows, so bundling IE was putting other software providers out of business.
travisoneill1 8y ago
A quick search for a local restaurant shows yelp as the top hit. Google shows a info box to the side with their own reviews. I don't see a problem with this, and I can't imagine it being illegal. Companies are allowed to cross-promote between their services. Changing this would go far beyond tech companies.
fatnoah 8y ago
> Google prioritizing their reviews above Yelp in search results This is one reason I use Google. I can view all Google review w/out downloading an app. I'd classify Yelp reviews in browser search as nothing more than an ad.

jsutton 8y ago

For starters, Amazon provided a marketplace platform for third parties to sell goods. They then gathered data on which items sold the best, created their own line of products based off this data, and crushed their customers-turned-competitors using their massive advantage in economies of scale.

nck4222 8y ago
FWIW, while I agree this a problem, large box retailers (Whole Foods before the Amazon acquisition, Walmart, etc) are well known for doing this as well. So if that's the line you draw, it extends further than just tech giants.
- sct202 8y ago
  It's a little bit different though, because Amazon has 2 streams of how they get products: Amazon can buy branded from vendor and control price and selection, or those same vendors could list directly on Amazon (as FBA) and the vendor controls price and selection. Pop sockets got in a fight recently with Amazon, because they wanted to stay FBA in order to have better control of selection and pricing, but Amazon was trying to force them into a more traditional vendor role.
  - jhall1468 8y ago
    Right, and Walmart only allows products in its store under their terms which is far more restrictive, so I'm failing to understand how this model is worse for competition than Walmart's. And what happened with PopSockets didn't quite work that way. They were already a vendor on Amazon, and they wanted to remove themselves as a direct vendor and designate a single reseller as their "approved" FBA on Amazon. So they wanted to change the terms of the agreement, Amazon said no, and that was that.
- giarc 8y ago
  Perhaps grocery stores have done well to keep their brands on lower shelves and not end cap their own stuff. Amazon brands will often appear first in the list of results, which would be akin to putting Great Value products front and centre on all Walmart shelves.

andrit 8y ago

well, the element that corrupts government should be removed and a govt for the people restored. Just breaking it up is as anti productive as just breaking up a company, if the company isnt breaking any laws. Govt is a different type of entity than a corporation and as enlightening as the comparison might be, a thought exercise is all that comparison should really be.

geofft 8y ago

There's a difference, at least on paper, between the government and corporations: the government is big and powerful, but (in a republican society) is accountable in some way to the people and society as a whole. Corporations are also big and powerful, and (in a capitalist society) accountable only to a majority of their shareholders. So there's a reason to believe that you cannot have corporations serve the public interest without either breaking them up to limit their power or fundamentally redefining what it means to be a corporation, but you can have government serve the public interest while remaining big and powerful. If the federal government followed the views of the American public to the detriment of career politicians, we'd say, "Great, you're actually doing your job." If Amazon followed the views of the American public to the detriment of career managers, we'd be very confused. (That said, breaking up the government sounds like a fine plan too, I just don't think it needs to be first)

travisoneill1 8y ago
In theory. But in fact it is the opposite. Companies are accountable to their customers above all else, and the government to its voters. If the IRS makes a mistake with your taxes and Amazon makes a mistake with your order, which of these would scare you more?
- geofft 8y ago
  I'm talking about accountability to society. I'm only a customer of Amazon in very limited ways (I own a Kindle that I received as a gift, which I buy a book for once every few months, and I spend about $30/month on AWS of which $29/month is a VM I should really decommission), but that doesn't change the ways they impact my life - their influence on the book market, the literally-everything-else market, the cloud computing market, their purchase of Whole Foods, their presence as an employer in my city, etc. None of those worries are a worry about Amazon making a mistake with my order. So I'm a lot more worried about Amazon than the IRS - I feel the IRS is in fact accountable to me in a way which Amazon isn't.

shawn-butler 8y ago

Perhaps not the government itself which exists within strict constitutional boundaries, but the same logic should apply to the major political parties with hard caps on the amount of incoming donations over which they have to "structurally separate" from the electoral process. Whatever that means.

clarkmoody 8y ago

She's a politician. She doesn't need logic behind her statements. Rather, she's tapping into progressive sentiments and trying to ignite her base during primary season.

aluminussoma 8y ago

The government is already being dis-intermediated. You could look at this as the government eliminating their competition. These companies have more revenue and cash on hand than many countries. Looking at the Bay Area, Google and Facebook are taking the lead on repairing and improving infrastructure because the government can't do it alone anymore.