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An exact same issue was raised in the 1910's about railroad companies who owned the rails and started transporting their own good and barring transportation acc

An exact same issue was raised in the 1910's about railroad companies who owned the rails and started transporting their own good and barring transportation access to other companies. I invite you to read this (quite old - 1914) book named "Other People's Money" by Louis Brandeis, it's in the public domain now, quick free read: https://books.google.com/books/about/Other_People_s_Money.html?id=uCpMAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false https://books.google.com/books/about/Other_People_s_Money.ht... History repeats itself. PS: you might also read this book to understand how the people owning today's banks are the same group of people that owned railroad companies!

lotsofpulp 8y ago
I don't think it's the same exact issue since a key feature of railroads is the use of land, which can't be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs.
- yohann305 8y ago
  >> which can't be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs. Sure it sounds easier to build an app store, but is it really any simpler than building railroads? One might think of app store as being just software but it's way more than that, it's an entire ecosystem built by a huge company made of the best talent in the world. Look at big companies like Microsoft and Blackberry who have given up on their smartphone ecosystem (and respective app stores). It's definitely very competitive and cannot be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs.
  - lallysingh 8y ago
    What app store are you on? The only ones I see have crap search and recommendation systems. Beyond that they're off the shelf shopping carts for file downloads. The stores that are popular are so because they're preinstalled. That's it.
- vanderZwan 8y ago
  I think the ability to exclude is what matters here
- drenvuk 8y ago
  Do you think it could be argued people's attention span is a limited and that having so much of it should be regulated? I mean, here's a quick spreadsheet because you got me interested in this for a bit. Assuming everyone in the world spoke english here's the amount of bytes we could collectively consume. Average word size in letters 4.5 bytes per letter (ascii) 8 Adult average reading speed wpm 250 active hours a day (24 - work - sleep) 8 work days a year 261 non work days a year 104 Number of adults(15 and over) in the world 5,553,830,738 Total number of processed bytes 1.87542E+17 Processed Terabytes per year 187541.7563 Processed Petabytes per year 187.5417563 Processed Terabytes per day 513.8130311 Those are rough but I think it should get the point across. There can only be so much information processed by humans a day. Which means that if you have a monopoly on it at any point in time you should be regulated accordingly.
- amelius 8y ago
  Not endlessly, but railroads can be replicated a few times. Same holds for mobile platforms: you can replicate them a number of times, but certainly not infinitely many times.
- _jal 8y ago
  You've only correctly identified the scarcity on one side of the comparison.
ABCLAW 8y ago
For those that don't know, Louis Brandeis is also the father of modern privacy rights in the western world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_to_Privacy_(article) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_to_Privacy_(article)
amelius 8y ago
Isn't a better comparison the situation with telephony in the old days, where a monopoly situation was ended, and competition was enforced?
mlindner 8y ago
I'll counter this with the success of Japan because the Japanese railway companies own all the land around the stations and lease it out to companies and improve that land because they own it.
- metildaa 8y ago
  Note that China also does this, and this is illegal in nearly every other country under anti-trust law. This happens to also be the only way to make passenger profitable, capturing the positive financial externality.
  - kilotaras 8y ago
    Can you expand on that? "land around train stations" doesn't look as a market that should be subject to anti-trust laws.
    - metildaa 8y ago
      Most countries view it as a monopolistic tactic akin to how railroads used to be the only buyer for produce & grain in many rural areas of the US, as they would refuse to sell space for bulk goods that they also traded in. Vertical integration is a strong force, especially when it comes to infrastructure.

lotsofpulp 8y ago

I don't think it's the same exact issue since a key feature of railroads is the use of land, which can't be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs.

yohann305 8y ago
>> which can't be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs. Sure it sounds easier to build an app store, but is it really any simpler than building railroads? One might think of app store as being just software but it's way more than that, it's an entire ecosystem built by a huge company made of the best talent in the world. Look at big companies like Microsoft and Blackberry who have given up on their smartphone ecosystem (and respective app stores). It's definitely very competitive and cannot be replicated endlessly with very low marginal costs.
- lallysingh 8y ago
  What app store are you on? The only ones I see have crap search and recommendation systems. Beyond that they're off the shelf shopping carts for file downloads. The stores that are popular are so because they're preinstalled. That's it.
vanderZwan 8y ago
I think the ability to exclude is what matters here
drenvuk 8y ago
Do you think it could be argued people's attention span is a limited and that having so much of it should be regulated? I mean, here's a quick spreadsheet because you got me interested in this for a bit. Assuming everyone in the world spoke english here's the amount of bytes we could collectively consume. Average word size in letters 4.5 bytes per letter (ascii) 8 Adult average reading speed wpm 250 active hours a day (24 - work - sleep) 8 work days a year 261 non work days a year 104 Number of adults(15 and over) in the world 5,553,830,738 Total number of processed bytes 1.87542E+17 Processed Terabytes per year 187541.7563 Processed Petabytes per year 187.5417563 Processed Terabytes per day 513.8130311 Those are rough but I think it should get the point across. There can only be so much information processed by humans a day. Which means that if you have a monopoly on it at any point in time you should be regulated accordingly.
amelius 8y ago
Not endlessly, but railroads can be replicated a few times. Same holds for mobile platforms: you can replicate them a number of times, but certainly not infinitely many times.
_jal 8y ago
You've only correctly identified the scarcity on one side of the comparison.

ABCLAW 8y ago

For those that don't know, Louis Brandeis is also the father of modern privacy rights in the western world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_to_Privacy_(article) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Right_to_Privacy_(article)

amelius 8y ago

Isn't a better comparison the situation with telephony in the old days, where a monopoly situation was ended, and competition was enforced?

mlindner 8y ago

I'll counter this with the success of Japan because the Japanese railway companies own all the land around the stations and lease it out to companies and improve that land because they own it.

metildaa 8y ago
Note that China also does this, and this is illegal in nearly every other country under anti-trust law. This happens to also be the only way to make passenger profitable, capturing the positive financial externality.
- kilotaras 8y ago
  Can you expand on that? "land around train stations" doesn't look as a market that should be subject to anti-trust laws.
  - metildaa 8y ago
    Most countries view it as a monopolistic tactic akin to how railroads used to be the only buyer for produce & grain in many rural areas of the US, as they would refuse to sell space for bulk goods that they also traded in. Vertical integration is a strong force, especially when it comes to infrastructure.