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At the end of the day it's an ideological argument. Google has an almost immeasurably large influence on the public commons and society. In my view anything tha

At the end of the day it's an ideological argument. Google has an almost immeasurably large influence on the public commons and society. In my view anything that has such a large influence needs to be regulated to ensure the public interest and good. Capitalism serves society which serves the people. In that order.

root_axis 7y ago
> Google has an almost immeasurably large influence on the public commons and society. I disagree. Google does not have much in the way of meaningful influence over the public commons and any influence they do have is offered up voluntarily by the public to google. If google wants to curate specific content that is their prerogative and if people don't like it they should boycott and protest against google. Every single google product is non-essential unlike e.g. corporations that dominate food, real-estate, and medicine. If the people determine that access to an internet index is a human right, the government should create its own index instead of picking a particular corporation and effectively nationalizing its product. > In my view anything that has such a large influence needs to be regulated to ensure the public interest and good. I agree that tech companies need regulations, but those regulations should apply to all companies instead of being applied to companies that we personally disagree with.
- CriticalCathed 7y ago
  I don't disagree with the company -- I don't even know what that means. I think that no entity should have that much unchecked power and influence over society. Information, and the control of access to information, is power. In many ways it's one of the most important resources in existence. Google is in such a unique situation, much like 'ma Bell was back when it was broken up into the baby bells. As such, it will require unique regulatory action; though probably I would deal with through blanket legislation rather than a limited and targeted regulatory approach. As such, all indexes would be subject to the same rules. It's not a novel idea that corporations must serve the public good. We have long past decided that this is something government facilitates. See, public utilities, common carrier status for telecoms, and hundreds of other industries. We won't agree. Like I said, this is an ideological position.
  - root_axis 7y ago
    > I don't disagree with the company -- I don't even know what that means It means to personally disagree with a company's behavior or ideology. > I think that no entity should have that much unchecked power and influence over society They don't have unchecked power and influence over society. Why do you think they do? > Information, and the control of access to information, is power That's a vague platitude, additionally, picking and choosing what google is allowed to curate does absolutely nothing to mitigate the amount of information they collect or control. Now, if you were proposing a law that prohibits companies from gathering certain types of information or storing it for more than a certain amount of time, or mandating that companies must allow you to delete or otherwise manage data collected about you, that would make sense (and I would personally agree with the sentiment behind such laws) > Google is in such a unique situation, much like 'ma Bell was back when it was broken up into the baby bells I am not necessarily opposed to breaking up google (i.e. alphabet), but that doesn't really hamper their ability to collect information about you, nor does it dampen google's search dominance, in fact, it is likely to amplify their dominance since it would force google.com to focus primarily on the core-search product rather than on cross-cutting concerns across all of alphabet. > We won't agree. Like I said, this is an ideological position. Fine. Not sure what I'm supposed to take from that statement.

root_axis 7y ago

> Google has an almost immeasurably large influence on the public commons and society. I disagree. Google does not have much in the way of meaningful influence over the public commons and any influence they do have is offered up voluntarily by the public to google. If google wants to curate specific content that is their prerogative and if people don't like it they should boycott and protest against google. Every single google product is non-essential unlike e.g. corporations that dominate food, real-estate, and medicine. If the people determine that access to an internet index is a human right, the government should create its own index instead of picking a particular corporation and effectively nationalizing its product. > In my view anything that has such a large influence needs to be regulated to ensure the public interest and good. I agree that tech companies need regulations, but those regulations should apply to all companies instead of being applied to companies that we personally disagree with.

CriticalCathed 7y ago
I don't disagree with the company -- I don't even know what that means. I think that no entity should have that much unchecked power and influence over society. Information, and the control of access to information, is power. In many ways it's one of the most important resources in existence. Google is in such a unique situation, much like 'ma Bell was back when it was broken up into the baby bells. As such, it will require unique regulatory action; though probably I would deal with through blanket legislation rather than a limited and targeted regulatory approach. As such, all indexes would be subject to the same rules. It's not a novel idea that corporations must serve the public good. We have long past decided that this is something government facilitates. See, public utilities, common carrier status for telecoms, and hundreds of other industries. We won't agree. Like I said, this is an ideological position.
- root_axis 7y ago
  > I don't disagree with the company -- I don't even know what that means It means to personally disagree with a company's behavior or ideology. > I think that no entity should have that much unchecked power and influence over society They don't have unchecked power and influence over society. Why do you think they do? > Information, and the control of access to information, is power That's a vague platitude, additionally, picking and choosing what google is allowed to curate does absolutely nothing to mitigate the amount of information they collect or control. Now, if you were proposing a law that prohibits companies from gathering certain types of information or storing it for more than a certain amount of time, or mandating that companies must allow you to delete or otherwise manage data collected about you, that would make sense (and I would personally agree with the sentiment behind such laws) > Google is in such a unique situation, much like 'ma Bell was back when it was broken up into the baby bells I am not necessarily opposed to breaking up google (i.e. alphabet), but that doesn't really hamper their ability to collect information about you, nor does it dampen google's search dominance, in fact, it is likely to amplify their dominance since it would force google.com to focus primarily on the core-search product rather than on cross-cutting concerns across all of alphabet. > We won't agree. Like I said, this is an ideological position. Fine. Not sure what I'm supposed to take from that statement.