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"generally speaking the idea is that more competition should address harms — and that increased regulation, in contrast, reduces competition" I think this idea

"generally speaking the idea is that more competition should address harms — and that increased regulation, in contrast, reduces competition" I think this idea that regulation is the opposite of competition is not correct (or is too simplified to be meaningful). It is obviously possible to enact regulation that would make competition less viable. It is also just as obvious that regulation which enables competition is possible. For example, consider a regulation that standardizes a "social contacts list" and requires that ecosystems in which a use can maintain a list of contacts must be capable of import/export in this standard format. Do you think this would help or hurt competition among social networks? Would this be an overreach? Is this an example of regulation performing "product design"?

JackFr 6y ago
> For example, consider a regulation that standardizes a "social contacts list" and requires that ecosystems in which a use can maintain a list of contacts must be capable of import/export in this standard format. Such an innocuous regulation may seem pro consumer and pro competition, but in practice is probably not great. To start, Congress is probably not qualified to come up with such a standard, leaving you with two possibilities, and new government bureaucracy to manage the standard -- who simply become targets of industry lobbying, or an industry consortium, which is not subject to lobbying because it is already controlled by industry incumbents. This bureaucracy now exists to protect incumbents through 'certification' hurdles and other gatekeeping and reduces innovation since by simply preventing changes.
- shuntress 6y ago
  This seems like you are saying "The system is broken and cannot work" but that this assertion hinges mainly on the assumption that "new government bureaucracy to manage the standard" is automatically a bad thing. In reality, there should be both a government bureaucracy and industry consortium for the exact reasons you have laid out. The industry consortium brings deep technical knowledge and pulls in private companies best interest. The government bureaucracy brings broad technical knowledge and pulls in the general public's best interest. Obviously there are significant complexities regarding the effectiveness and social consciousness of either group that are interdependent and potentially dead-locked by external factors (Such as the effectiveness/regulation of lobbying in general). But I don't think that justifies your apparent "Can't win don't try" attitude.
  - R0b0t1 6y ago
    >hinges mainly on the assumption that "new government bureaucracy to manage the standard" is automatically a bad thing. It might be. Do you see consumers clamoring outside the statehouse for more regulation? No? That is likely because they won't benefit from it. I understand sometimes people do not know what is best for them, but I think the bar for telling people how to live their life should be higher. Every day I am impacted by pointless regulations that cost me money while enriching others. A lot of the ills with the tech industry are related to centralization, not lack of regulation. That centralization is often driven by regulation that prevents centralization. That is exactly what this regulation would do.
sukilot 6y ago
It's a legal defense argument. Of course it's not correct or intellectually honest.
tacocataco 6y ago
Imagine your cell phone only being able to reach other Sprint customers.
guerrilla 6y ago
I think this is right, especially when it comes to capturing externalities. In that case, you're just changing the environment in which they compete.
jjk166 6y ago
> For example, consider a regulation that standardizes a "social contacts list" and requires that ecosystems in which a use can maintain a list of contacts must be capable of import/export in this standard format. So now every social network must be similar enough to facebook that facebook can import its social contacts lists (and thus must beat facebook at its own game) or so different that it doesn't even have social contacts lists (and thus isn't competing with facebook at all). This sort of regulation may hadicap a dominant player in the field, but it also handicaps everyone else, and the dominant player is best positioned to play with a handicap. Things only get more problematic if lobbyists from the dominant player get the regulations made in such a way that the handicap for everyone else is worse. You can only regulate what already exists, so regulations by their nature will always enshrine the status quo. Breaking up monopolies and preventing mergers which significantly reduce competition is much more reasonable than prescriptive regulation in cases where innovations in technologies and business practices can reasonably be expected.
- enumjorge 6y ago
  The specific example the parent comment used may be flawed, but the main point still stands. Regulation can promote competition (just as it can prevent it).
  - jjk166 6y ago
    That a regulation which promotes competition could be made has not been definitively ruled out, but it has yet to be demonstrated. Clearly despite a regulation being well reasoned and good intentioned, it may nevertheless produce the opposite effect. Identifying the issues with such a regulation prior to its passage may be quite difficult, even before we consider the financial incentive to deliberately craft and promote a deceptive regulation. On top of this, there is still the fact that regulations can not accurately anticipate future innovation and thus it is purely left to chance that a regulation which promotes competition right now will continue to do so in the future. If we had a history of strong independent regulatory bodies who consistently updated regulations as new data emerged and dropped regulations which were found to do more harm than good, I might agree that we should strive for those hypothetical good regulations, but alas we can be quite confident that a regulation which stifles competition (whether intentionally or not) will stay on the books for years if not decades. I'd love to be convinced otherwise but I see no reason to believe regulating innovative industries like tech is likely to be a good idea.

JackFr 6y ago

> For example, consider a regulation that standardizes a "social contacts list" and requires that ecosystems in which a use can maintain a list of contacts must be capable of import/export in this standard format. Such an innocuous regulation may seem pro consumer and pro competition, but in practice is probably not great. To start, Congress is probably not qualified to come up with such a standard, leaving you with two possibilities, and new government bureaucracy to manage the standard -- who simply become targets of industry lobbying, or an industry consortium, which is not subject to lobbying because it is already controlled by industry incumbents. This bureaucracy now exists to protect incumbents through 'certification' hurdles and other gatekeeping and reduces innovation since by simply preventing changes.

shuntress 6y ago
This seems like you are saying "The system is broken and cannot work" but that this assertion hinges mainly on the assumption that "new government bureaucracy to manage the standard" is automatically a bad thing. In reality, there should be both a government bureaucracy and industry consortium for the exact reasons you have laid out. The industry consortium brings deep technical knowledge and pulls in private companies best interest. The government bureaucracy brings broad technical knowledge and pulls in the general public's best interest. Obviously there are significant complexities regarding the effectiveness and social consciousness of either group that are interdependent and potentially dead-locked by external factors (Such as the effectiveness/regulation of lobbying in general). But I don't think that justifies your apparent "Can't win don't try" attitude.
- R0b0t1 6y ago
  >hinges mainly on the assumption that "new government bureaucracy to manage the standard" is automatically a bad thing. It might be. Do you see consumers clamoring outside the statehouse for more regulation? No? That is likely because they won't benefit from it. I understand sometimes people do not know what is best for them, but I think the bar for telling people how to live their life should be higher. Every day I am impacted by pointless regulations that cost me money while enriching others. A lot of the ills with the tech industry are related to centralization, not lack of regulation. That centralization is often driven by regulation that prevents centralization. That is exactly what this regulation would do.

sukilot 6y ago

It's a legal defense argument. Of course it's not correct or intellectually honest.

tacocataco 6y ago

Imagine your cell phone only being able to reach other Sprint customers.

guerrilla 6y ago

I think this is right, especially when it comes to capturing externalities. In that case, you're just changing the environment in which they compete.

jjk166 6y ago

> For example, consider a regulation that standardizes a "social contacts list" and requires that ecosystems in which a use can maintain a list of contacts must be capable of import/export in this standard format. So now every social network must be similar enough to facebook that facebook can import its social contacts lists (and thus must beat facebook at its own game) or so different that it doesn't even have social contacts lists (and thus isn't competing with facebook at all). This sort of regulation may hadicap a dominant player in the field, but it also handicaps everyone else, and the dominant player is best positioned to play with a handicap. Things only get more problematic if lobbyists from the dominant player get the regulations made in such a way that the handicap for everyone else is worse. You can only regulate what already exists, so regulations by their nature will always enshrine the status quo. Breaking up monopolies and preventing mergers which significantly reduce competition is much more reasonable than prescriptive regulation in cases where innovations in technologies and business practices can reasonably be expected.

enumjorge 6y ago
The specific example the parent comment used may be flawed, but the main point still stands. Regulation can promote competition (just as it can prevent it).
- jjk166 6y ago
  That a regulation which promotes competition could be made has not been definitively ruled out, but it has yet to be demonstrated. Clearly despite a regulation being well reasoned and good intentioned, it may nevertheless produce the opposite effect. Identifying the issues with such a regulation prior to its passage may be quite difficult, even before we consider the financial incentive to deliberately craft and promote a deceptive regulation. On top of this, there is still the fact that regulations can not accurately anticipate future innovation and thus it is purely left to chance that a regulation which promotes competition right now will continue to do so in the future. If we had a history of strong independent regulatory bodies who consistently updated regulations as new data emerged and dropped regulations which were found to do more harm than good, I might agree that we should strive for those hypothetical good regulations, but alas we can be quite confident that a regulation which stifles competition (whether intentionally or not) will stay on the books for years if not decades. I'd love to be convinced otherwise but I see no reason to believe regulating innovative industries like tech is likely to be a good idea.