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If it’s a crime for you to misspeak wouldn’t you err on the side of caution? Anti trust hearings of 4 tech companies at once... ridiculous... All 4 of you have

If it’s a crime for you to misspeak wouldn’t you err on the side of caution? Anti trust hearings of 4 tech companies at once... ridiculous... All 4 of you have a monopoly on... something! Bullshit politics. You aren’t being forced to use ANY services from big tech in the US there is HEAPS of competition. Just US lawmakers shoring up constituents

jjeaff 6y ago
While I very much dislike the anticompetitive practices of these companies, I have to agree they aren't really close to monopolies. Google and Facebook are not social media companies. They are advertising companies. They sell ad space. There are still a lot of different ways to spend as money.
- wpietri 6y ago
  This is wrong in a few ways. One, antitrust includes more than monopoly, including oligopoly and monopsony. Two, there is no generic advertising market; there are a variety of specific ones. Three, Facebook and Instagram are the only way a lot of small companies find buyers, because their platforms give them rich data for ad targeting not available elsewhere. This came up during the Stop Hate For Profit campaign; large companies joined easily, but many small businesses couldn't. Having zero effective choice is a clear sign of anti-trust concerns.
wpietri 6y ago
This would be more plausible if VCs weren't spending billions openly trying to create the sort of market dominance that lets them exercise outsized pricing power. The book Super Pumped, for example, shows clearly that Uber was seeking a monopoly. They only got a duopoly in which they're the dominant player, but from a pricing perspective that's nearly as good. It follows from VC efforts that market dominance produces massive profits. That money comes from somewhere. Anti-trust enforcement is way too weak in the US. Congress's motives in going after the tech companies is decidedly mixed, but given decades of laxity, I'll take it as a good start.
- onethought 6y ago
  ... are you assuming the US = world? Uber didn’t get a monopoly... and there are a bunch of competitors in lots of different countries. And Uber is paying for this with epic losses every year... where is the anti trust?
  - wpietri 6y ago
    We were talking about US-based tech companies speaking to the United States Congress about possible anti-trust violations in US markets. A bunch of competitors in other countries doesn't mean anything for US markets. And epic losses are a sign of the antitrust violation: they're burning capital unsustainably to buy market share from which they can extract oligopoly rents.
    - onethought 6y ago
      So which city doesn’t have taxis any more in the US? Before Uber... where were the taxi anti trust hearings?

jjeaff 6y ago

While I very much dislike the anticompetitive practices of these companies, I have to agree they aren't really close to monopolies. Google and Facebook are not social media companies. They are advertising companies. They sell ad space. There are still a lot of different ways to spend as money.

wpietri 6y ago
This is wrong in a few ways. One, antitrust includes more than monopoly, including oligopoly and monopsony. Two, there is no generic advertising market; there are a variety of specific ones. Three, Facebook and Instagram are the only way a lot of small companies find buyers, because their platforms give them rich data for ad targeting not available elsewhere. This came up during the Stop Hate For Profit campaign; large companies joined easily, but many small businesses couldn't. Having zero effective choice is a clear sign of anti-trust concerns.

wpietri 6y ago

This would be more plausible if VCs weren't spending billions openly trying to create the sort of market dominance that lets them exercise outsized pricing power. The book Super Pumped, for example, shows clearly that Uber was seeking a monopoly. They only got a duopoly in which they're the dominant player, but from a pricing perspective that's nearly as good. It follows from VC efforts that market dominance produces massive profits. That money comes from somewhere. Anti-trust enforcement is way too weak in the US. Congress's motives in going after the tech companies is decidedly mixed, but given decades of laxity, I'll take it as a good start.

onethought 6y ago
... are you assuming the US = world? Uber didn’t get a monopoly... and there are a bunch of competitors in lots of different countries. And Uber is paying for this with epic losses every year... where is the anti trust?
- wpietri 6y ago
  We were talking about US-based tech companies speaking to the United States Congress about possible anti-trust violations in US markets. A bunch of competitors in other countries doesn't mean anything for US markets. And epic losses are a sign of the antitrust violation: they're burning capital unsustainably to buy market share from which they can extract oligopoly rents.
  - onethought 6y ago
    So which city doesn’t have taxis any more in the US? Before Uber... where were the taxi anti trust hearings?