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Neither of your examples illustrate the nature of monopoly, even by technical definition. There are basically zero markets in which there is one completely dom

by jariel 6y ago

Neither of your examples illustrate the nature of monopoly, even by technical definition. There are basically zero markets in which there is one completely dominant player due to the nature of 'product quality' alone, there are always external factors or even natural artifacts of the system that facilitate a dominant player. For the same reason that YC companies don't go ahead and just compete with airliner manufacturers such as Boeing whereupon the only competition is derived from massive, state-backed players - it is not possible to complete with Google today. The barriers to entry towards building a great search engine are likely more insurmountable than even those for airline carriers, the notion that some entity with the 'right stuff' could go ahead and do it is laughable at face value. Compounded with the fact that Google has entrenched and most likely anti-competitive distribution to market via Android, Chrome - the argument becomes moot. So first, we need to separate Android, Chrome and Google at very least, and then ensure that access to browsing technologies is on a truly level playing field. That would be a good start. At this point, frankly, many other browser technologies - even those materially inferior would start to come to the fore - which is probably illustrative of where the 'true power' of Google comes from, i.e. more from distribution dominance than from actual search tech. While we are at it we can legislate grounds for app competition, platform openness, personal data ownership and the rules concerning the objective self-regulation of social media companies. At the same time, we shouldn't leave the 'sleeping giant' MS Windows distribution monopoly out of our sights either. Google has been a barrier to progress for almost a decade now, they are just another Oracle but with pink and green hair.

pb7 6y ago
You can find the exact same stuff on Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yandex, Ecosia, Searx, Startpage, Baidu, and many other smaller players. Best player != only player. You, as a user, shouldn't care whatsoever about the market share of your search engine when it returns all the same things. Have you seen any of the DuckDuckGo threads on HN? People are quite happy with the results they're getting. Google being popular doesn't stop a competitor from serving the exact same results.
- jariel 6y ago
  Standard Oil owning the railways did not stop anyone from buying oil from many of Standard Oil's competitors either. And yet, Standard Oil put them all out of business somehow. Your comment fails to address market structure and externalities: Baidu and Yandex are both strategic investments by national players for what are de facto protected industries. It's futile to compare Baidu and Google on a 'free market basis', ironically, doing so rhetorically will yield for you some understanding of Google's position. And of course: "Google being popular doesn't stop a competitor from serving the exact same results." This is false, and if it were true, would undermine your own argument. DDG/Bing has some good results, but generally not competitive on the whole with G particularly in the long tail - and the tail is very long. Second - if they did actually have results of 'equal quality' then why would Google own 95% of the market? Because people just randomly and arbitrarily chose Google over competitors for no reason related to quality? Or could it be that market structure and distribution (and long-tail quality, which is an insurmountable problem) are impossible to achieve. Put differently Google is the default option on a lot of platforms, because Google uses it's market power to ensure that. The analogy would be: "The Supermarket sells one kind of water. It's water. The same as all other water and it's the same price. It's called Google water, it's right there at checkout, you can pick up unlimited quantities" - and if you prompt, and ask about it, you may find out that there are 'other brands' of water available, and yes, it's probably of the same quality, but if you wait a few minutes, the clerk can go into the back and maybe find some'. Google owns all of the shelf space. In a close real world analogy - it's for the same reason that you can only get 'Coke' or 'Pepsi' in many situations, and for the same reason there is no '3rd Cola'. Contemplate the situation with that question: "If DDG etc. produce the same results, why does everyone chose G?" because that will unpack a lot for you.
  - pb7 6y ago
    > If DDG etc. produce the same results, why does everyone chose G? Because Google is the best search engine in the same way the iPhone is the best phone. That doesn’t mean an Android phone can’t do all the same things an iPhone can. That doesn’t mean DuckDuckGo can’t find you all the things Google can.

by jariel 6y ago

pb7 6y ago

You can find the exact same stuff on Bing, DuckDuckGo, Yandex, Ecosia, Searx, Startpage, Baidu, and many other smaller players. Best player != only player. You, as a user, shouldn't care whatsoever about the market share of your search engine when it returns all the same things. Have you seen any of the DuckDuckGo threads on HN? People are quite happy with the results they're getting. Google being popular doesn't stop a competitor from serving the exact same results.

jariel 6y ago
Standard Oil owning the railways did not stop anyone from buying oil from many of Standard Oil's competitors either. And yet, Standard Oil put them all out of business somehow. Your comment fails to address market structure and externalities: Baidu and Yandex are both strategic investments by national players for what are de facto protected industries. It's futile to compare Baidu and Google on a 'free market basis', ironically, doing so rhetorically will yield for you some understanding of Google's position. And of course: "Google being popular doesn't stop a competitor from serving the exact same results." This is false, and if it were true, would undermine your own argument. DDG/Bing has some good results, but generally not competitive on the whole with G particularly in the long tail - and the tail is very long. Second - if they did actually have results of 'equal quality' then why would Google own 95% of the market? Because people just randomly and arbitrarily chose Google over competitors for no reason related to quality? Or could it be that market structure and distribution (and long-tail quality, which is an insurmountable problem) are impossible to achieve. Put differently Google is the default option on a lot of platforms, because Google uses it's market power to ensure that. The analogy would be: "The Supermarket sells one kind of water. It's water. The same as all other water and it's the same price. It's called Google water, it's right there at checkout, you can pick up unlimited quantities" - and if you prompt, and ask about it, you may find out that there are 'other brands' of water available, and yes, it's probably of the same quality, but if you wait a few minutes, the clerk can go into the back and maybe find some'. Google owns all of the shelf space. In a close real world analogy - it's for the same reason that you can only get 'Coke' or 'Pepsi' in many situations, and for the same reason there is no '3rd Cola'. Contemplate the situation with that question: "If DDG etc. produce the same results, why does everyone chose G?" because that will unpack a lot for you.
- pb7 6y ago
  > If DDG etc. produce the same results, why does everyone chose G? Because Google is the best search engine in the same way the iPhone is the best phone. That doesn’t mean an Android phone can’t do all the same things an iPhone can. That doesn’t mean DuckDuckGo can’t find you all the things Google can.