> More generally it seems like when industries are growing, there is competition in this kind of area, but later on this dies off. I wonder if there's a structu

> More generally it seems like when industries are growing, there is competition in this kind of area, but later on this dies off. I wonder if there's a structural reason for this? This is the natural end result of a totally free market. Step 1: Competion, therefore consumers are looked after Step 2: Some companies are "winning" the competition more than others, some of them buy the "losing" companies. Repeat until there's just one big player and they can charge whatever they want for whatever they can be bothered making available to people. You have to hope the FTC steps in and stops one company just buying all of its competition forever.