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But ISPs obviously do have competition. And the desire for social media censorship goes way beyond biased recommendation engines. Based on the reaction to Musk

But ISPs obviously do have competition. And the desire for social media censorship goes way beyond biased recommendation engines. Based on the reaction to Musk's "zero recommendation score" proposal for hateful content, just messing around with recommendation algorithms but not going further (ie. banning the content itself from being viewed by anyone) means the fascists win.

smt88 4y ago
> But ISPs obviously do have competition. This is absolutely untrue about 70+ million people in the US[1]. It's also functionally untrue for most of us who have a choice between 1-3 large companies. I live in a major US city, and my options are Comcast or AT&T. We don't even have Starlink yet. When 3-4 companies control nearly 100% of the market, there isn't any real choice. It's easy for them all to just be terrible. 1. https://ilsr.org/report-most-americans-have-no-real-choice-in-internet-providers/ https://ilsr.org/report-most-americans-have-no-real-choice-i...
- yanderekko 4y ago
  3-4 companies isn't a monopoly. Even if there's one company people are free to move. And broadband internet competes with mobile internet. This may sound somewhat glib, but it's also glib to say that a person whose friends all primarily interact on say Facebook is not subject to comparable market power from Facebook.
  - yunwal 4y ago
    3-4 companies in a market can exist and still have 1 company be a monopoly. There’s also the issue of renters not having the ability to switch carriers because their landlords won’t let an alternate ISP install in their building. Then, if you want anything resembling high speed internet, your options are even more limited. Only 25% of zip codes in cities have more than 1 provider that provides >25mbps. So, companies can still behave like monopolies even if there’s more than 1 ISP in their region.

smt88 4y ago

> But ISPs obviously do have competition. This is absolutely untrue about 70+ million people in the US[1]. It's also functionally untrue for most of us who have a choice between 1-3 large companies. I live in a major US city, and my options are Comcast or AT&T. We don't even have Starlink yet. When 3-4 companies control nearly 100% of the market, there isn't any real choice. It's easy for them all to just be terrible. 1. https://ilsr.org/report-most-americans-have-no-real-choice-in-internet-providers/ https://ilsr.org/report-most-americans-have-no-real-choice-i...

yanderekko 4y ago
3-4 companies isn't a monopoly. Even if there's one company people are free to move. And broadband internet competes with mobile internet. This may sound somewhat glib, but it's also glib to say that a person whose friends all primarily interact on say Facebook is not subject to comparable market power from Facebook.
- yunwal 4y ago
  3-4 companies in a market can exist and still have 1 company be a monopoly. There’s also the issue of renters not having the ability to switch carriers because their landlords won’t let an alternate ISP install in their building. Then, if you want anything resembling high speed internet, your options are even more limited. Only 25% of zip codes in cities have more than 1 provider that provides >25mbps. So, companies can still behave like monopolies even if there’s more than 1 ISP in their region.