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> It surprises me how willing much of the technical HN crowd is wanting the government to have more power. They already have a monopoly on use of physical forc
by Eisenstein 3y ago
> It surprises me how willing much of the technical HN crowd is wanting the government to have more power.
They already have a monopoly on use of physical force and detention. There is no 'more power' to give them.
You are confusing 'enacting legislation' with 'giving power'. And anti-trust regulation would cover anti-competitive behavior (if we ever enforced it), so no legislation has to be enacted. It is only a matter of determining if it anti-competitive, which it appears not to be.
Rest easy, there are more impactful things to worry about than government overreach into the practices of huge society-shaping entities which are larger than most other nation's governments.
Note: When will a corporation become big enough that we concede that without the monopoly on force and detention it is a de-facto government? At that point can the libertarians give up the 'hands off corporate affairs' schtick?
- scarface_74 3y agoThere is nothing more dangerous than government power. The government has a monopoly on legalized violence. > Note: When will a corporation become big enough that we concede that without the monopoly on force and detention it is a de-facto government? At that point can the libertarians give up the 'hands off corporate affairs' schtick There is absolutely no BigTech company that I can’t use my own free will not to use.
- candiddevmike 3y agoThe cool thing about BigTech these days is even if you don't use them, they still know about you, or you use them indirectly via other products and cloud services. They have their fingers in every proverbial pie.
- scarface_74 3y agoWhat does Apple or Amazon know about non users? My ad blocker blocks analytics on mobile and desktop that takes care of Google and Facebook. Whose left?
- Eisenstein 3y agoOf course there isn't anything more dangerous than the government. That is the whole point of a monopoly on force and detention. If done properly it is used to keep people from harming others. Also, the cell phone in your pocket broadcasts your location a few times a second, and the corporations with that data love working with the government.
- scarface_74 3y agoSo tell me how BigTech has personally hurt you? Did they come in your home and force you to use their products?
- saagarjha 3y agoYes, they do. It is difficult to live in society today without interacting with their products.
- scarface_74 3y agoReally? Which products are you forced to use?
- Eisenstein 3y agoWell, you aren't forced to live in a house or use a toilet or buy your food. If your conditions are 'forced' then I guess the bar is pretty damn low, but everyone I know wants to operate in modern society and to do that one requires the use of services run by large quasi-monopolistic corporations.
- scarface_74 3y agoSo which part of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs can’t be met without depending on “monopolistic” tech companies?
- dwallin 3y agoVery few governments in the world have an absolute monopoly on violence. Most countries allow some private ownership of weapons, have self defense laws and/or have private security companies. Many countries also allow private mercenary forces that can operate outside their borders. People like to assume that governments and corporations are inherently incompatible, but that’s just not true. A government is just whichever organization(s) has the most power within a geographical region and a company can very easily become the de facto government in an area if its power is unchecked. For the most prominent historical example of this look at the East India Government: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_India_Company From a contemporary perspective there are plenty of examples of large multinationals effectively controlling and directing smaller, less wealthy governments. Even in big countries with strong governments, the influence of large corporations on what laws get passed and how they are enforced can become significant.