6 ms·
Are you Elon? Also monopolies are never awesome.
by nehal3m 2y ago
Are you Elon? Also monopolies are never awesome.
- Taek 2y agoif you don't want monopolies then you need to create regulations that make it easy for new startups to compete
- nehal3m 2y agoI agree, but given Elons current position there is basically no chance that’s going to happen in the next four years.
- coliveira 2y agoThe future of the US: 90% of cars will be Tesla (other carmakers will go bankrupt), internet access and space exploration will be monopolized as well.
- yencabulator 2y agoAttempting to make Ford disappear would be a political suicide.
- coliveira 2y agoYes, Ford will be on that 10% left.
- fragmede 2y agoFor the monopolist they are!
- flanked-evergl 2y agoHistorically they have been even better for consumers than monopolists.
- montagg 2y agoThey are when you can regulate the crap out of them to benefit everyone after they’ve benefited from government contracts, FCC governance, an educated population, etc.
- stouset 2y agoI can’t think of anything less likely to happen in the coming years.
- piyh 2y agoHonest question because it's something I've internally debated over. Would we have had Bell Labs without the AT&T monopoly?
- mensetmanusman 2y agoNo, organizational slack and a willingness to spend on r&d is required for labs to exist. Monopolies can afford expensive r&d.
- Zambyte 2y ago> Would we have had Bell Labs without the AT&T monopoly? The implication here is that Bell Labs was a good thing. While I find it hard to say I wouldn't have loved to have been a part of something like that, I think we may have been better off without it, considering what it squashed.
- treyd 2y agoA research environment like Bell Labs freed from the behemoth of AT&T would have been a great boon to society had it stayed around in a similar form to today.
- vajrabum 2y agoAT&T was heavily regulated (common carrier) through much of it's history and was a big part of the reason that BellLabs was so influential. Not true of SpaceX and Starlink.
- lmm 2y agoWould we have had a single lab that became famous for so many things? No. Would we have got thousands of smaller labs that added up to more innovation? Maybe.
- honestAbe22 2y ago[dead]
- mmaunder 2y agoPerhaps you’re not aware that SpaceX sued the US government to break ULAs monopoly on national security launches and brought down costs. And perhaps you’re unaware just how many national telcos world wide have a national monopoly and for the first time ever may have to compete with Starlink? Perhaps you’re also unaware of the grip that Russian rocket engine manufacturers had with the RD180 engine on the US launch sector until recently and the positive impace SpaceX has had on that.
- iml7 2y ago[flagged]
- nehal3m 2y agoOn the one hand you’re arguing that SpaceX is awesome for breaking monopolies. On the other you’re saying it’s awesome that “it’s over” and they own the market now. Perhaps you missed the irony.
- inemesitaffia 2y agoThere's no real non cost barrier here
- ssl-3 2y agoMust a monopoly always be bad? For example: Mitutoyo seems to have a monopoly on producing accurate digital calipers that have battery life measured in years (using one dainty little LR44 alkaline cell). They use approximately fuck-all for power whether switched on or off. Certainly, the market is open for others to produce an actually-competitive product with similar performance. All it takes is for the competition figure out how to do it and put them into production, since any necessary patents expired long ago. But they simply have not done so. So here we are today, wherein: The free market has decided that Mitutoyo has a defacto monopoly on tools of this capability. Is that... is that implicitly a problem, somehow?
- nehal3m 2y agoYeah I should think so. edit: I don’t use this category of tools so for the sake of argument I will assume your assertion on Mitutoyo’s monopoly is accurate. Without serious competitors, Mitutoyo has little reason to push the boundaries of performance or reduce costs further. Monopolies can result in complacency, where companies become gatekeepers rather than innovators. In this case Mitutoyo may have a fine product but the monopoly introduces a systemic risk of lack of innovation or price gouging. You’re assuming the market has chosen rationally but economic conditions, patent legacies, and lack of competition might simply be symptoms of market failure rather than optimal outcomes.
- serf 2y ago>For example: Mitutoyo seems to have a monopoly on producing accurate digital calipers that have battery life measured in years (using one dainty little LR44 alkaline cell). They use approximately fuck-all for power whether switched on or off. metrology is vast. I am a fan of Mitutoyo too, but this is a poor example of a monopoly. I have literally 3 different brands , including Mitutoyo, on my desk, and the Mitutoyo unit offers the worst value-to-dollar ratio and it's the hardest to read at a glance; it's only there because it's the coolant-proof unit I have on hand at the moment. i'd gladly give up a bit of battery life for a backlight and some bigger character display; thankfully the market responded by offering this from about numerous other manufacturers.. >So here we are today, wherein: The free market has decided that Mitutoyo has a defacto monopoly on tools of this capability. well, no. Mitutoyo is great, but American shops, especially any DoD affiliated ones, push American made Starett like crazy. All of my less-discerning maker friends use Amazon/Harbor Freight/Chicago no-name Alibaba glass scale calipers and they're perfectly happy with them. My German friends often use Vogel/Hoffman/Mahr. But anyway, whatever. I love my Mitus, and I even have a pair of their very first electronic scale calipers in a drawer somewhere ; the battery life was great even then.
- GeekyBear 2y agoThere is a difference between having a monopoly and having a lower cost per unit of mass put into orbit.
- kumarvvr 2y agoThere are dozens of satellite launch systems around the world. Its hardly a monopoly.