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The market has failed. It's allowed massive monopolistic and anti-competitive scenarios to play out, and technology outran legislation like crazy. There are bil

The market has failed. It's allowed massive monopolistic and anti-competitive scenarios to play out, and technology outran legislation like crazy. There are billions of people who are a victim of the failure mode I pointed out. You using an alternative (and being here, on this forum) singles you out as one of one in tens of millions of people with the capacity and knowledge to accomplish that. 25 years ago it made sense to let things play out. Now we're looking at ownership by subscription, and people unable to actually own their own devices, with constant, ubiquitous, global surveillance for all but the most wealthy, and even them most of the time. We see a proliferation of some of the worst possible things online, and companies that are unable and unwilling to effectively moderate their billions of users with resorting to heavy handed authoritarian tactics. Tactics which, when recognized by those in power, are quickly taken over and utilized for purposes far beyond anything so prosaic as "protecting children" or "combating terrorism." Apple and Microsoft and Google and the rest have shown us that the tech market is more or less just like the old steel and oil markets - robber barons rush in, coordinate, distill the market to a handful of effective players, capture regulation and lobby legislation to maximize their own profit, and there is no concomitant return of value to the users or the market in general. If you're too big to run the business responsibly, you should be legally prohibited from expanding further. This is about as pro-market as you can get, it requires actual unmet needs in any market to be met, and holds those operating in the market to account for their behavior.

kulahan 1y ago
This failure is primarily due to regulatory capture, rather than a failed free market approach, for what it’s worth.
- bigyabai 1y ago
  You're going to need some actual citations for that narrative before anyone buys into it. The US refused serious regulation out of fear of stifling a fully-financialized economy. Now that America has no manufacturing capacity and a weak grasp on raw materials, our only lucrative businesses embrace exploitative subscription services, lock-in and planned obsolescence. Every economist in the US could have surmised that this would be an issue following the aforementioned oil/steel rackets. It just switched from the secondary sector to the tertiary sector of the economy.
  - kulahan 1y ago
    I think you might have a slightly off-kilter view of what I mean. Regulation is not inherently good. Large corporations will often work through lobbyists (I don’t think anyone can deny the incredible access powerful lobbyists have in the US) to enact laws purely to stifle competition. An example of this is major groups like Meta directly requesting regulations on major topics, because when a law is in place, you know exactly how to skirt around it and you find all the loopholes you can. A short overview with some examples on how the US differs from other regions in this respect: https://www.numberanalytics.com/blog/regulatory-capture-us-law https://www.numberanalytics.com/blog/regulatory-capture-us-l...
  - rpdillon 1y ago
    > Now that America has no manufacturing capacity This is a meme that doesn't have any bearing in reality. The U.S. remains the world's second-largest manufacturer behind China, with real output reaching an all-time high of $2.5 trillion in 2021. Manufacturing's contribution to U.S. GDP in 2023 was approximately 10.2%, or $2.3 trillion. The reason the meme persists, I think, is that fewer and fewer folks work in manufacturing, due to a massive increase in automation. In essence, the U.S. didn't offshore manufacturing as much as they automated it. So it seems to have disappeared from an employment perspective, even though in continues to drive the economy. Automation has significantly boosted productivity and efficiency, enabling higher output, but it has also contributed to the long-term decline in manufacturing employment. The notion that the U.S. subsists on "exploitative subscription services, lock-in and planned obsolescence" is, while part of the everyday consumer experience, not a good reflection of what is really driving the economy.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 1y ago
  The market was free to capture the regulators, so they did.
chmod775 1y ago
> The market has failed. It's allowed massive monopolistic and anti-competitive scenarios to play out, and technology outran legislation like crazy. Why is that the market's fault? That's like blaming a river for flowing downhill. The most stable configuration in a free market is a monopoly. Obviously everything eventually ends up as one without intervention. It's a mathematical certainty. This is 100% on regulators allowing that to happen.
- observationist 1y ago
  I agree, and now that we have an existence proof for the exact way things have gone wrong, we can see that these companies are exploiting numbers of customers and consumers far greater than they can responsibly handle. We need to legislate what responsible means, in this context, and apply reasonable boundaries and limits on scale. A single company that leaks nearly every person's private information online should be held to account for irresponsible practices, having damaged the entire world, but despite this happening multiple times, they hardly even get a slap on the wrist. The status quo is untenable. We need better regulations that accommodate reality, and leave regulators no choice but to hold companies and people to account for the harms they do.
- 1718627440 1y ago
  > The most stable configuration in a free market is a monopoly. Free market doesn't mean unregulated. It means that the market reflects the true costs so market participants have free choice. When you have a monopoly, the market is probably not free anymore.
dotancohen 1y ago
> The market has failed. So you argue that the capitalist approach failed, and now you advocate for a socialist approach? Maybe the market didn't fail. Maybe the market is providing what the consumers demand. Maybe you are an outlier, different from the rest of the consumers. Do you feel that there is no option for you on the market? Windows, nor Debian, nor Ubuntu, not Mac meet your needs? Do you think that there are others like you, if so then why not start a business and serve that market? You might have tremendous opportunity here.
- 1718627440 1y ago
  No capitalism doesn't mean manchester capitalism. Capitalism is about the agency of companies as supposed to government control. A market without rules isn't free. You need to regulate a market in order to keep it free.

kulahan 1y ago

This failure is primarily due to regulatory capture, rather than a failed free market approach, for what it’s worth.

bigyabai 1y ago
You're going to need some actual citations for that narrative before anyone buys into it. The US refused serious regulation out of fear of stifling a fully-financialized economy. Now that America has no manufacturing capacity and a weak grasp on raw materials, our only lucrative businesses embrace exploitative subscription services, lock-in and planned obsolescence. Every economist in the US could have surmised that this would be an issue following the aforementioned oil/steel rackets. It just switched from the secondary sector to the tertiary sector of the economy.
- kulahan 1y ago
  I think you might have a slightly off-kilter view of what I mean. Regulation is not inherently good. Large corporations will often work through lobbyists (I don’t think anyone can deny the incredible access powerful lobbyists have in the US) to enact laws purely to stifle competition. An example of this is major groups like Meta directly requesting regulations on major topics, because when a law is in place, you know exactly how to skirt around it and you find all the loopholes you can. A short overview with some examples on how the US differs from other regions in this respect: https://www.numberanalytics.com/blog/regulatory-capture-us-law https://www.numberanalytics.com/blog/regulatory-capture-us-l...
- rpdillon 1y ago
  > Now that America has no manufacturing capacity This is a meme that doesn't have any bearing in reality. The U.S. remains the world's second-largest manufacturer behind China, with real output reaching an all-time high of $2.5 trillion in 2021. Manufacturing's contribution to U.S. GDP in 2023 was approximately 10.2%, or $2.3 trillion. The reason the meme persists, I think, is that fewer and fewer folks work in manufacturing, due to a massive increase in automation. In essence, the U.S. didn't offshore manufacturing as much as they automated it. So it seems to have disappeared from an employment perspective, even though in continues to drive the economy. Automation has significantly boosted productivity and efficiency, enabling higher output, but it has also contributed to the long-term decline in manufacturing employment. The notion that the U.S. subsists on "exploitative subscription services, lock-in and planned obsolescence" is, while part of the everyday consumer experience, not a good reflection of what is really driving the economy.
Eddy_Viscosity2 1y ago
The market was free to capture the regulators, so they did.

chmod775 1y ago

> The market has failed. It's allowed massive monopolistic and anti-competitive scenarios to play out, and technology outran legislation like crazy. Why is that the market's fault? That's like blaming a river for flowing downhill. The most stable configuration in a free market is a monopoly. Obviously everything eventually ends up as one without intervention. It's a mathematical certainty. This is 100% on regulators allowing that to happen.

observationist 1y ago
I agree, and now that we have an existence proof for the exact way things have gone wrong, we can see that these companies are exploiting numbers of customers and consumers far greater than they can responsibly handle. We need to legislate what responsible means, in this context, and apply reasonable boundaries and limits on scale. A single company that leaks nearly every person's private information online should be held to account for irresponsible practices, having damaged the entire world, but despite this happening multiple times, they hardly even get a slap on the wrist. The status quo is untenable. We need better regulations that accommodate reality, and leave regulators no choice but to hold companies and people to account for the harms they do.
1718627440 1y ago
> The most stable configuration in a free market is a monopoly. Free market doesn't mean unregulated. It means that the market reflects the true costs so market participants have free choice. When you have a monopoly, the market is probably not free anymore.

dotancohen 1y ago

> The market has failed. So you argue that the capitalist approach failed, and now you advocate for a socialist approach? Maybe the market didn't fail. Maybe the market is providing what the consumers demand. Maybe you are an outlier, different from the rest of the consumers. Do you feel that there is no option for you on the market? Windows, nor Debian, nor Ubuntu, not Mac meet your needs? Do you think that there are others like you, if so then why not start a business and serve that market? You might have tremendous opportunity here.

1718627440 1y ago
No capitalism doesn't mean manchester capitalism. Capitalism is about the agency of companies as supposed to government control. A market without rules isn't free. You need to regulate a market in order to keep it free.