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Monopolies become entrenched because of network effect. Phone companies had the same problem until the government stepped in. Web standards are great. And the

Monopolies become entrenched because of network effect. Phone companies had the same problem until the government stepped in. Web standards are great. And the web is really something special. No one owns the web. I can publish my own website with a ton of different vendors offering hosting. There's a power law distribution of provider success but it's still a fair game. App publishing is owned by two companies. Messaging is siloed. Discoverability is pay to play. There is no townsquare not owned. The way to solve these problems is forcing platforms over a certain size to open their protocols. So We can make on own messaging client that communicates with the gatekeepers. We can offer, without the app stores, our software to their users in the same way that the gatekeepers allow. Monopolies kill markets. Allowing a fair market on network effect platforms would make the categories competitive. Smaller businesses could compete. The margins would lower for the gatekeepers. The consumers would benefit from lower prices and more innovation. Most of all, we'd finally be able to reverse the trend of cynical software - 'enshitification' - that comes when a monopoly understands that they no longer need to compete.

hypeatei 11mo ago
I see what you're getting at now, thanks. I left a comment on a thread about iOS recently[0] where Apple is only making their things open in jurisdicfions where they're forced to which was kinda infuriating/nonsensical to me. Governments have obviously caught onto this but Apple is still trying to squeeze out as much rent as possible while they still can. 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45822302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45822302
Aurornis 11mo ago
> Discoverability is pay to play. There is no townsquare not owned. And yet anyone can publish a website, like you said. Anyone can create an Instagram or TikTok profile and start selling things. Millions of small businesses do this all the time and grow on these platforms without "pay to play". > So We can make on own messaging client that communicates with the gatekeepers What does this have to do with letting people create businesses? Who's going to pay you (one way or another) to use your messaging client to connect to these open services when they can use the official client or anyone else's client? I think idealists imagine a world where tech giants are forced to open their platforms for free and they can use their own apps to connect to Reddit and YouTube and other platforms while avoiding the ads. It's a pipe dream to imagine that regulators will come in and force businesses to be unprofitable for the good of the public. Platforms need to make money to exist. They can either charge admission or show ads. There isn't a third option where they're forced to become a public good so that other businesses can freely benefit from their infrastructure.

hypeatei 11mo ago

I see what you're getting at now, thanks. I left a comment on a thread about iOS recently[0] where Apple is only making their things open in jurisdicfions where they're forced to which was kinda infuriating/nonsensical to me. Governments have obviously caught onto this but Apple is still trying to squeeze out as much rent as possible while they still can. 0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45822302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45822302

Aurornis 11mo ago

> Discoverability is pay to play. There is no townsquare not owned. And yet anyone can publish a website, like you said. Anyone can create an Instagram or TikTok profile and start selling things. Millions of small businesses do this all the time and grow on these platforms without "pay to play". > So We can make on own messaging client that communicates with the gatekeepers What does this have to do with letting people create businesses? Who's going to pay you (one way or another) to use your messaging client to connect to these open services when they can use the official client or anyone else's client? I think idealists imagine a world where tech giants are forced to open their platforms for free and they can use their own apps to connect to Reddit and YouTube and other platforms while avoiding the ads. It's a pipe dream to imagine that regulators will come in and force businesses to be unprofitable for the good of the public. Platforms need to make money to exist. They can either charge admission or show ads. There isn't a third option where they're forced to become a public good so that other businesses can freely benefit from their infrastructure.