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[flagged]

xboxnolifes 6mo ago
> ...one day, one of the municipal counselors just called up a friend who worked for a fiber laying company and asked them for a favor: put out a press release saying that they were “investigating” laying an undersea fiber to power a municipal fiber network on the little island. They called in a favor that put pressure on the company from public expectations.
- HauntingPin 6mo ago
  Yes. What do you think happens in a competitive marketplace? Sony heard about Nintendo partnering up with Philips for the SNES CD expansion, so Sony made their own console. That's literally competition. The details of how the "public pressure" came to be don't matter, because the monopoly didn't know about that. All they knew was there was a potential competitor, so they behaved according to that information. That's how it works.
  - karlgkk 6mo ago
    Frankly, I think you're trying to poke holes in a straightforward concept. And now you've dug your heels in and you're trying to justify it. But... let's ignore opinions and interpretations... > Sony heard about Nintendo partnering up with Philips for the SNES CD expansion, so Sony made their own console This is completely inaccurate in every way possible. You even have the order of events backwards (Nintendo and Sony partnered first). There is in no way in which even the most charitable interpretation of this statement could bear out. Just about the only correct part is that you have some (but not all!) of the relevant parties involved. If you're wrong about such a well documented, cut and dry matter of historical record, then what else are you wrong about? :)
    - drfloyd51 6mo ago
      That isn’t actually refuting his original argument. Just proving his example false. Then you beg the question with a bit of a straw man fallacy thrown in.
      - karlgkk 6mo ago
        > That isn’t actually refuting his original argument. Just proving his example false. Correct. It is extremely false. And it's an extremely well documented event, as well. > Then you beg the question with a bit of a straw man fallacy thrown in. I expressed my opinion. I did not misrepresent that person's argument (i didn't represent it at all). As for begging the question, well, I'm not sure what you're referring to, unless you mean the intensely cut and dry sequence of historical events? In which case... well, they're so unaligned with reality that it's comical.
  - deleted 6mo ago
    [deleted]
  - hrimfaxi 6mo ago
    I don't understand this line of thinking. The spreading of a false rumor is an example of a competitive marketplace? If this took place in a different domain wouldn't it be fraud? That it was in the public benefit seems orthogonal.
    - irishcoffee 6mo ago
      It is not fraud to claim that one is considering doing something, and publishing that information. Imagine how that would actually play out if you were right. (You’re not)
      - hrimfaxi 6mo ago
        But in the case of the grand parent the company had no intention of following through and did it seemingly at the request of the friend. > one day, one of the municipal counselors just called up a friend who worked for a fiber laying company and asked them for a favor: put out a press release saying that they were “investigating” laying an undersea fiber to power a municipal fiber network on the little island.
    - kulahan 6mo ago
      Yes, if a simple unsubstantiated rumor is enough to get your competitors to spend potentially millions of dollars to fight you, that's a competition. Literally what else could it be? It can be two things, anyways. You can utilize fraud to manage your competitors expectations. CEOs lie constantly about the state their products are in, in order to drum up more sales. It has absolutely zero requirement to be beneficial to the public in order to be a competitive marketplace. They're also competing to make as much profit as possible, which has effectively zero benefit for the public.
      - WalterBright 6mo ago
        > They're also competing to make as much profit as possible, which has effectively zero benefit for the public. The end result is plenty of cheap stuff for people to buy. It's why free markets have full supermarkets and socialist markets have long lines. Take the free market in software, for example. My entire software stack on my linux box cost me $0.
  - xboxnolifes 6mo ago
    Maybe i misinterpreted the original comment, but having the government step in to pressure a company is not usually what i find people mean when they talk about competitive markets. Let alone when the pressure is through a side channel.
MajorTakeaway 6mo ago
Sometimes commenters all over the internet write like this because they just got incredibly jealous after reading the parent post. I've been thinking more and more about how most posts are jealous or depressed outtakes against the world, system, or other person. This fundamental human behavior won't change, and is as reflexive as a monopolistic company reacting to a press release, proving the parent correct despite their scathing response of the child. It's worth noting that 4chan and Reddit also live here because both sites are insufferable.
bigbadfeline 6mo ago
> What exactly did they prove? They proved that the Free Market doesn't automatically provide functional competition, if you think about it, the Western-style free market is very keen on creating and maintaining monopolies, even cheating isn't going to help you here. > The company laid down fibre because of what they saw as a potential competitor (municipal fibre). The OP is about free market failures, not about competition. As another example, many people have pointed out that there is much more competition in China than in the US. Hope, this is enough for you to understand the difference.
- kortilla 6mo ago
  Western free market doesn’t create monopolies. Where did you get that idea? The only place monopolies tend to emerge is heavily regulated areas that allow for regulatory capture (laying fiber is a great example of this).
  - greedo 6mo ago
    Or in places where network effects make it impossible to compete.
  - bigbadfeline 6mo ago
    > Western free market doesn’t create monopolies. To quote myself: "the Western-style free market is very keen on creating and maintaining monopolies" Guess who's the highly influential investor, with strong connection to the WH who said the following: "Competition is for losers". This sums up pretty well what the free market is keen on.
    - bigstrat2003 6mo ago
      It is well known that individual businessmen often want to reduce competition, because it's best for them. That is why the government's important role in the free market is to promote competition. But just because the market is imperfect and can be captured without the government making sure that people play fair, does not mean that the free market is "a lie" as TFA claims. It means that it's imperfect, as are all human endeavors.
NewsaHackO 6mo ago
So this shows competition works, but I thought the original post was about the free market. When the two companies were asked to fill a need for the people, they refused, and the people were not otherwise about to independently provide the service based on their own funds. I feel as though if the only way of getting companies to do something without organic competition is to use underhanded methods (such as lying about another competitor), then the free market has some places for improvement, no?
- xbmcuser 6mo ago
  Competition works up to a certain point its best for short term returns and not for long term as the time and capital investment increases the chances of monopolies forming increases. This is the reason why I think most public infrastructure should be invested in and owned by the government. Let companies compete on building, running and maintaining it.

[flagged]

> ...one day, one of the municipal counselors just called up a friend who worked for a fiber laying company and asked them for a favor: put out a press release saying that they were “investigating” laying an undersea fiber to power a municipal fiber network on the little island. They called in a favor that put pressure on the company from public expectations.

HauntingPin 6mo ago
Yes. What do you think happens in a competitive marketplace? Sony heard about Nintendo partnering up with Philips for the SNES CD expansion, so Sony made their own console. That's literally competition. The details of how the "public pressure" came to be don't matter, because the monopoly didn't know about that. All they knew was there was a potential competitor, so they behaved according to that information. That's how it works.
- karlgkk 6mo ago
  Frankly, I think you're trying to poke holes in a straightforward concept. And now you've dug your heels in and you're trying to justify it. But... let's ignore opinions and interpretations... > Sony heard about Nintendo partnering up with Philips for the SNES CD expansion, so Sony made their own console This is completely inaccurate in every way possible. You even have the order of events backwards (Nintendo and Sony partnered first). There is in no way in which even the most charitable interpretation of this statement could bear out. Just about the only correct part is that you have some (but not all!) of the relevant parties involved. If you're wrong about such a well documented, cut and dry matter of historical record, then what else are you wrong about? :)
  - drfloyd51 6mo ago
    That isn’t actually refuting his original argument. Just proving his example false. Then you beg the question with a bit of a straw man fallacy thrown in.
    - karlgkk 6mo ago
      > That isn’t actually refuting his original argument. Just proving his example false. Correct. It is extremely false. And it's an extremely well documented event, as well. > Then you beg the question with a bit of a straw man fallacy thrown in. I expressed my opinion. I did not misrepresent that person's argument (i didn't represent it at all). As for begging the question, well, I'm not sure what you're referring to, unless you mean the intensely cut and dry sequence of historical events? In which case... well, they're so unaligned with reality that it's comical.
- deleted 6mo ago
  [deleted]
- hrimfaxi 6mo ago
  I don't understand this line of thinking. The spreading of a false rumor is an example of a competitive marketplace? If this took place in a different domain wouldn't it be fraud? That it was in the public benefit seems orthogonal.
  - irishcoffee 6mo ago
    It is not fraud to claim that one is considering doing something, and publishing that information. Imagine how that would actually play out if you were right. (You’re not)
    - hrimfaxi 6mo ago
      But in the case of the grand parent the company had no intention of following through and did it seemingly at the request of the friend. > one day, one of the municipal counselors just called up a friend who worked for a fiber laying company and asked them for a favor: put out a press release saying that they were “investigating” laying an undersea fiber to power a municipal fiber network on the little island.
  - kulahan 6mo ago
    Yes, if a simple unsubstantiated rumor is enough to get your competitors to spend potentially millions of dollars to fight you, that's a competition. Literally what else could it be? It can be two things, anyways. You can utilize fraud to manage your competitors expectations. CEOs lie constantly about the state their products are in, in order to drum up more sales. It has absolutely zero requirement to be beneficial to the public in order to be a competitive marketplace. They're also competing to make as much profit as possible, which has effectively zero benefit for the public.
    - WalterBright 6mo ago
      > They're also competing to make as much profit as possible, which has effectively zero benefit for the public. The end result is plenty of cheap stuff for people to buy. It's why free markets have full supermarkets and socialist markets have long lines. Take the free market in software, for example. My entire software stack on my linux box cost me $0.
- xboxnolifes 6mo ago
  Maybe i misinterpreted the original comment, but having the government step in to pressure a company is not usually what i find people mean when they talk about competitive markets. Let alone when the pressure is through a side channel.

MajorTakeaway 6mo ago

Sometimes commenters all over the internet write like this because they just got incredibly jealous after reading the parent post. I've been thinking more and more about how most posts are jealous or depressed outtakes against the world, system, or other person. This fundamental human behavior won't change, and is as reflexive as a monopolistic company reacting to a press release, proving the parent correct despite their scathing response of the child. It's worth noting that 4chan and Reddit also live here because both sites are insufferable.

bigbadfeline 6mo ago

> What exactly did they prove? They proved that the Free Market doesn't automatically provide functional competition, if you think about it, the Western-style free market is very keen on creating and maintaining monopolies, even cheating isn't going to help you here. > The company laid down fibre because of what they saw as a potential competitor (municipal fibre). The OP is about free market failures, not about competition. As another example, many people have pointed out that there is much more competition in China than in the US. Hope, this is enough for you to understand the difference.

kortilla 6mo ago
Western free market doesn’t create monopolies. Where did you get that idea? The only place monopolies tend to emerge is heavily regulated areas that allow for regulatory capture (laying fiber is a great example of this).
- greedo 6mo ago
  Or in places where network effects make it impossible to compete.
- bigbadfeline 6mo ago
  > Western free market doesn’t create monopolies. To quote myself: "the Western-style free market is very keen on creating and maintaining monopolies" Guess who's the highly influential investor, with strong connection to the WH who said the following: "Competition is for losers". This sums up pretty well what the free market is keen on.
  - bigstrat2003 6mo ago
    It is well known that individual businessmen often want to reduce competition, because it's best for them. That is why the government's important role in the free market is to promote competition. But just because the market is imperfect and can be captured without the government making sure that people play fair, does not mean that the free market is "a lie" as TFA claims. It means that it's imperfect, as are all human endeavors.

NewsaHackO 6mo ago

So this shows competition works, but I thought the original post was about the free market. When the two companies were asked to fill a need for the people, they refused, and the people were not otherwise about to independently provide the service based on their own funds. I feel as though if the only way of getting companies to do something without organic competition is to use underhanded methods (such as lying about another competitor), then the free market has some places for improvement, no?

xbmcuser 6mo ago
Competition works up to a certain point its best for short term returns and not for long term as the time and capital investment increases the chances of monopolies forming increases. This is the reason why I think most public infrastructure should be invested in and owned by the government. Let companies compete on building, running and maintaining it.