4 ms·

Can't reply to tombert, we're too deeply nested for hacker news, but the Microsoft example is great. The government didn't have anything to do with them being

by krupan 1mo ago

Can't reply to tombert, we're too deeply nested for hacker news, but the Microsoft example is great. The government didn't have anything to do with them being a monopoly? Have you heard of copyright laws? Did you know that Microsoft's whole business depends on the application of copyright laws to software? Did you know copyright protection used to only last for a few years? And then copyright holders lobbied government for longer and longer copyright protection?

tombert 1mo ago
Even if I concede all of this, and I really don’t, that doesn’t imply that it was a concerted effort to make Microsoft in particular a monopoly, at least not in the same way that they, for example, made AT&T a monopoly. Are you suggesting that the existence of laws means that monopolies are inherently government ordained? Great, then that means that the standard oil example still holds. P.S. you can actually keep replying, there’s just an artificial timer as they get nested. You can actually get around that if you click on the date/time (e.g. “2 hours ago”) and reply directly.
- krupan 1mo ago
  Aha! Neat trick to defeat hacker news's attempt to keep us from having long unproductive conversations. Let's keep it going. Does it matter if the government purposely ordained the monopoly or stupidly made it possible by extending copyright protections indefinitely? The government is the problem either way and they shouldn't have that much power!
- pocksuppet 26d ago
  It's still government protection which caused Microsoft to be a monopoly. You provide a great example of libertarian goalpost-moving: > Microsoft wasn't protected by the government. > Yes they were, by copyright law. > But the government didn't set out to make Microsoft a monopoly.
WalterBright 1mo ago
Copyright is a government granted monopoly. Over time, I've come to conclude that copyright should not be a monopoly, or at least the copyright protection shouldn't last more than a handful of years.

by krupan 1mo ago

tombert 1mo ago

Even if I concede all of this, and I really don’t, that doesn’t imply that it was a concerted effort to make Microsoft in particular a monopoly, at least not in the same way that they, for example, made AT&T a monopoly. Are you suggesting that the existence of laws means that monopolies are inherently government ordained? Great, then that means that the standard oil example still holds. P.S. you can actually keep replying, there’s just an artificial timer as they get nested. You can actually get around that if you click on the date/time (e.g. “2 hours ago”) and reply directly.

krupan 1mo ago
Aha! Neat trick to defeat hacker news's attempt to keep us from having long unproductive conversations. Let's keep it going. Does it matter if the government purposely ordained the monopoly or stupidly made it possible by extending copyright protections indefinitely? The government is the problem either way and they shouldn't have that much power!
pocksuppet 26d ago
It's still government protection which caused Microsoft to be a monopoly. You provide a great example of libertarian goalpost-moving: > Microsoft wasn't protected by the government. > Yes they were, by copyright law. > But the government didn't set out to make Microsoft a monopoly.

WalterBright 1mo ago

Copyright is a government granted monopoly. Over time, I've come to conclude that copyright should not be a monopoly, or at least the copyright protection shouldn't last more than a handful of years.