Oh there used to be a lot of HDD mfgr in perhaps 1985, all new products like this have an explosion of competitors, then they all get bought out or otherwise ex

Oh there used to be a lot of HDD mfgr in perhaps 1985, all new products like this have an explosion of competitors, then they all get bought out or otherwise exit the market. There used to be something like one hundred car manufacturers in the USA, around a century ago! Another way to look at oligopolies is they no longer need to compete on quality or specs if they slack in unison, and the collapse and commodification of their product means they'll get nickel and dimed to death so I wouldn't expect perfection from them, they find ways to screw up. You can't "wish" or "push" commodity status on a market if mother nature and the economy in general prevent it from happening, forcing commodity style management onto a non-commodity product/market just makes a mess.