[Kalium]

Email is an instructive example.

In theory, anyone can implement a standards-compliant system and play on the same level as the major providers. In practice, the email ecosystem has had to evolve a series of defenses against bad actors who took advantage of precisely this standardized openness.

There are, in practice, a relatively small number of email providers that users are likely to interact with. They all find ways to do it profitably. Power is very much consolidated.

[eitland]

> There are, in practice, a relatively small number of email providers that users are likely to interact with. They all find ways to do it profitably. Power is very much consolidated.

For now.

It wouldn't surprise me a bit if EU takes time to look into this after they've finished what they've already started.

In fact I'd recommend we all send complaints to local authorities and point out if big actors are blocking our servers without reason (and no, I guess "didn't care to verify" won't fly.)

[zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC]

And yet, it is a lot less consolidated than antisocial media is.

You can actually run your own mail server without major problems, and even if you use an email provider, there still are quite a lot of them on the planet, and they do have to compete, so if one started to be too much of an asshole, users could reasonably easily switch to a different one, so that certainly limits what providers even attempt to do.