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by bconnorwhite 2151 days ago
The best thing about "tech monopolies" is that there are so many of them
2 comments
tomp 2151 days ago
Indeed, we should be talking about a cartel instead. Coordinated action, e.g. banning the same people / videos / keywords on the same day.
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vageli 2151 days ago
The problem is with word choice. "Tech" has little to do with the business domain.
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bconnorwhite 2151 days ago
True, but even after narrowing this, you usually end up with 3/4 of these companies in competition.

Messaging? FB vs Apple vs Google

Ads? FB vs Google vs Amazon

Video? FB vs Google (YouTube) vs Amazon (Twitch)

Especially re: Google linking to its own sites, are we now arguing Google has a monopoly over google.com? It gets a bit weird

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enumjorge 2151 days ago
> are we now arguing Google has a monopoly over google.com? It gets a bit weird

I don't know anyone who's arguing that. But I do see people arguing Google having a monopoly on search. In a lot of domains, a business can be created or destroyed entirely on their Google search rank.

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twblalock 2151 days ago
Even if Google search was broken off to a standalone company, it would still have a monopoly on search.

The competition just isn't as good at search. Bing has been around for a long time and has managed to gain less than 10% of market share, even though almost everyone has heard of it.

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guerrilla 2151 days ago
That's only if you rig it by choosing the market to make it turn out that way. They aren't a monopoly in every market they are in. They're monopolies in specific markets. No company has ever been a monopoly in general, except perhaps the Soviet state but even that isn't strictly true.

Search? Google. Online retail? Amazon. Video hosting? Google.

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