[freedomben]

> They're entrenched monopolies. Google, Apple, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon products are all shit, but users don't really have any other choice.

If their products are all shit, how are they able to maintain their monopolies? Why hasn't a competitor started up that offered a better product?

[bogwog]

Is this question meant to be rhetorical, or are you genuinely asking? Because the answer is simple: that's how monopolies work. Monopolies don't need to compete to succeed, they just need some way to exclude competitors. All of those companies have multiple ways to do that for most/all of their products.

[freedomben]

> Is this question meant to be rhetorical, or are you genuinely asking?

It's a little of both to be honest. I disagree that their products are shit (in fact some of their products I think are really damn good), and I don't see how short of coercion with government or a private army or something that you could maintain a monopoly with products that suck.

But I genuinely think I might be missing something here. Maybe a better question is, how are they able to maintain their monopolies with shit products? Huge barriers to entry combined with quick acquisition of competitors? That's mostly how Rockefeller did it in the 19th century, but that's not a good parallel either because he didn't have a shit product.