[usr1106]

Why only 90%? For smart phone operating systems it's higher I'd assume (not counting China, that's not a free country anyway). Same for desktop computers.

A major failure of free market economics that is widely ignored by politics.

[lokar]

Except the big cloud companies have been replacing more and more high end gear from vendors like juniper with in house designs, which are gradually percolating out. High end routing and switching gear is gradually becoming commodity.

[KeplerBoy]

>Same for desktop computers.

Does it really matter which OEM you buy your Intel or AMD system from? Desktop computers are a market where the 2 top vendors actually have had all the market until Apple entered the scene with its ARM offerings. I'm excited if others will follow with high-end options (Qualcomm and Nvidia).

[usr1106]

Oh right. I meant desktop computer operating systems.

But desktop computer chipsets is the same mess. We can be glad already that there is competition between 2 vendors (1). Some years ago it was probably over 90% Intel.

Servers is not fundamentally better, just with slightly different market shares.

And everything is x86, which is certainly not the optimal solution from several aspects. I wonder whether that would be still alive with some healthy competition between at least a dozen of vendors.

Edit: (1) 2 plus Apple, which is better than only 2, but sti not fully free competition. Few people choose Apple because of their chipset.

[jtriangle]

We don't have a free market economy, we have bought and paid for regulatory pressure and we call it 'free', while the reality is, it's the worst of both free market and planned economics.

[wolverine876]

Those very market giants have people repeating that it's the regulators, which are their bane, rather than the Republican Party, which do everything to undermine not only all regulation (you can see how people blaming the regulators would serve the Republicans), but every other aspect of government - even tax collection - that would stand in the way of the power of market oligarchs.

[jtriangle]

The party doesn't matter, government regulation is mostly allowed to exist at the behest of defacto monopolies. It sure as hell isn't the common man making these things happen, nor is it people who represent us in a meaningful way.

It does play into their hands perfectly to blame 'the Republicans' or 'the Democrats', and it does indeed make the problem seem more solvable, easy solution right? Vote out the other guy, problem solved, except when we do that, problem not solved, it just changes the guy who's cashing the checks because the problem is much, much bigger than that (and those that cause the problem are much smarter than that).

[wolverine876]

I don't know how you can see GOP behavior, in Congress, the courts, and (when they have it) the White House, and overlook the radical anti-regulation, pro-corruption and power policies and actions.

[jtriangle]

You don't know how, simply because I do not. I just see the manipulation of regulation, which includes, but is certainly not limited to, removing regulation, from all politicians.

From there it's a simple manner of looking up who their donors are, and, it should come at no surprise to anyone, that the money that's behind these people comes from entities that directly benefit from their actions.

[wolverine876]

> simply because I do not. I just see the manipulation of regulation, which includes, but is certainly not limited to, removing regulation, from all politicians.

You are entitled to your own opinion, of course, but not to your own facts. If you don't know the facts - and if you are interested in regulation, especially those facts - then that's your mistake and will lead to other mistakes.

[lrem]

Ah, no. For all the failings of the series of duopolies, it’s still not even near planned economics. Just think it through.