[cheschire]

I think it’s the other way around. Those large entities break all the same laws and rules as others and then get to the point where they can influence the creation of a regulatory moat around themselves to prevent competitors from taking the same path as them.

[ttoinou]

True but lets take examples one by one to see what we can learn : Spotify was doing illegal things until they made a deal to become legal and not to be trialed over what they done. Seems like business deals is what saved them, not regulatory capture (the regulations around IP for music pre existed Spotify)

[cheschire]

Sure that is what saved them initially, but following that early 2010’s period of hemorrhaging money and eventual recovery, then they started digging that moat.

https://www.politico.com/story/2015/04/spotify-washington-lo...

https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/clients/issues?...

[ttoinou]

Very interesting thank you for the links. I'm not knowledgeable in the Music Modernization Act, but maybe some of this lobbying is to avoid being sued rather than building legal long term moat

[TeMPOraL]

Same would be the case for YouTube. Google case was different in that AFAIK there wasn't any obvious legal problem with indexing, and, back then, they were actually doing everyone a favor.

Hardly anyone had any issue with Google search until the time when news media screwed themselves over by going all in on ads, overdoing it, then trying to bring back the paywall, only to realize no one is actually browsing their sites but instead relies on Google to find specific articles. All kinds of legal and technical nonsense started happening (and then Google improved the blurbs under search results and added the "answer box", leading publishers big and small to collectively lose their minds...).

[nayuki]

And then news media in Canada got even worse a few years ago. They demanded the government make a law so that when Google or Facebook even links to an article, they must pay the news org. Google decided to pay the link tax. Facebook decided to block all news links. From talking to people, most think that Facebook is the villain, in reality it's the news orgs in collusion with state power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_News_Act , https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/csj-sjc/pl/charter-charte/c18_...

[gardnr]

Then Facebook complied with the new law which had negative outcomes for Canadians. The politicians then blamed Facebook for the negative outcomes: https://www.wired.com/story/meta-facebook-instagram-news-blo...

I do believe that large companies should be taxed to help improve society. This law was not the right way to do it.

[Workaccount2]

I guess I sort of understand where this idea comes from, and when I was young I was totally into it, but now being in the corporate world for a decade and having my own small business, I just don't really see it anymore.

Big corps tend to be extremely conscientious of the the law. The law may not be ideal, but they tend to be hyper aware of it and have lawyers to ensure it. Small companies on the other hand are the wild fucking west, and tend to be overflowing with "turn a blind eye to that".

What big corps love is regulation that is expensive for small shops to overcome. They can drop $500k on a product cert no problem, be legally in the clear (and graciously compliant!), while making it near impossible for small guys to compete.