[Analemma_]

It's interesting that this is pretty much identical to the WHATWG/W3C situation: there is theoretically a standards body, but in practice it's defunct; the browsers announce what they will ship, and the "standards body" can do nothing but meekly comply.

The difference being that there's at least a little bit of popular dissatisfaction with the status quo of browsers unilaterally dictating web standards, whereas no one came to the defense of CAs, since everybody hated them. A useful lesson that you need to do reputation management even if you're running a successful racket, since if people hate you enough they might not stick up for you even if someone comes for you "illegally".

[bigfatkitten]

Uber is a morally bankrupt company that built its market position through criminal conduct, but everyone looked the other way because they hated the taxi industry even more.

The CA industry is the new taxi industry.