• tiredofsametab@kbin.run
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      3 months ago

      Yeah, Google, Meta, Amazon, and probably others really need to get broken up and get proper antitrust treatment. I say this even as someone who holds stock (like a total of 5 shares, so not much) in a couple of those. I used to dream of working at Google as well, but that dream died quite some time ago based on their actions and culture.

    • Defaced@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      That’s never going to happen. I’m not sure on what stipulates a monopoly in this scenario, but the fact that there’s bing, duck duck go, kagi, and a handful of others means it’s not really a monopoly which tells me there is some specific ruling here that they’ve determined is monopolistic behavior.

      Edit: yeah after reading the article, wtf Google…

      • AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml
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        3 months ago

        Because of network effects the understanding of a monopoly has to grow with changing technology.

        The fundamental problem is that it wouldn’t even be desireable to split up many of the new social media and internet technologies because that would reduce the quality for everyone, increase costs to support as a business and increase environmental damage from duplicating server storage and power consumption.

        What we need is to turn them into public utilities that have significant democratic input by their own workforce (the experts and enthusiasts) and the users (the billions of people who actually create the value for the thing).

        • aes@programming.dev
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          3 months ago

          This is a somewhat surprising position to see in the fediverse…

          (I mean, I get what you’re saying, and I guess someone should bring that to the party, but there is s different way)

          • AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml
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            3 months ago

            Hmm well arguably I ought to rethink my opinion now that lemmy is working well enough.

            Look at how many niche communities tried to move from reddit to lemmy and failed. Basically all of them. Even just a little pushback of reddit did a lot (not letting communities be abandoned or closed). Then lemmy is becoming increasingly fragmented (e.g. US imperialists and socialist instances). Then you have people deleting years worth of contribution and valuable content on reddit, answers to questions etc. Or what happens when ~20% of the current lemmy instances fold because of server cost or lost interest? And ultimately how much of a dent on a civilization level is the fediverse going to make?

            All that are example of how network effects create a “toll” if you try to leave them.

            The EU recently mandated that messenger apps need to create a compatibility layer and afaik even that looks like it’s going to fail to work as thought.

            • aes@programming.dev
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              3 months ago

              Yesss… You’re not wrong, but I really do believe the solution we want is to be found somewhere in that direction. Considering the Google graveyard, the faang crowd isn’t all that reliable either.

  • MimicJar@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    To frame this question differently, why is Apple able to sell default access on their devices?

    Quick math shows Apple makes ~100 Billion per year. The article states Google pays ~20 Billion to Apple per year. That’s a significant value to Apple.

    I’m not necessarily disagreeing with the decision, but curious how Google paying Apple is a monopoly, but Apple offering search to the highest bidder isn’t also a problem (or maybe it is).

    As another example, how well did the EU browser choice ruling have on consumers choosing a browser.