Currently, honest companies that respect the user's data cannot compete with companies that try to profit as much as possible from our it.
I see this as similar to regulating pollution. Forbidding companies from cutting costs by polluting the air and the rivers allows for innovation and entrepreneurship in cleaner alternatives.
It's also really not the outcome wanted by regulators. Everyone losing access to their email and information, YouTube, etc would create absolute chaos. Antitrust's job is to rein in profit, not destroy markets.
This ideological purity doesn't work well in the real world, and it's not about profits either.
People don't care about privacy as much as you imagine them to, especially if they have to give up everything they get for ads today. One look at what people willingly share to the world on social media shows that.
But powerful monopolies are a problem and market competition is the correct answer to that power. Regulation isn't a magic cure and should be used to place guardrails on the market, but in this case could've been written far better to provide data protection without entrenching the major players even further.
Amazing that the monopoly taking a 30% cut doesn't feel like it has to resort to selling user data. I wonder if app makers on a free and transparent platform would act more ethically?
This argument is always repeated within the first ten minutes of these discussions, but I don't really understand why anyone assumes that competition is somehow the panacea to every problem on the planet.
I don't want ten unregulated facebooks who all leak my data, I want one facebook that plays by reasonable rules. The dynamics of social networks which don't deliver value if they're fragmented has made the competition focus obsolete. When Zuckerberg makes this point he is obviously speaking in his self-interest but he is absolutely right and the dominance of his platform proves it.
The world isn't better off if half of the information is on bing and half of the information is on google, the world is better off if those large companies which do deliver benefits to end consumers by virtue of their centralisation are bound by law to implement reasonable standards.
Normally, I'd agree. But with the centralization and corresponding dominance of so many services, I worry many companies can make that choice and not have market effects correct them.
That's the point. It prevents oligopolies forming (as we have now), short of them producing enough value per user to cut them a sizeable payment.
All the problems of big tech disappear when they're held accountable for their actions. The easiest way to hold them accountable is to reduce their clout.
counter point: asking companies to do the bare minimum to guarantee that companies don't steal customer's data, infringe copyright and generally piss on people's rights for their own profit, seems like a reasonably good thing.
I'm at least as leery as the next person about entrenching large incumbents, but if the data required to make people rich is unavailable because it needs to be appropriately licensed, why is that a problem for anyone other than the few people trying to be rich?
If my content on platform XYZ will create a benefit for me later on, sell me on that. In the form of free usage, or actual licensing $$ now. The "oh I can't make the money I want without other people's stuff" is not compelling.
True, and I absolutely support regulation where necessary. I strongly support regulation that require companies to handle user data in a confidential manner, for example. But that doesn't make all regulation automatically good; I strongly oppose regulation that requires companies to share sensitive user data with anyone who asks for it, for example. And forcing a company to do business it does not want to do, seems unreasonably oppressive.
In this particular case, if Google barely makes any money on linking to news sites, and the law says they need to pay a lot of money to link to those sites, then the obvious business decision is not to link to those sites at all, which will likely hurt news sites, because they get less visitors.
There are levels of regulation that will hurt the market, rather than help it, and this sounds like it might be one of those.
I recognise the right and need of democratic governments to regulate markets, but I also recognise that this can turn the government into an authoritarian seat of power, that serves power, rather than the people. This democratic accountability needs to work, needs to be used, needs to be obeyed by the government. So that makes it good that Google shares with the Australian public what's going on.
But the prospect of a few powerful tech companies putting their competitors out of business should concern everyone. And there's no reason for such harsh measures.
Sure, but the corporations have incentives to run things the way they're running them now, and users will aggregate to platforms others use, which will in turn be driven by addictiveness. And you're not going to quit a platform if it means losing touch with your friends and access to your data on it.
I agree when it's a healthy market. But when the choice is between relinquish most control over your own device or relinquish most of your privacy, maybe it's time to regulate the market?
In the EU this is happening on both fronts:
- The GDPR has Android phone manufacturers to ask consent for different ways of using your data and being able to remove data. This is starting to work, on a Samsung phone Samsung/Google will ask you separate consent for using your data for diagnostics, ad targeting, etc. It's not perfect yet, but regulatory pressure is giving people privacy back.
- The DMA will force Apple to allow side-loading and alternative payment methods without taking a cut.
Once this has all played out, we'll still have a duopoly, but at least users and third-party developers are better protected.
You say it as if these companies shutting down would be a bad thing. These products exploit their users in ways the users and society at large does not yet understand.
If a product cant be profitable without abusing its power, it shouldn't exist.
It's time for this draconian type of business service be disrupted. It's gotten too big and unregulated.
We often question monopolistic behavior with regard to market share and competition for physical goods. However we don't see this type of questioning with regard to data monopolies. Hate to say it that while I enjoy the use of Google and Facebook, they may also fall into this arena. Though with those companies at least an order of magnitude worth of effort MORE is expended on some form of heightened security, communication, and standards primary thru tertiary of their core offering.
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