42 votes

US Federal Trade Commission accuses Amazon of illegally protecting monopoly in online retail

5 comments

  1. [4]
    jackson
    Link
    gift link
    14 votes
    1. [3]
      Prairie_Skies
      Link Parent
      Thank you for the gift link! Appreciated that. I think anti-trust definitions have been long overdue to be updated. I'm not sure the exact metric(s) which we should base any updated definitions...

      Thank you for the gift link! Appreciated that.

      I think anti-trust definitions have been long overdue to be updated.

      I'm not sure the exact metric(s) which we should base any updated definitions off of, so I'm all ears, but Google, Amazon, and similar companies have gotten around having anything officially approaching a monopoly or similar by diversifying it's markets.

      While they don't claim a significant enough portion of any one market, their total economic and cumulative market presence ensures they remain entrenched and growing powerhouses that can push out or acquire any completion.

      This hurts innovation, consumers, and even the very companies themselves through stagnation, as even once great features show strong signs of decay (Ex: see google's search engine a decade ago or more vs now).

      Additionally in the US where money more openly buys political favor (see 'lobbying' aka rebranded and legalized bribery), this gives these powerhouses significant political influence. All of which enable further predatory practices and exacerbates the negative societal impact mentioned earlier but with increased class power stratification.

      9 votes
      1. [2]
        trobertson
        Link Parent
        The EU has a very different take on this - they recognize several monopolies in tech. Their Digital Markets Act, which is coming into force fairly soon, explicitly uses the recognized monopolies...

        I'm not sure the exact metric(s) which we should base any updated definitions off of, so I'm all ears, but Google, Amazon, and similar companies have gotten around having anything officially approaching a monopoly or similar by diversifying it's markets.

        The EU has a very different take on this - they recognize several monopolies in tech. Their Digital Markets Act, which is coming into force fairly soon, explicitly uses the recognized monopolies as the justification for the act.

        This Wikipedia page contains the list of recognized monopolies, listing percentage of market owned by the tech companies. It's pretty hard to claim they are anything other than monopolies.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Markets_Act#Rationale

        ninja edit: "These companies have until 6 March 2024 to comply with all of the Act's provisions."

        6 votes
        1. Prairie_Skies
          Link Parent
          This is neat! Thanks for sharing 🙂. Just shared the info on this act with some of my coworkers as we were having a related discussion. Sorry it took me a while on the reply. Relatively new to...

          This is neat! Thanks for sharing 🙂. Just shared the info on this act with some of my coworkers as we were having a related discussion.

          Sorry it took me a while on the reply. Relatively new to having a Tildes account (lurked for years) so didn't realize replies populated in the sidebar.

  2. kjw
    Link
    Another reason not to use Amazon ever.

    Another reason not to use Amazon ever.

    2 votes