Tis interesting that Disney owns so many companies
that I might use, but don't really need at all.
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Monopolies
- Thread starter Rival
- Start date
that I might use, but don't really need at all.
But only on our planet.
Some people live on a very different one.
I remember - not too long ago in the grand scheme of things - when Microsoft had to pay huge fines for the "anti-trust" act of bundling Internet Explorer with windows, which was seen as unfair against Netscape.
I don't know how Amazon and Apple get away with the stuff they do now, considering where the line was drawn ~20 years ago.
PureX
Veteran Member
What do they buy and sell?
Gargovic Malkav
Well-Known Member
A real monopoly is when you have no choice but to use that company's services, though.
In my country the railway used to be a monopoly.
If you wanted to travel by train here, you had no choice but to use the NS.
I can imagine the companies you speak of could be considered aspiring monopolies though.
Except twitter.. I don't think I've even seen a medium like Twitter somewhere else, nor am I sure if one would be at risk of a lawsuit if one would try to copy Twitter with their own brand and style.
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber & Business Owner
They have their own line of various stuff, they buy streaming and other digital publishing rights, they even make contracts with other companies like the USPS as a means of business interests.
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
I call that human programming projects monopolized.
Secret Chief
Veteran Member
HonestJoe
Well-Known Member
Again, I'm not saying any of that is necessarily good but it still isn't the definition of monopoly.
Each one of those has to be considered individually. When we break up a monopoly its a judgement call, because we do want businesses to grow. We want to encourage investors to invest in the business growth. We stop monopolies sometimes. Businesses know that they can be broken up, so it helps keep them from becoming absolute bullies --- usually.
Bell was famously broken up into the baby bells which now have names like AT&T and Bell Atlantic. Bell had complete control of all or almost all telephone lines in the USA, and telephones had become a necessity of living. Prices were arbitrary. There were fears (admittedly not based in reality) that the phone company culd take over the country by controlling and manipulating our ability to communicate. The government sued and won, and it broke up Bell into multiple companies each with different parts of the telephone market.
What about Amazon? ******************** To me its unclear, so I would not recommend breaking it up at this time. I might recommend regulating its price fixing scheme.
Does it participate in price fixing? Maybe. It requires anyone who wants to get "Amazon's Choice" status to sell their product at the same price everywhere else. This means that you can't shop around for a lower price if the item you're interested in says "Amazon's Choice" on it. Its a new form of price fixing that could be called price-fixing-lite. Is it price fixing? Depends upon how much business relies upon that Amazon's Choice sticker and how much they need Amazon's search engine. If you can barely get any business going without Amazon's Choice then its a problem. Also if you cannot get low prices anymore because of Amazon's Choice then its a problem.
I make a living off one these, so I don't have a problem with it. Probably not so much with the others, either.
Sorry to answer the question with a question, but if you came up with an idea and built a lucrative business from the model, do you think it would be fair to give others the right to break it up?
Despite the simple definitions, monopolies aren't about being forced to use their goods or services, or having no alternatives. It's about being unable to be threatened by competition. Basically lifting itself out of free market onto something where anything like illegal buyouts, market regulation etc can be simply paid off, fines and all.
The biggest myth of free market is that it self regulates. At this point even if you somehow got enough people to choose to not use Amazon or Disney it wouldn't make a difference. They could still operate at a 'loss' and get gains through massive amounts of wealth hoarding. (This isn't even harder for smaller titans. Tesla has only has one, ONE year where it earned a profit. Yet it continued to accrue wealth.)
And if someone somehow did make a rival product or service, they could use both legal and illegal hostile buyout techniques to gain it, because doing illegal business is just part of business since they aren't threatened by any normal fines.
It also makes places like Amazon and Disney ****ty places to work at because workers rights orgs can't get a leg in and it's easy for Amazon to just pay off safety violation fees.
The real problem here though, is that anti-trust laws havent been keeping up with complex digital markets, which involves all of the above corps. No significant law has been added in over 100 years. So despite the fact that there isn't a brick and mortar store in the world not effected by Amazon pricing, it's not looked at as a comparable market.
The biggest myth of free market is that it self regulates. At this point even if you somehow got enough people to choose to not use Amazon or Disney it wouldn't make a difference. They could still operate at a 'loss' and get gains through massive amounts of wealth hoarding. (This isn't even harder for smaller titans. Tesla has only has one, ONE year where it earned a profit. Yet it continued to accrue wealth.)
And if someone somehow did make a rival product or service, they could use both legal and illegal hostile buyout techniques to gain it, because doing illegal business is just part of business since they aren't threatened by any normal fines.
It also makes places like Amazon and Disney ****ty places to work at because workers rights orgs can't get a leg in and it's easy for Amazon to just pay off safety violation fees.
The real problem here though, is that anti-trust laws havent been keeping up with complex digital markets, which involves all of the above corps. No significant law has been added in over 100 years. So despite the fact that there isn't a brick and mortar store in the world not effected by Amazon pricing, it's not looked at as a comparable market.
Yup. One of the issues with Australian politics is an over-concentration of media ownership.
Gargovic Malkav
Well-Known Member
Not when any form of social media is compared to twitter, no.
PureX
Veteran Member
But what little actual entertainment content they produce is a complete luxury item that anyone can easily live without if it's over-priced. So there's really no way for them to create a monopoly with it. And apart from that, they don't actually make and sell anything, they just offer an interface between buyers and sellers for a small fee. And if they try to exploit that fee, someone else will quickly set up a replacement.
I think the thing we would need to watch with Amazon is their control over all the commerce they enable. If they start using that to create shortages, and price increases, and manipulating the market values of the companies that sell through them, that could be a real problem.
PureX
Veteran Member
Yes, but what that definition misses is the fact that supposed competitors can and do collude to create effective monopolies without actually becoming one company. AND they can do this without ever actually meeting and stating their mutual intent to do so. Making them impossible to prosecute.
This is how most monopolies occur now days. They are either conjoined by being swallowed up by giant conglomerates, or they collude by mutual desire. Greed makes very cooperative "competitors".
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Secret Chief
Veteran Member
I agree the world is probably full of informal cartels.
And surprise, Jeff Bezos has bought the Washington Post and affiliated papers.
Of course, most of our other news outlets already seem to be owned by your countryman, Rupert Murdoch.
Shadow Wolf
Certified People sTabber & Business Owner
You should give Kindle a try. Seriously. There are affordable "economic" versions (it advertises a book to you when you wake it up), the screen kind of looks like real paper (which makes it way easier on the eyes), and especially because e-books generally cost way less and there's lots of stuff you can get very for cheap (including complete works of many classic authors) and many things even for free. In terms of opening up what you can read it's only bested by placing holds through WorldCat (and even then, the Kindle has many things that are e-book only and it's still way more convenient). It's so good that even those who don't want to make the switch are forced to admit the merits of the device.
And, yes, Amazon has their own brand of stuff and sell things directly. And all those individuals and businesses who are selling in Amazon? There's more and more joining them because Amazon is dominating more and more of the market.
List of Amazon brands - Wikipedia