Professor Who Coined Term 'Net Neutrality' Thinks It's Time To Break Up Facebook (theverge.com) 107
pgmrdlm shares a report from The Verge: Best known for coining the phrase "net neutrality" and his book The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires, Wu has a new book coming out in November called The Curse of Bigness: Antitrust in the New Gilded Age. In it, he argues compellingly for a return to aggressive antitrust enforcement in the style of Teddy Roosevelt, saying that Google, Facebook, Amazon, and other huge tech companies are a threat to democracy as they get bigger and bigger. "We live in America, which has a strong and proud tradition of breaking up companies that are too big for inefficient reasons," Wu told me on this week's Vergecast. "We need to reverse this idea that it's not an American tradition. We've broken up dozens of companies."
"I think if you took a hard look at the acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram, the argument that the effects of those acquisitions have been anticompetitive would be easy to prove for a number of reasons," says Wu. And breaking up the company wouldn't be hard, he says. "What would be the harm? You'll have three competitors. It's not 'Oh my god, if you get rid of WhatsApp and Instagram, well then the whole world's going to fall apart.' It would be like 'Okay, now you have some companies actually trying to offer you an alternative to Facebook.'" Breaking up Facebook (and other huge tech companies like Google and Amazon) could be simple under the current law, suggests Wu. But it could also lead to a major rethinking of how antitrust law should work in a world where the giant platform companies give their products away for free, and the ability for the government to restrict corporate power seems to be diminishing by the day. And it demands that we all think seriously about the conditions that create innovation. "I think everyone's steering way away from the monopolies, and I think it's hurting innovation in the tech sector," says Wu.
"I think if you took a hard look at the acquisition of WhatsApp and Instagram, the argument that the effects of those acquisitions have been anticompetitive would be easy to prove for a number of reasons," says Wu. And breaking up the company wouldn't be hard, he says. "What would be the harm? You'll have three competitors. It's not 'Oh my god, if you get rid of WhatsApp and Instagram, well then the whole world's going to fall apart.' It would be like 'Okay, now you have some companies actually trying to offer you an alternative to Facebook.'" Breaking up Facebook (and other huge tech companies like Google and Amazon) could be simple under the current law, suggests Wu. But it could also lead to a major rethinking of how antitrust law should work in a world where the giant platform companies give their products away for free, and the ability for the government to restrict corporate power seems to be diminishing by the day. And it demands that we all think seriously about the conditions that create innovation. "I think everyone's steering way away from the monopolies, and I think it's hurting innovation in the tech sector," says Wu.
Safe Harbor (Score:5, Interesting)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
If they want to curate content according to their political bias, then treat them like the politically-biased media outlets they are, legally liable for the content they host, instead of platforms under "safe harbor" protections. If they want to continue to be treated like platforms, then they can keep their hands off their political opponents' speech.
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They're already not 'common carriers' so they really didn't lose anything by curating.
The solution is to reestablish 'common carrier' protections for those web forums that deserve it.
Re:Safe Harbor (Score:4, Interesting)
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What I don't get is why people put "Amazon" on that list. "X is true about a bunch of social media vertical monopolies, plus Amazon for no reason" is always a sign the speaker is full of shit.
Rant about social media, or rant about Amazon and Walmart, but there's no overlap. Amazon is still smaller than Walmart, by the way, in terms of retail market share.
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The conservation is about big companies killing competition, not social media. It just happens that a couple of these large companies are social media companies, at least if you count Google as social media.
Now whether Amazon has been preventing competition, I can't say.
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Now whether Amazon has been preventing competition, I can't say.
All companies that are good at what they do prevent competition from companies that suck, but beyond that Walmart and Amazon are far from monopolies. Obviously, there's two of them, but beyond that Walmart is just over 10% of retail IIRC and Amazon somewhere between 5-10%.
They have no monopoly power to abuse.
You can complain about both for many reasons, starting with the way they treat their workers. But that's just a category error if you're comparing them with the monopolies of Facebook, Twitter, and Yo
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The issue at hand is monopolies and the consequent stifling of innovation and lack of competitive pressure, that being the only thing which makes our economy work for people instead of against them.
Competitive pressure does not make our economy work for The People, when the worker's share of the profit continues to shrink. It makes it work for new Owners, but so what? New boss, same as the old boss. From the user's standpoint, as long as new features make it into Facebook, they're deriving the same amount of benefit they would from competition (since there's no business reason to run a social network that doesn't spy on its users.)
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In Facebook's case, competitive pressure might cause them to reduce what they charge for advertising, which would reduce costs for companies trying to market their products, which could mean lower overall costs to their customers. Another benefit might involve Facebook adding new features, which they would not otherwise have added, or reducing the amount of n
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This was disbanded in the Regan era.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
It is presently legal for the entertainment industry to engage in these acts with impunity. As evidenced by the last two years.
Entertainment Industry == News, talk radio, music radio, news paper, magazines, cnn, cbs, abc, fox, etc.
Holy Fuck (Score:1)
Why do I bother coming here anymore?
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We don't even have that anymore.
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PHRASING.
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You came for the whoo! and got stuck with the Wu woo.
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Re:People WANT monopolies (Score:5, Interesting)
At this point in time,
Jeff Bezos owns Amazon and news papers and whatever else
Satya Nadella is in control of one of the biggest new networks (which slashdotters will never see because it's through Edge and Bing)
The Alphabet boys are in control of what almost everyone in the world sees
Zuck and Dorsey could easily control a MASSIVE amount of what everyone sees.
What's also important is that most of these people seem to have some inkling of wanting to be good people. They're all stumbling their way through trying to be nice and fair and more powerful than the leaders of the UN nations.
Imagine if Facebook were broken into 20 different news and social media sites that were all controlled by basically the same people? It would be bigger, not smaller than it is today.
So... why can't these megabillionairs launch democracy sites which would break the two party system and allow equal access to all potential candidates. I mean seriously, politics is about gaining votes... which is about visibility. Zuck, Dorsey, Alphabet Boys and Nadella could easily outdo all the other mass media outlets in the world and offer a real political platform where "He who has the billion dollar fund raising power wins" isn't how it will work. They could make it a platform which works somewhat like a game or a reality TV series where interested candidates can compete on the merits of their beliefs over time and build up viewership.
These companies could capitalize by making their own kind of Apprentice style TV series that would allow the people to judge how different candidates lead and make decisions. But instead of making it about "You're fired" which still seems to be a mantra for Trump, make shows that simulate real political situations. Have episodes where they are confronted with issues like trying to mediate between Democrats and Republicans who disagree with each other just because they're both stupid. Or other episodes where as president they are presented with a bill to sign or veto which makes no sense, is nothing but 1000 pages of ear marks with a stupid name that exists only because congress can't discuss anything anymore. I for example would veto it and say "Don't send it back until you've actually read the thing and made the contents reflect what the title says... and actually discuss it... none of this passing the shit around until we get all our earmarks in bullshit. If you do that and the bill still sounds good, and you still have the votes, I'll sign it... otherwise, don't waste my time."
Imagine if it were possible for political science majors in school to learn more about administering the government rather than learning to establish, collect, distribute and manipulate political capital?
These mega-corporations are well positioned to make this happen in the real world. There's nothing wrong with Facebook interfering with what people seem to call the democratic system so long as they actually do it fairly and in the right way.
That being said... we need the mega-monopolies... consider Amazon grocery delivery. Instead of having 10,000 stores spread out over the whole country selling the same shit, there could be 50-100 well managed and automated warehouses. That means a lot of really important things.
1) Waste management... any idea how much meat we produce for no other reason than to stock shelves and make it look more attractive to buy and to provide selection? What about milk? What about vegetables? Do you really think there's a world food shortage? Is there a real resource consumption problem? Consumption means that we... well consume it. We don't. The massive amount of meat, fish, dairy etc... we produce and then simply throw away... in its packaging
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When we get mega-corporations that compete in more than one arena the consumer ALWAYS loses. Comcast has local monopilies around the US and can command whatever price they want for their shit service - and NOBODY can do anything about it. The consumer has to suck it up and pay up for dropped connections and piss poor speed, or do without. The internet is becoming a necessity, so most will cough up the dough.
Now imagine Amazon had a stranglehold on something that's a true necessity like food distribution. Th
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It's correct that people want one point of access to a thing, but nobody really wants a monopoly.
Assuming that one inevitably leads to the other is part of the problem.
For example, with the video streaming sites, what we really need is for them to collaborate on the platform (how you login and watch shit) but compete on the content, meaning that if you watch American Gods on the shared platform, Amazon gets paid a share of your subscription, yet if you watch Luke Cage on the same platform, Netflix gets paid
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Then there was FDR who had the national radio and used it as a weapon against others in Washington to give him near-dictator powers. And then he completely without foresight fucked up the political system in America by imposing term limits which meant that politicians who have real plans that take more than 8 years to accomplish... won't.
When we got TV and had 1-3 channels,
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Interesting comment. A few points...
Then there was FDR who...fucked up the political system in America by imposing term limits which meant that politicians who have real plans that take more than 8 years to accomplish... won't.
This proposed and passed by Republicans after FDR died.
Then the news networks realized that they needed to differentiate themselves from each other in order to earn ratings and keep enough viewers to justify their jobs. So they started catering to groups.
After the Fairness Doctrine was repealed, networks eventually realized that news could now be entertainment. And profitable beyond their dreams.
They've turned Republicans and Democrats into team Red and team Blue. They have actively stacked the teams... not with political leaders.... not we law makers... not with anything like that. They stacked the decks with "Good TV"!!!
"Good TV", good line!
Both parties ... instead of representing the people.... which means ALL THE PEOPLE... not just your own voters have decided instead that Team Red or Team Blue need absolute control of the government to make decisions without discussing anything with the bat shit crazy people on the other team.
The trouble is, each side will say that their decisions *are* "for the good of all the people".
No... neither party was ever sane... but what we have now is not democracy... It's the roman senate shortly before it was dissolved and an empire was declared.
Whether or not we've ever had a democracy can be debated. Also, the Roman senate was never dissolved. The label "Empire" was a later conclusion of historians, an
Professor? Professor? (Score:2)
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Dr. Who! :D
How (Score:3)
exactly do you break up a company who offers a service for free?
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Facebook, Google, and Apple need to be broken up. (Score:1)
Microsoft has fallen below the zone they were once in.
And how would that solve anything for consumers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Facebook has grown because it offered the best social platform for users. The point of social platforms is to connect with everyone else. Fragmentation means people needing to belong to and check multiple platforms. Trying to force competition won't solve any user issues. However, once Facebook stops providing a compelling service, people will move on their own. The same as they gave up MySpace and the same as they rejected Google+. The market chose Facebook and will purge it when time comes.
The same with Google. There were plenty of entrenched search services when Google came to be. Users chose it because it was better. The old search services died because they didn't evolve. If Google stops being the best fit option, people will go somewhere else. They already have choices like Bing and Duck Duck Go. As the service is free, people are choosing based on functionality, not on price. Those that don't like the privacy price of Google are opting for other services. You can't just declare another search service is required and then force the public to use it so that you can claim to have multiple services with comparable market share.
If people were given a choice of all you can eat steak or beets at equal cost, odds are that the majority would choose steak. When you remove cost and scarcity, the premium option will dominate. Digital services don't have scarcity like physical products do. It's a different economy.
Re:And how would that solve anything for consumers (Score:4, Interesting)
Facebook has grown because it offered the best social platform for users.
As stated in the summary: Facebook has grown by purchasing their competitors. The summary mentions WhatsApp and Instagram specifically.
Your comment about the problem with fragmentation is an example of why Facebook needs to be broken up by an outside entity: they have a natural monopoly, since real competition from startups would lead to fragmentation.
I've said this before, but if the government came along and broke up the company by splitting off Facebook's front-end from its back-end, then we could have competition on the front-end without fragmentation of the userbase. This scenario can only happen through regulation though.
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As stated in the summary: Facebook has grown by purchasing their competitors. The summary mentions WhatsApp and Instagram specifically.
While this is true, so far they have not bought their competitors to shut them down, or to raise prices to the detriment of consumers. They are building a monopoly, but so far, it is not harmful from an economic perspective, and unfortunately I don't think anti-trust law is concerned with privacy, so the case for breaking up Facebook is not strong.
Apple would be a much juicier target, especially as they recently became the world's first trillion dollar company (with Amazon close behind). Splitting out the
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Facebook has grown by both natural monopoly and aquisition. Growth by natural monopoly is not prohibited by, and not fixable by, antitrust law as it currentl
Re:And how would that solve anything for consumers (Score:4, Insightful)
"Fragmentation means people needing to belong to and check multiple platforms"
No, it doesn't. How many email services do you connect to? There are thousands of them and still you don't have any problem to get and send emails from/to anyother. How can this be?
Hint: the fact that things are a given way doesn't mean it must be the only possible one.
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How many email services do you connect to? There are thousands of them and still you don't have any problem to get and send emails from/to anyother. How can this be?
Because email is not a social network, it is point to point. Even NNTP delivery was fragmented, though. You'd have to go to specific news servers to get access to certain hierarchies, let alone groups. Being technically able to share information doesn't guarantee that it will happen.
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"Email is not point to point. TO/CC/BCC all has the option to give multiple recipients."
It's too bad you don't know how email works. When you put a bunch of recipients into an email, that same email is sent to each of the recipients in turn, with jiggered headers. And it's point to point, as a connection is made to each server, and a copy created for each recipient. And it has been always thus, although UUCP nodes used to do all communication through a single smarthost which would forward the individual mes
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"Being technically able to share information doesn't guarantee that it will happen."
No, of course not, reality being my guest. Conversely, that it is not happening now doesn't mean it can't happen. Which turns back to the parent poster: there's no technical limitation so that having multiple "social network" providers forceully leads to fragmentation, which means he is wrong.
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Facebook has grown because it offered the best social platform for users.
Hmmm. "Best" isn't defined here, not by you and not by context, other than the vague inference that because it grew it must be the best. Facebook grew because it was in the right spot at the right time, and now the "network effect" of its accumulated base is a significant barrier to entry to competition.
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That stifles innovation. Once you have a standardized protocol, everyone on that standard has to agree to changes and roll them out at the same time. The only way to really innovate requires someone start a completely new service that's not part of the open network.
ok (Score:1)
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We need open platforms (Score:2)
These proprietary social networks are bad for free speech.
I have no problem with facebook, google, twitter, except that they concentrate the internet in the hands of a few large companies.
We need open platforms like HTML, TCP/IP, Email, Newsgroups, etc.
All old retrograde stuff according to the children. But there isn't one of these social networks that couldn't be made P2P or something that anyone could set up their own personal server for that interlinked with each other.
A 20 dollar raspberry pi could host
Not a monopoly or required... (Score:3)
I don't like Facebook either but its not a monopoly, nor is it required in anyway to use the internet. Anyone could come up with the next social network thing anytime now or you can just NOT use Facebook. It isn't like an OS or a browser that is necessary for use or access to anything. Facebook or Twitter are tools of convenience and can easily be done without. If you don't like what is being said filter it out or don't use either.
We had the chance... (Score:2)
and blew it...with Microsoft. They should have been broken up just like Standard Oil. But they were not and that just created a precedent for companies like Facebook and Amazon and Google. We reap what we sow.
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Why I posted this (Score:2)
What the f____ (Score:2)
"Look over here! See? We're thinking about maybe eventually doing something someday! (Pay no attention to the massive personal data collection feast that every-single-damn-corporation and government in the entire bloody world is gorging on behind the curtain)"
WHY do people give so many shits for instabook and facegram? It's not something anybody actually needs to begin with. For fucks sake. Big tech is not "The internet"... in fact, the case has been made that these companies are big evil time eaters that p
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social platforms should be open (Score:1)
The Importance of Patent Reform (Score:3)
"I think everyone's steering way away from the monopolies, and I think it's hurting innovation in the tech sector..."
Monopolies exist everywhere (not just the tech sector), but what has truly killed innovation is the patent system.
When companies amass tens of thousands of patents they'll never actually use in huge patent "war chests", it only serves one purpose; to allow Greed to stifle and control innovation.
Innovation reform is pointless without patent reform. You can't throw a stick 10 feet without hitting something that is patented 746 ways, to include throwing a stick 10 feet. When the world is controlled at that level, any attempt to innovate becomes more and more pointless and frustrating.
Remember the SURGE of innovation (Score:1)
Wu Who? (Score:2)
TFS: It's good style to use the complete name of the subject of an article at least once. But yeah, this is Slashdot, so carry on editors.
Forced to use Facebook? (Score:2)
Who the heck is forced to use Facebook? If you think it is the only place on the Internet, then I guess it should be broken up. But is anyone really that stupid?
If you really hate Facebook so much, start promoting alternatives like Diaspora. (a free distributed model social network). But what you'll find is that people don't want to sign up for Diaspora any more than they want to keep their Facebook account.
The fad behind the "social network" is fading away, as people are transforming how they use these ser
...dilemma... (Score:2)