Quote (thesnipa @ Sep 21 2018 11:20am)
i agree it's bad, and i disagree with the right's need to redefine things like monopolies to attempt to curb the behavior. they wont recognize what amounts to a monopoly of internet providers, that exploit their customers, but recognize what amounts to a monopoly with search engines because they may or may not be influencing public opinion in a way we can't track or measure, only vaguely see is happening on some level. it's not as if we're even talking monopolies in different sectors, its all internet related.
I think there's an important distinction that while both ISPs and internet titans like google have monopolies within their respective spheres, ISPs have actually been remarkably non-exploitative in terms of expression, social/political, etc (they've engaged in price gouging for sure, mobile in the US and hard lines in the UK for example), the search titans on the other hand have been rabid and foaming at the bit to exploit their monopolies to affect social/political change and censor peoples opinions. Look at how the battle went for piracy in ISPs vs the DMCA, and compare it to how the battle has gone for free expression on social media. There was a brief time when ISPs sent out scare letters to grudgingly comply with the RIAA, but they dropped even that and are nearly 100% hands-off at this point. Meanwhile google, facebook, twitter, etc are engaging in rampant censorship, manipulation and micromanagement of social trends on a
daily basis, which is why I made this thread.
Monopolies in and of themselves aren't inherently corrupt and nefarious. Even in the days of trust-busting, there was an explicit nuance that only the exploitative and abusive monopolies were being targeted;
And there have been at least passable success stories in the 'good trust' departments. Telecoms were only allowed to operate their monopolies when they agreed to measures like extending service to everywhere in America. At least while they stuck to phone lines, it worked out fine, and there were good infrastructure arguments for consolidating under monopoly entities. Once they started charging exorbitant rates for text messages and mobile data it got kind of dubious, but you can do virtually anything you want online short of felonies and your telecoms won't intervene.