Techdirt Podcast Episode 97: Can Tech Be Trusted Without Antitrust?

from the sometimes? dept

Tue, Nov 1st 2016 12:45pm — Leigh Beadon

Monopolies are one of the areas that even the most staunchly anti-regulation folks often agree there is a role for government intervention. In the world of tech, multiple big antitrust fights have broken out and continue to rage in both America and the EU — but how effective is this kind of regulation and how often should it really happen? This week, we discuss whether or not there is a role for antitrust in the world of technological innovation.

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Filed Under: antitrust, monopoly, podcast
Companies: facebook, google, microsoft

4 Comments

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Groaker (profile), 1 Nov 2016 @ 12:53pm

Antitrust is dead. One of the first, and most useful, applications would be for the ISPs, but that is not going to happen. Legislators and agencies are bribed and extorted to deny competition in that area.
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Jake, 1 Nov 2016 @ 3:34pm

OS purchases by government
It's probably still worthwhile to break up monopolies that rely on large governmental purchases on a regular basis, like Microsoft. That's how you get the massive lumbering cadavers of barely functioning bloatware, government keeps feeding the zombie.
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Groaker (profile), 1 Nov 2016 @ 6:32pm

Its not that I disagree with you. I would like to see more antitrust actions, but they are not occuring.

The antitrust action against Microsoft did not go well despite many reputed malpractice examples, and questionable business practices.
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Mason Wheeler (profile), 2 Nov 2016 @ 6:49am

Hersch (I think; I'm not 100% clear which cohost voice belongs with which name) was absolutely right about Yelp. When your business model involves literally running a protection racket, you have no moral high ground from which to launch attacks on Google.

As for Apple, IMO there is no question that they need to be smacked down. Their iOS "walled garden" is prima facie an abusive business practice. It's not a question of whether you can uninstall Apple apps, but of whether you can install other apps in the first place. There's nothing stopping anyone from putting a different app store on an Android device, but when Apple gets to decide what you can and cannot do with your own property, that's a violation of your rights and it needs to stop, or to be stopped.
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