I think it's basically true though? the way I remember it, AIM only died once Facebook messenger rolled out. Facebook messenger was only viable because Facebook already had a huge number of users. if you were already "friends" with someone, it was even easier to message them there than it was to ask for their AIM username.

Doesn’t that kind of argue the point though that you don’t need government to interfere with tech to avoid monopolies and anticompetitive behavior? The market took care of that.

ICQ and AOL basically died. While Microsoft bought Skype and basically morphed it into new-MSN. So Microsoft's slow growth, long-term strategy succeeded, while it shouldn't have (?).

I don't think this is really a counterexample. skype was already a widely used product when microsoft bought it. joel isn't arguing that you can't have enough money to just buy a product that already has a large network of users. also (iirc), skype only took market share from aol in the first place because it had a killer feature aol lacked: video chat. network effects mean you can't be replaced by a similar service, not that you can't be disrupted by a new product with a unique feature that people actually want.

You consider Skype to be a “success”?