Can we quantify how much advantage we get as retail investors? And how does it compare to the billions spent on dedicated networking, radio gimmickry, and specialized hardware and software magic, plus the opportunity cost of pulling all that talent and capacity from other industries?

If every trade settled at, say, the rolling average price of the last 60 seconds-- or 60 minutes-- it would dramatically quiet the "noise" in the market. There would still be enough demand from conventional investors, and the averaging policy could actually stabilize the riskiest scenarios (i. e. a temporary loss of market makers causing orders to settle at comically out-of-bound prices)