Re:Amazon Prime Video content to start including ads next year
by Vt71fcAqt7 on Friday September 22, 2023 @02:30PM
(#37615803)
Agreed. Products/companies can be anticompetitive even if they are not a monopoly. Products can also contain their own submarket in which they achieved a monopoly through anticompetitive practices. For example ios on Iphones. That last bit is somewhat controversial but is the opinion of the current justice department of the executive branch of the government and seems to be the correct reading of the Kodak case[0]. In any event I don't think Prime video is anticompetitive except in as much as it can take losses for years to price others out of the market but that doesn't seem to be happening.
[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastman_Kodak_Co._v._Image_Tec....
Re:Amazon Prime Video content to start including ads next year
by mrcrumb1 on Friday September 22, 2023 @05:04PM
(#37617781)
No true Scotsman argument aside, anti-competitive practices by very powerful firms are a bad thing, even if the firm got the market power because they have or had the best product.
Re:Amazon Prime Video content to start including ads next year
by parineum on Saturday September 23, 2023 @03:40PM
(#37626683)
> No true Scotsman argument
I was wary of the phrasing when I was writing it because of that but I don't think it's a "no true scotsman" argument because there is a real legal definition of monopoly that they clearly don't even come close to satisfying. I probably should have replaced the word "true" with "real" or "legal".
Re:Amazon Prime Video content to start including ads next year
by mrcrumb1 on Tuesday September 26, 2023 @12:29PM
(#37661753)
The FTC disagrees with you: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/09/...
AKA, not a monopoly.
Monopoly is such a funny buzzword to me because it's both wildly misused and completely misunderstood to be an inherently bad thing.
In reality, there is rarely a true monopoly and the only bad thing about them is that they enable anti-competitive behavior and that's the thing that's illegal and bad.
Amazon "quasi-monopoly" comes from having the best service. Great service is good for consumers.