You should know 80% of Hacker News works for either Google or Facebook.

Do you think it's impossible to have a nuanced discussion about monopolies? Their net effect may be wholly negative while having some interesting aspects

Not impossible, but mostly impossible. You can discuss the interesting aspects of large corporations, but you can't really discuss them in a vacuum. The top level post about "big kahuna" companies comes across as an unambiguous defense of monopolies, not an attempt at nuanced conversation.

Not a participant in your back-and-forth, but the top level comment seems to be much more nuanced than your posts. Perhaps you could:

>”Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith.”

> "Split them up at your own (US) perils, not unlike killing own Golden Goose."

Honestly, it's disgusting.

Have these people even read the white papers that Google releases? They are mostly marketing pieces.

When systems and technologies are not publicly reproducible, why should scientists and (most) engineers care? I will not take Google at its word and would not recommend it to others.