[HN Gopher] FTC reportedly plans major antitrust lawsuit against...
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FTC reportedly plans major antitrust lawsuit against Amazon
Author : mikece
Score : 154 points
Date : 2023-06-29 15:05 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (nypost.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (nypost.com)
| pengaru wrote:
| Did the USA ever even get AMZN paying their income tax, or is
| AMZN still stowing trillions offshore? Or am I confusing AAPL
| with AMZN? Hell they're probably both doing it.
| Seattle3503 wrote:
| I hope they go after KDP (Kindle) exclusivity next. Authors put
| their content on Kindle Unlimited, then have to live with Amazon
| eating into their profit share. Amazon also has no problems
| rolling over entire subgenres with algorithmic tweaks, destroying
| them.
| moose_man wrote:
| Technopolies are the blood sucking vampire squids of the modern
| economy.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| A less well known area of concern with Amazon is the way it is
| now purchasing for its own business. It is actively cutting out
| local distributors in favour of direct deals with manufacturers.
| This is really squeezing those businesses.
|
| Edit: this seems particularly monopolistic because it is using
| its own global logistics to undermine the supply chain to other
| retailers.
| throwaway9274 wrote:
| ...Why do we want local distributors? Open to changing my mind,
| but that sounds more like actual efficiency gain from vertical
| integration.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| Because other retailers need the local distributors. If you
| knock them out of the market there is no local stockholder
| and you need to buy directly from the manufacturer (in a
| third country) yourself. A smaller company probably can't
| afford to buy in those kind of quantities.
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| If there isn't a law that bans marketplaces from competing
| against the vendors that operate on that marketplace, then there
| should be one.
| peanuty1 wrote:
| Why should that be banned when it benefits consumers?
| givemeethekeys wrote:
| Marketplaces serve to benefit both consumers and producers.
|
| How would one prove that the consumer benefits? The in-house
| brand will immediately be featured more on search results
| than the vendor brand.
| [deleted]
| likpok wrote:
| A lot of the beef with Amazon seems to be "welcome to retail". I
| don't think Walmart even has third-party logistics for its stores
| -- or if it does it's of the "hire contractors and squeeze them
| hard" variety.
|
| Personally I've found the customer experience of non-FBA
| merchants on amazon is often pretty bad: long shipping times and
| weird return policies. This gets at a sort of core problem with
| this: where is the line between anticompetitive behavior and just
| "making good products". I was very happy when google did it's
| hotels thing, the hotel aggregators are by-and-large unpleasant.
| And as much as there was wailing and gnashing of teeth here about
| amp, when I was doing a mobile search I would preferentially
| click amp sites -- they tended to work much better.
|
| Of course all of this depends on what specifically the FTC is
| arguing, and we won't see that until they actually file.
| silisili wrote:
| Walmart has been working on their logistics. I haven't quite
| figured it out yet - most things in store they will just
| deliver from the store, ask for tip, etc. Some things are only
| available for 'shipping', but that shipping is often same day
| delivery, and it's apparent someone just brought it from the
| store. And some things are 1 day shipping, where it looks like
| they're moving items from a WM a couple hours away to your
| local store, then delivered as described above. In the latter
| two, tips are not even asked for.
| no_wizard wrote:
| Amazon can have pro consumer policies (free shipping & returns.
| Easy return process) without predatory practices though. It
| would be _silly_ for the FTC to argue that good consumer
| experience is anti-trust behavior.
|
| What they could argue is about the myriad of ways that Amazon
| uses its market power to put others out of business or force
| them to sell (diapers.com comes to mind on this[0]).
|
| [0]: https://slate.com/technology/2013/10/amazon-book-how-jeff-
| be...
| mywittyname wrote:
| Amazon's retail arm isn't the grounds of anti-trust action.
|
| Their ownership of AWS, Twitch, MGM, Gaming studios, windfarms,
| lenders are problems. If they want to be an retail giant,
| that's fine, but they shouldn't be producing and selling games
| & movies as well. They need to pick a lane and spin off
| unrelated entities that only exist because of Amazon's
| dominance in retail.
|
| Their expansion into all of these market segments make sense in
| isolation. Amazon builds a better service internally, then
| begins to offer it for sale to others. But at some point,
| they've crossed over into abusing their monopoly in one area to
| expand into another.
| pessimizer wrote:
| i.e. break it into IT infrastructure, logistics, marketplace,
| and manufacturing. I'd also break out payments. Amazon can
| stay just as it is, but it needs to be multiple companies
| negotiating the best deals with each other.
| likpok wrote:
| A big complaint I've seen in the past is AmazonBasics, where
| amazon copies successful products and sells them for slightly
| cheaper. This is identical to brands like Great Value
| (walmart), Up&Up (target), Nice (walgreens) and Safeway
| Select.
|
| Similarly, I have seen a lot of complaints that amazon
| charges for ad space in the search, and you therefore need to
| pay to get out of page two. This, again, is widely practiced
| in retail. The cereal aisle doesn't look like it does because
| the store manager is making it up, general mills and post
| rent the space and decide how to arrange their sections. New
| retail products need to explicitly or implicitly pay for
| placement: either with cash or with free / discounted
| product.
| jroseattle wrote:
| Has the FTC outlined what Amazon is actually doing in "rewarding"
| or "penalizing" 3p merchants? I see a reference to Amazon's
| "algorithm". Hazarding a guess, it would have to be either
| category listings or search results? Is there something else?
|
| If so, this is some weak-sauce when it comes to anti-competitive
| behavior.
| kevin_thibedeau wrote:
| Competing with Amazon Basics products developed in response to
| third party sales data. Anointing certain sellers as "Amazon's
| Choice".
| brigade wrote:
| Probably search results showing items with prime shipping
| before items without it.
|
| Which... as a consumer is exactly what I want.
| BlakeSimpson wrote:
| I feel like they are up against a new lawsuit daily. First all
| the class actions regarding fake prime sales and hard to cancel
| subscriptions, now this.
|
| Although this one I believe is more of an attempted power play by
| the FTC, the others not so much.
| gjsman-1000 wrote:
| I'm actually not convinced this is going to go very well. The FTC
| for the last few years has talked a big game, and hired people
| who have talked a big game; but the actual lawsuits have been
| pretty mediocre and occasionally even poorly thought through. An
| example lately is their battle with Microsoft to block the
| ActiVision acquisition which, the general consensus of observers
| seems to be, isn't going very well and the hope of the FTC
| getting their injunction is dwindling. Another example would be
| the FTC's recent failure to prevent Facebook's acquisition of
| Within.
| majormajor wrote:
| The FTC shifted under Khan from a posture of "don't bring a
| case if it's not bulletproof" to one of "be willing to litigate
| even on things we might lose" to be less of a pushover. See
| discussion and quotes here:
| https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/07/technology/meta-vr-antitr...
|
| I think this is probably wise even if they don't win much:
|
| 1) it'll set the boundaries of how courts interpret the current
| laws, which will inform if there are unpopular holes that could
| become part of political platforms going forward
|
| 2) it'll add that much uncertainty and "cost of doing business"
| legal expense to companies playing fast and loose in other
| novel ways because they've known they're unlikely to get
| challenged
| 8note wrote:
| 3) it'll show lawmakers where the laws are good and where
| they need changes
| CPLX wrote:
| Are you actually following the MS/Activision testimony? They've
| been getting absolutely crucified, there are multiple examples
| of blatantly illegal emails and discussions of anti-competitive
| behavior being introduced on the stand.
|
| The only real question right now is if the judge whose son
| quite literally works for Microsoft (!!) will decide that laws
| don't matter, which has been the main issue with antitrust
| enforcement in the recent past.
| granzymes wrote:
| Her son working for another Microsoft division isn't an issue
| and notably neither the FTC nor private plaintiffs whose case
| the judge previously dismissed even asked her to recuse.
| capital_guy wrote:
| I am amazed to see people defending AMZN in these threads. They
| are so obviously monopolistic with such a plethora of problems
| with the way the treat consumers, workers, businesses, and the
| planet. More power to the FTC -- just wish they had taken these
| actions sooner.
| prepend wrote:
| I don't think I'm defending Amazon so much as noting that
| Amazon does not have a monopoly on retail or even e-commerce.
|
| I don't think issues should be picking sides so much as seeking
| the truth.
|
| Amazon had 38% of online retail market share [0] and only 9% of
| total retail market share [1]. So I think it's going to be hard
| to show antitrust violations without some price collusion.
|
| [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/274255/market-share-
| of-t... [1] https://www.pymnts.com/news/retail/2022/amazon-and-
| walmart-m...
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Amazon had 38% of online retail market share
|
| Sure, but "online retail" is pretty clearly an overly broad
| market including separate segments between which there is no
| substitution effect, and there are a whole lot of segments
| within that where Amazon has majority (>50%) market share
| (safety & security, communications, home audio, portable
| audio, etc.)
|
| Not that this is about retail, per se, anyway, except maybe
| in leveraging market position in retail as an aspect of the
| anticompetitive behavior regarding sellers planning on using
| their fulfillment services.
| wilg wrote:
| Where are you getting that data?
| Sakos wrote:
| You don't need a monopoly to engage in anti-competitive
| behavior. Ffs. Antitrust isn't necessarily about monopolies.
| How is that so hard to understand?
| aaronblohowiak wrote:
| The OP of the thread you are replying in claimed "so
| obviously monopolistic"...
| subsubzero wrote:
| Agree, (these are not the droids you are looking for). Look
| to Google, Meta, and the telecoms as they are the most
| eggregious and abuse their market position blatantly.
| EA-3167 wrote:
| This antitrust action isn't about their retail sector
| though... I can only assume the many people acting without
| that understanding here didn't read the article.
| lisasays wrote:
| Anitrust actions do not require the presence of a monopoly.
|
| Rather, they addresses situations where companies
| unreasonably exert power to lessen competition.
|
| The idea is to prevent monopolies from forming in the first
| place.
| prepend wrote:
| > unreasonably exert power to lessen competition.
|
| The unreasonable part is where the monopoly power comes in.
|
| Companies lessening competition happens all the time, it's
| the monopoly aspect that triggers antitrust.
| ThatPlayer wrote:
| Monopoly power does not require a literal monopoly.
| Straight from the FTC: https://www.ftc.gov/advice-
| guidance/competition-guidance/gui...
|
| > Courts do not require a literal monopoly before
| applying rules for single firm conduct; that term is used
| as shorthand for a firm with significant and durable
| market power
|
| I'd say Amazon has "significant and durable market power"
| robertlagrant wrote:
| What does that mean? Does Microsoft have that with
| Windows? Intel with x86? Apple with phones? What is the
| scale of those words?
| ThatPlayer wrote:
| It means it's up to the courts to decide on a case by
| case basis.
| grimgoldgo wrote:
| There are three primary antitrust laws, only one of them
| focuses on monopoly power in the way you describe. The
| Clayton and FTC acts are broader.
| 0xParlay wrote:
| Can they save me from Comcast first? I'd be curious how
| that backlog refinement meeting goes.
|
| > See that filter that orders priority by realized value?
| Remove it and order by campaign contributions
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > Can they save me from Comcast first?
|
| Talk to the FCC, probably.
| tomlin wrote:
| [flagged]
| willcipriano wrote:
| Translated from non incriminating corporate speak to
| plain English:
|
| "We have to been seen doing something, the election cycle
| is fast approaching. What if we go after Comcast?"
|
| "They gave a important senators son a no show job so they
| are off limits for the time being"
|
| "Amazon?"
|
| "Let me check, actually they haven't done much for us
| lately, let's shake them down, if they give my cousin a
| few million for consulting we give them a small fine, if
| not we give them the law"
| atdrummond wrote:
| Online retail includes airlines websites, for example (Delta
| recently shared they were a Top 5 US online retailer in their
| investor presentations).
|
| I am sure that for CPG, Amazon's share is significantly
| higher.
| api wrote:
| Amazon has a near-monopoly at this point on _online_ retail
| in the USA, mostly owing to their logistics network and
| ability to deliver so easily combined with the one stop shop
| advantage.
| benced wrote:
| "Amazon had 38% of online retail market share"
| bitterspeak wrote:
| Being good at something does not make you a monopoly. They
| are not actively blocking other online retail platforms.
| This is not a statement to defend Amazon but the fact that
| I prefer Amazon for its features (like same day delivery)
| is just plain capitalism. The customers have a choice to
| buy from a retailer they prefer and the important thing is
| that I still have an option to choose where I make my
| purchases.
| _gabe_ wrote:
| This exactly. I tried buying from other online retailers
| recently to support other businesses directly, and their
| websites are replete with what I would consider dark
| patterns. Things like listing 2-day shipping and then
| burying the fact that you'll get the item 2 days from
| when it ships but it will take them a month to process
| it. Seriously, this is a thing.
|
| At least with Amazon I know I'm actually getting it in 2
| days or they'll give me a refund (and often times still
| give me the product too).
| Nasrudith wrote:
| Remember the FTC and their laughably ill-prepared anti-trust
| lawsuit against then Facebook? They tried table-pounding
| instead of doing their homework to properly define the area of
| monopoly and got their case thrown out.
| hbosch wrote:
| I don't think it's so much about defending AMZN as it is
| recognizing what a weak case the FTC chose. It's going to
| amount to a mere slap on the wrist for Amazon, in reality. This
| suit does nothing to limit the velocity Amazon has in
| entertainment, retail, payments, cloud and so on.
| gochi wrote:
| I also don't really get the desire to defend them even if you
| were a loyal fan. Outside of AWS, none of their services are
| good anymore and have deteriorated. The only reason people
| think Prime is even valuable is because of the quantity >
| quality overriding people's rational. Amazon (the storefront)
| has turned into Aliexpress but with the shoddiest random brands
| ever like XYGHY selling you a product they're dropshipping for
| a 300% markup. They've turned into the store where it's only
| worth using to get AmazonBasics from.
| dv_dt wrote:
| Prime shipping has degraded to me to the point that 20% and
| rising of the orders are late, and that's with a recent
| warehouse in the same city.
| bostik wrote:
| I might well be one of the very few people in the thread
| who can still benefit from prime shipping.
|
| We have an Amazon prime depot about 10 minute _walk_ from
| our house. The drivers can schedule their deliveries to us
| either to the beginning or end of their routes, and that
| shows: we get prime shipping for almost everything. In
| fact, trying to batch individual items into fewer
| deliveries is not necessarily even an option anymore. It 's
| rare that I need the order in for next day, and I'd be
| happy to have the whole batch delivered in 2-3 days. But
| no, I get a small batch on next day, one item on day 2 and
| two more on day 3. There is no - or very rarely - option to
| select "all of these in one go, on day 3, please".
|
| Then again, I live in UK, in the weird place that's both in
| London and in Kent at the same time. That said, when we
| _do_ need next-day delivery, it tends to be available for
| about 50% of the time.
| sdflhasjd wrote:
| What does the "end of the route" look like for you? For
| me, along with the worsening reliability of prime, it's
| just getting later and later. When first moved into this
| address, deliveries were generally before 3. Slowly that
| became 5, then 7. Finally, to take the absolute piss this
| has become as late as 10pm, which is not what I call
| "next day" and at that point I don't really want it
| delivered at all.
| bostik wrote:
| Rarely much later than than after 7, usually between
| 14:00 and 17:00 in the afternoon. In a rather bizarre
| twist, maybe slightly less than half the time _before_
| 14:30. Never before 09:45
|
| I think we've had two deliveries after 20:00 in the past
| year.
| KennyBlanken wrote:
| ...and of course our state AGs and the FTC are doing
| nothing about holding Amazon accountable for claiming prime
| = 1 day shipping.
| nilespotter wrote:
| I let my prime membership lapse last year and I barely
| notice the difference. I stopped shopping there as much and
| started queuing things up into batches to meet the free
| shipping without prime threshold. Now that threshold seems
| to be zero, I still get free shipping on everything. It
| takes a little bit longer, like 1-2 days, sometimes, that's
| it.
| [deleted]
| technothrasher wrote:
| > They've turned into the store where it's only worth using
| to get AmazonBasics from.
|
| Some that is because if anything does well in their
| marketplace, they make an AmazonBasics version and then
| undercut them.
| treis wrote:
| This doesn't seem to be the right tack. There's legitimate
| reasons to favor sellers that use your own logistics. Hard to see
| that as anti-competitive. Even harder to see why they picked this
| issue when there's seemingly many more blatant ones going on.
| tootie wrote:
| I think her strategy is pretty plausible. They're abusing their
| position. I won't say it's slam dunk monopolism, but we've been
| on a decades-long trend of looser and looser regulation and I
| think it's high time the FTC takes a stand to actually tighten
| a bit. I'm not familiar enough with legal statute to say how
| strong their case will be, but it certainly feels like the kind
| of the thing they should be doing and I trust Lina Khan to have
| her ducks in a row. She wouldn't be teeing up a high profile
| case that doesn't have a high chance of success.
| pessimizer wrote:
| There are good reasons for violating most rules. That's why we
| write laws; in order to make violating those rules more
| expensive, therefore not profitable.
|
| It's not exculpating for a burglar to claim that a burglary was
| a really good choice for them at the time.
|
| edit:
|
| > There's legitimate reasons to favor sellers that use your own
| logistics. Hard to see that as anti-competitive.
|
| These sentences bother me so much. The argument is about what
| is or is not legitimate, and you're not making an case, you're
| just giving a verdict. _Why_ is it hard to see?
| dragonwriter wrote:
| > There's legitimate reasons to favor sellers that use your own
| logistics. Hard to see that as anti-competitive.
|
| Whether or not there are _also_ "legitimate reasons", its not
| hard at all to see favoritism on a platform with market
| dominance conditioned on use of another service as leveraging
| dominance in one market to gain control of another.
| treis wrote:
| Hard for me to buy "selling on Amazon.com" and "fulfilling
| orders sold on Amazon.com" as separate markets.
| TheCaptain4815 wrote:
| Not only that, I'm sure most customers PREFER sellers that use
| Amazon's logistics. I sure do. It's more trustworthy, you know
| the product exists at an amazon warehouse, faster shipping,
| etc.
| sergiotapia wrote:
| I'm the total opposite. How can I trust Amazon if they aren't
| the ones selling me the merchandise? 3rd party sellers killed
| that website entirely for me.
|
| I needed to buy creatine and the last place I would buy it
| would be Amazon because there are too many chinese
| counterfeits, and worse Amazon seems to wash their hands of
| any responsibility. I ultimately bought creatine from
| nootropicsdepot. I buy things directly from the manufacturer
| now or physically from Target.
| Eji1700 wrote:
| The cynic in me says it's because this way they can say "we
| tried" and not actually do anything.
|
| Antitrust lawsuits died the day MS got a slap on the wrist, and
| we've been paying for it as a society ever since. I really
| doubt the authenticity of this effort, but I also lack the
| expertise to judge properly so maybe I shouldn't be so
| pessimistic.
| likpok wrote:
| I don't think it's the cynical take, the current FTC chair
| seriously believes that the FTC should be doing more
| antitrust enforcement and the paper that got her noticed
| specifically called out Amazon (IIRC the amazon/diapers.com
| conflict).
|
| She runs into challenges because she has a somewhat novel
| theory of antitrust. This causes conflict between the long-
| standing staffers (who both want to win cases and seem to
| dislike the new direction) and with judges (who don't seem to
| be buying her theories).
| CPLX wrote:
| Her theory of antitrust goes back 100+ years. It's that
| there should be robust competition and when firms get too
| large and powerful they should be broken up.
|
| The alternate theory is the novel one. That theory
| basically sums up to "no we shouldn't" and also "after a
| few years in public service I am happy to announce I have
| taken a role at a large monopolistic company and can now
| afford a summer home."
|
| For more info read this book: https://mattstoller.com/
| grogenaut wrote:
| Are using novel as in newer or novel as in different than
| widely considered at current?
| HWR_14 wrote:
| > the day MS got a slap on the wrist
|
| That "slap on the wrist" was sufficient to prevent MS from
| owning the browser.
| chung8123 wrote:
| It prevented a lot more than that. They were not able to
| bundle software where Apple was able to include many things
| by default.
| Eji1700 wrote:
| Only just, and more because of their continued incompetence
| in that area with IE.
|
| They were going to actually break the company apart into
| different divisions to stop the vertical monopoly, but
| instead that's just become standard.
| JohnFen wrote:
| > Even harder to see why they picked this issue when there's
| seemingly many more blatant ones going on.
|
| I know nothing about their thinking here, but very often when
| you see enforcement agencies focusing on something that seems
| like a lesser problem in the basket of problems, it's because
| they're selecting the specific point they feel they can win in
| court on.
|
| What wins in court is related to what you can prove, not
| necessarily related to what the worst offense is.
| burkaman wrote:
| What are the legitimate reasons?
| totallywrong wrote:
| How about fake reviews? That's a whole industry deceiving people
| with Amazon's blessing. I can't even fathom the economic impact
| of the practice over the years.
|
| And another one: Amazon Basics. Free market research with the
| data from your paying sellers, to then enter a market with a
| product you know will sell, in a position of dominance. Much like
| they do with open source in AWS.
|
| They should get hit with billions, but one can only hope.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > Free market research with the data from your paying sellers,
| to then enter a market with a product you know will sell, in a
| position of dominance.
|
| But these are the things that are pro-competitive. So now they
| make batteries. They're not putting Energizer out of business,
| they can still sell through Walmart or local convenience stores
| etc., and some customers still buy Energizer batteries on
| Amazon, but now customers have a new option for batteries from
| a well-known brand with lower prices. Obviously the competitors
| don't like this -- they're losing business to new competition
| -- but new competition is _good_.
|
| Where you run into problems is where companies leverage a
| dominant market position in one area into abusive practices in
| another. So for example, if Amazon had a monopoly on retail,
| they could demand huge margins for reselling a competitor's
| batteries, or just stop carrying competing batteries and charge
| high prices for their own because customers have no other
| option.
|
| But they have no such market power. If they tried to charge
| significantly more than competing retailers for basic
| commodities, customers would just buy them from whoever has the
| best price.
|
| Compare this to, for example, mobile app stores where customers
| in practice have one store provided by the phone platform and
| if that store charges high margins or doesn't carry something
| they want, they have to buy a different device for hundreds of
| dollars, over a $1 app. Also, there are only two platforms of
| note so if you dislike any practice shared by both of them
| you're out of luck, whereas in an ordinary retail market there
| are a zillion competing retailers.
| hyperbovine wrote:
| Curious that a competitor has not sprung up to address this
| problem head-on...
| barbazoo wrote:
| Probably hard with a behemoth like Amazon having so much
| influence on the market.
| YChacker100 wrote:
| It was always coming...
| pacetherace wrote:
| I sometimes do find different prices for same products with
| amazon pushing me to buy product with prime shipping.
|
| If you use an extension like Honey, it will warn you that a
| product is available for lower price without Prime.
| scrum-treats wrote:
| If you have time, consider taking a picture of that and
| submitting it to FTC (https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/#/), in
| support of https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-
| releases/2023/06/....
| johndhi wrote:
| With Temu coming from China to compete with Amazon, and the US
| regulators going full anti-China recently, I'm really interested
| to see whether these actions against Amazon get pushback from the
| top of government, and ultimately get stalled.
| ocdtrekkie wrote:
| I hope not. I am so tired of "but if you don't let us be evil,
| China will" as a justification to allow tech monopolies to
| operate unchecked.
|
| We should regulate Amazon, and we cannot regulate Temu, we ban
| it.
| FormerBandmate wrote:
| China's banning our tech companies and they're regulating the
| shit out of their own. They do a lot of shit we shouldn't but
| they're dead on that tech companies should serve society
| instead of the other way around
| hyuuu wrote:
| eh, the US also bans Chinese tech companies too, i think
| the fear of data being used inappropriately is equally high
| on both parties. The US does have more international and
| larger corporations, so obviously in terms of number we
| have more banned.
| gloryjulio wrote:
| Not really. There are some hardware bans, but are there
| any bans on the software companies?
| jimbob45 wrote:
| _We should regulate Amazon, and we cannot regulate Temu, we
| ban it._
|
| Then we're back to the trade war. The tit-for-tat from that
| became ridiculous.
| cscurmudgeon wrote:
| We have always been in a trade war, we just never fought
| back.
| PreachSoup wrote:
| We are not back in the trade war. We always IN the trade
| war. Look up how many things are banned in China while
| their companies like Tencent/Tiktok/ Aliexpress/Temu just
| do whatever they want here.
|
| The question has and will always been, so what are you
| gonna do about it?
| jncfhnb wrote:
| Oh neat. I didn't know who Temu was or why I was getting
| blasted with their ads.
|
| They keep trying to sell me dildo headware.
| screwturner68 wrote:
| A lot of the anti-china stuff is coming from the top, the CHIPS
| act is a great example. I think taking down Amazon and maybe
| busting them up ala AT&T would be a feather in Biden's cap with
| the liberals and the right thing to do. Then they need to go
| after Google and Facebook.
| chaosharmonic wrote:
| > A lot of the anti-china stuff is coming from the top, the
| CHIPS act is a great example.
|
| I mean... TSMC is based in Taiwan, and if China were ever to
| invade they'd have a vested interest in kneecapping American
| businesses that currently rely on that chip supply (AMD,
| Apple, and Qualcomm all come to mind) -- for any of a list of
| reasons ranging from turnabout over the whole Huawei thing to
| just the obvious incentive to turn that manufacturing
| capacity toward producing a domestic supply.
|
| In that context, building up domestic suppliers of our own is
| just a reasonable precaution.
|
| > I think taking down Amazon and maybe busting them up ala
| AT&T would be a feather in Biden's cap with the liberals and
| the right thing to do. Then they need to go after Google and
| Facebook.
|
| But also yes, I'm with you on this wholeheartedly.
|
| I'd further add, given we have a history of breaking up
| telecom companies specifically for amassing too much market
| power that you as a consumer to avoid them, that we should
| probably turn the same to most ISPs. Also that it's baffling
| that no one's gone after Apple over iMessage, what with the
| way it actively makes text chains worse the moment anyone
| involved isn't a customer of theirs.
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