Originally posted by aldra
These handful of companies enjoy a near-monopoly on communication, largely due to government interference in the market. In terms of the first amendment, this makes them the equivalent of the 'town square' where freedom of speech applies in the same sense that freedom of speech still applies if a company buys up all the public areas of a town.
The fact that the government has not only funded them through outfits like Al'phabet but selectively applied the law to their cartel to their benefit, (specifically - protections relating to the distinction between publisher and platform) makes it super hilarious that they're using their 'untouchable' position to undermine their elected president.
Not only is Trump being blacklisted or banned on major social media platforms and services hosted by the few major tech companies, they're actively colluding to deplatform him from anywhere outside of their control, as evidenced by both Google and Apple removing Parler's app on the basis that they won't moderate wrongthink. Ironically enough, since they officially claim to be platforms, they are legally required to only censor blatantly illegal content and are doing the wrong thing by censoring opinions that aren't direct calls to action.
The core idea behind capitalism is that the free market remains free because all entrants have equal opportunity; monopoly shouldn't happen because a company that grows too large becomes inefficient and is usurped by newcomers that are able to offer similar products or services at more reasonable price.
In a capitalist state the economic power is parallel to political power and they're meant to be kept separate because the purpose of a government is to serve the interests of the people, whether they're profitable or not. Because there's no fundamental law keeping these two structures apart, they'll always end up intertwined. Economic power leaks into the political system which, through regulation, changes the rules of the market in a way that's beneficial to the 'investor'.
What we're seeing here is government interference in the market creating a cartel that is, in effect able to dictate to the government. Can it end any other way?
1. monopolies are naturally occurring, especially in tech firms as patents and specialization are barriers of entry
2. whether government intervenes or not, they still have a right to decide who uses their product. The government ordering them to be available to them is overt overreach.
3. When I made original post I was aware of twitter and facebook and now its pretty much everybody. Oh well, who cares? If you want to hear from Trump so bad he will get a hold of you if he cares. The risks of keeping him on the platform clearly outweigh the rewards and trying to order private businesses to do the president's bidding and carrying his stupid ass message is about as unamerican as it gets
4. Facebook got sued for monopolizing and thats funny, mostly because they swallow up everything smaller, not because of government intervention
5. Trump is not unable to communicate now, nor does that really matter with his 10 days left. He is on his way out and becoming more irrelevant by thr day which is why this is ok.
6. Social media entities do evil things every single minute of every day. This is definitely the least evil thing they did the entire day. There is literally nothing wrong with it. "They should bow to the government that protected them!" What? Why? You don't get to make that decision.
7. The economic theory you posted went out after Adam Smith and became a joke after the discovery of oil.
8. Economic power keeping political power in check is an interesting phenomena that could go either way. In this case its censoring a lame duck president on his way out the door so objectively there is more benefit than harm but I agree it could be a dangerous precedent, especially if all the tech companies band together to collude. I'm not sure that's what happened in this case as FB and twitter were the first to kick him off and it looks like no one else wanted to be left holding the bag and looking like they were appeasing political violence.
9. Tech firms were evil before and are going to be evil after the 20th. I'm not saying there is anything good about them but this particular move has more benefit than harm and making Donald Trump mad is funny
10. Sorry for the list
