It's what they used to call a natural monopoly. Having one central provider flows from the structure of the business. Amazon has built an amazing fulfillment empire, but it also runs a marketplace where competes with its sellers. It's like the NYSE operating mutual funds or packaging ETFs. Like the railroads, Amazon controls an outsized chunk of the online marketplace and uses its position as one might expect.
The railroads were controlled the structure of commerce in the US. Their tariffs enforced an industrial north and agricultural south. Railroads were as despised as cable companies or ISPs. Regulation helped a bit, but only a bit. Then the government built the interstate highway system and industry was dramatically restructured.
The last big antitrust case involved Microsoft. When IBM got sick of antitrust fights, they decided to outsource the operating system for their PCs. This was like throwing a monopoly bouquet at a wedding and Bill Gates was the bridesmaid who jumped highest and snatched the prize. His plan was to leverage this operating system monopoly into an internet monopoly, and the scheme was working before the Clinton administration sued. The reason I am writing this on Substack and not some Microsoft comment board is because of an antitrust lawsuit.
It's what they used to call a natural monopoly. Having one central provider flows from the structure of the business. Amazon has built an amazing fulfillment empire, but it also runs a marketplace where competes with its sellers. It's like the NYSE operating mutual funds or packaging ETFs. Like the railroads, Amazon controls an outsized chunk of the online marketplace and uses its position as one might expect.
The railroads were controlled the structure of commerce in the US. Their tariffs enforced an industrial north and agricultural south. Railroads were as despised as cable companies or ISPs. Regulation helped a bit, but only a bit. Then the government built the interstate highway system and industry was dramatically restructured.
The last big antitrust case involved Microsoft. When IBM got sick of antitrust fights, they decided to outsource the operating system for their PCs. This was like throwing a monopoly bouquet at a wedding and Bill Gates was the bridesmaid who jumped highest and snatched the prize. His plan was to leverage this operating system monopoly into an internet monopoly, and the scheme was working before the Clinton administration sued. The reason I am writing this on Substack and not some Microsoft comment board is because of an antitrust lawsuit.