this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2023
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Amazon execs destroyed years of evidence before FTC action, agency says::Amazon allegedly destroyed communications, turned controversial programs on and off, and knowingly raised prices for consumers, according to unsealed documents.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Amazon, meta, Google, Microsoft, Apple...

[–] TheBat 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

Even though I'm not a fan of Apple, I am not sure how it could be split. Unlike other companies mentioned, Apple is firmly in consumer electronics business, except for Apple TV+ which is a recent addition.

Their software products also exist to work only on specific hardware.

Also, only today I figured out that they have their own office suite lol. Don't know why I never thought about it before

[–] LufyCZ 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

They are heavily vertically integrated, even if split, they'd still work together as one company, because they simply don't have any other choice.

There are many products all of these companies have that aren't profitable (f.e. YouTube would either die or get enshitified to hell, can't see Prime Music surviving without the rest of the Prime ecosystem etc.).

Splitting most of these up would not help anyone.

[–] TheBat 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There are many products all of these companies have that aren't profitable

Splitting most of these up would not help anyone.

Good.

Companies have been using their profitable ventures to get dominant (or even solo) position in another market segment by undercutting the competition and then degrade their services as there's no other alternative for customers.

This should force them (and customers) to reconsider their offerings and the pricing for it.

[–] LufyCZ 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Everyone is complaining about services raising prices all the time. YouTube introducing anti-adblock tech has caused an uproar.

Do you know why YouTube is dominant? It's because it's subsidized. Running a service like that is more expensive than you could ever imagine and it's free, thanks to subsidization.

I'm not saying Google's a good company, but consider how much value YouTube has brought into the world - it's not only entertainment, but also education.

It wouldn't survive on it's own.

Splitting up companies makes no sense. They could (and in 99% of cases still would) work together as one. Regulating them and holding them accountable does, much more. Why not start there, instead of wasting your time here?

[–] LukeMedia 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's one of the issues with these business models, it's hard to give a consumer something and then take it away later to turn a profit (enshittification).

[–] LufyCZ 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So what you're saying is that instead of allowing companies to enshitiffy, we just kill all of them instantly?

[–] uis 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's because it's subsidized.

Do you know why google is ad monopoly? Because they have all youtube info.

[–] LufyCZ 3 points 1 year ago

There's no way that's true. It's a piece of it for sure, but they are neither an ad monopoly or a monopoly dependent on YouTube info.

[–] uis 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Their streaming. Also split software development and hardware development.

[–] TheBat 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But they only develop software for their hardware. Even after splitting, the Apple Software will only have one customer: Apple Hardware.

[–] uis 1 points 1 year ago

But Apple Hardware will have multiple suppliers

[–] Why9 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] uis 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Alpha, beta, GAMMA