Robber Baron (noun):
A person who has become rich through ruthless and unscrupulous business practices (originally with reference to prominent US businessmen in the late 19th century).
Word usage: "Both political parties served the interests of the corporate robber barons."
Famous robber barons included John Jacob Astor (fur) and Andrew Carnegie (steel). Both were tough, ruthless businessmen (and, especially in Carnegie's case, generous philanthropists...probably because they were trying to buy their way into heaven ;-). Depending on the source writing on them, they were also frequently labeled as "captains of industry." No doubt, business is a rough-and-tumble world and it's good that it is. It's kind of Darwinian in that way. Or it used to be.
Today, the top five companies worldwide are Google, Alphabet (Google's parent company), Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon. It might be fair to say that these companies represent the new Robber Baron class, especially given how zealously most guard their turf, so to speak.
Apple and Google both are widely acknowledged, in fact, to be "enthusiastic" in seeking to prevent competitors from entering their markets. Stories have recently arisen of Google demanding that negative stories about its corporate culture and search engine ranking practices be taken down, with publishers quickly acceding to such demands. Apple's "closed platform" business model -- which, for all intents and purposes, compels users to agree to use of only its software, its parts and apps, and its iTunes inventory, is legendary.
Microsoft, for its part, has always resisted, in varying degrees, allowing non-M/S Internet browsers and various non-M/S software from effectively operating on its assorted operating systems, and had only done so in the past because of the threat of antitrust action on the part of several governments and the European Union.
Speaking of, earlier this year the EU fined Google $2.72 billion dollars for breaching antitrust rules with its online shopping service, making sure that competitors' shopping sites were listed no higher than on page 4 of search results while its own businesses were always listed on page 1 and succeeding pages, ahead of all competitors even if the latter were more popular. The search engine behemoth has also been accused of using its ad placement service to bully various websites into conforming with Google's dominant philosophy, which seems largely sympathetic to what we would call "social justice" issues. All well and good, but if the tech giant seeks to also stamp out any dissent, ruthlessly using its supposedly "free and open" search engine services, is that necessarily something to be welcomed?
Amazon (which I personally love, to be honest) is equally famous for undercutting competitors on price, even it it means sustaining a loss in one way or another until its competitors give up or move on to other uncontested markets. Most likely, such price-cutting will effectively end once competitors offering the same goods and services Amazon does eventually exit the market and the online retail giant gains at least an oligopoly in each of the goods and services it offers. I don't know if that's actually feasible, but the possibility exists. Certainly, Amazon looks game to give it the old college try.
As to Facebook, its social media dominance is truly global in reach and it's already come under heavy scrutiny for several attempts in the recent past to control what its users think, see, read and listen to. It's also seeking to become an arbiter of just what constitutes "genuine" news and what doesn't. The social media leviathan has also received criticism for censoring users' posts. And it's demonstrated a near-Godlike ability to discern a user's most obscure habits and associations as well as affinities. Is this a good thing, for one media company to have so much knowledge of individual users' offline (online goes without saying) lives?
Is it time, then, to consider regulating at least some of these companies as public utilities (especially Google)? Should the government go so far as to bust up some of them, as it did to Ma Bell in the early 1980s? Is the reach and influence of these companies an unalloyed good or is such influence on their part worrying? I admit I'm no fan of over-intrusive government regulation, but I'm also no fan of unfair business practices and monopolies and/or oligopolies. Every time I look at these five companies I become increasingly uneasy as to the amount of control they're gaining over our lives, I have to say.
Is It Time to Break Up Google? - The New York Times
"Politics is just show business for ugly people."
A person who has become rich through ruthless and unscrupulous business practices (originally with reference to prominent US businessmen in the late 19th century).
Word usage: "Both political parties served the interests of the corporate robber barons."
Famous robber barons included John Jacob Astor (fur) and Andrew Carnegie (steel). Both were tough, ruthless businessmen (and, especially in Carnegie's case, generous philanthropists...probably because they were trying to buy their way into heaven ;-). Depending on the source writing on them, they were also frequently labeled as "captains of industry." No doubt, business is a rough-and-tumble world and it's good that it is. It's kind of Darwinian in that way. Or it used to be.
Today, the top five companies worldwide are Google, Alphabet (Google's parent company), Microsoft, Facebook, and Amazon. It might be fair to say that these companies represent the new Robber Baron class, especially given how zealously most guard their turf, so to speak.
Apple and Google both are widely acknowledged, in fact, to be "enthusiastic" in seeking to prevent competitors from entering their markets. Stories have recently arisen of Google demanding that negative stories about its corporate culture and search engine ranking practices be taken down, with publishers quickly acceding to such demands. Apple's "closed platform" business model -- which, for all intents and purposes, compels users to agree to use of only its software, its parts and apps, and its iTunes inventory, is legendary.
Microsoft, for its part, has always resisted, in varying degrees, allowing non-M/S Internet browsers and various non-M/S software from effectively operating on its assorted operating systems, and had only done so in the past because of the threat of antitrust action on the part of several governments and the European Union.
Speaking of, earlier this year the EU fined Google $2.72 billion dollars for breaching antitrust rules with its online shopping service, making sure that competitors' shopping sites were listed no higher than on page 4 of search results while its own businesses were always listed on page 1 and succeeding pages, ahead of all competitors even if the latter were more popular. The search engine behemoth has also been accused of using its ad placement service to bully various websites into conforming with Google's dominant philosophy, which seems largely sympathetic to what we would call "social justice" issues. All well and good, but if the tech giant seeks to also stamp out any dissent, ruthlessly using its supposedly "free and open" search engine services, is that necessarily something to be welcomed?
Amazon (which I personally love, to be honest) is equally famous for undercutting competitors on price, even it it means sustaining a loss in one way or another until its competitors give up or move on to other uncontested markets. Most likely, such price-cutting will effectively end once competitors offering the same goods and services Amazon does eventually exit the market and the online retail giant gains at least an oligopoly in each of the goods and services it offers. I don't know if that's actually feasible, but the possibility exists. Certainly, Amazon looks game to give it the old college try.
As to Facebook, its social media dominance is truly global in reach and it's already come under heavy scrutiny for several attempts in the recent past to control what its users think, see, read and listen to. It's also seeking to become an arbiter of just what constitutes "genuine" news and what doesn't. The social media leviathan has also received criticism for censoring users' posts. And it's demonstrated a near-Godlike ability to discern a user's most obscure habits and associations as well as affinities. Is this a good thing, for one media company to have so much knowledge of individual users' offline (online goes without saying) lives?
Is it time, then, to consider regulating at least some of these companies as public utilities (especially Google)? Should the government go so far as to bust up some of them, as it did to Ma Bell in the early 1980s? Is the reach and influence of these companies an unalloyed good or is such influence on their part worrying? I admit I'm no fan of over-intrusive government regulation, but I'm also no fan of unfair business practices and monopolies and/or oligopolies. Every time I look at these five companies I become increasingly uneasy as to the amount of control they're gaining over our lives, I have to say.
Is It Time to Break Up Google? - The New York Times
"Politics is just show business for ugly people."