Platform Economics

ICYMI: Leading Tech Services Increase Consumers’ Ability To Switch Services, While Reducing Entrepreneur Start-Up Costs

Tech critics have called for increased data portability to boost competition. Before the weekend, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, and others announced a new standards initiative called the Data Transfer Project to do exactly that, noting, “Portability and interoperability are central to cloud innovation and competition.” The initiative will allow consumers to transfer data directly between […]

What They Are Saying: Chorus Of Experts Sound Alarm Over EC Decision

In reaction to the European Commission’s Android decision, a chorus of people sounded the alarm, highlighting the choice, competition, and innovation Android has brought to the market and the negative impacts this decision will have on phone makers, developers, and consumers. It’s also important to remember the FTC conducted a multi-year investigation into these allegations, […]

ICYMI: Get The Facts Ahead Of EC’s Decision On Android Investigation

The EC is expected to fine Google’s Android, a free and open software. As NYT’s Farhad Manjoo wrote in 2016, “If Google’s grand plan really is to keep rivals off Android phones, it sure is doing a poor job of it.” The EC’s analysis curiously concludes Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS are not competitors. What’s […]

ICYMI: Former FTC Chair & General Counsel — How Unsound Criticisms Of A Grocery Store Chain 80 Years Ago Predicted Arguments Made By Modern-Day Tech Critics

In a recent paper, former FTC chair Timothy J. Muris and former FTC general counsel Jonathan Nuechterlein analyzed tech critics’ arguments against leading tech services within the context of backlash against the leading grocery chain A&P eighty years ago. After vertically integrating, the grocery store chain was once called the “Wal-Mart before Wal-Mart.” Muris and […]

Setting The Record Straight: Data Is Not The New Oil & Other Misconceptions

Last week, Martin Giles published a piece in the MIT Technology Review, “It’s Time To Rein In The Data Barons.” In making his case, Giles fails to note that consumers would have be paid $17,500 a year to give up search, $8,400 a year for maps, and more than $3,600 a year for social media. […]

Greenlighting Of AT&T-Time Warner Predicated On Highly Competitive Tech Space

As noted by the Wall Street Journal’s Alexandra Bruell in “AT&T’s Ambitious Plan To Take On Facebook And Google For Ad Dollars,” AT&T will become a major force in the advertising sector, having the ability to sell more targeted advertisements alongside video content. Bruell explains that AT&T could show “a young family in New Jersey […]

STRS: The Economist Ignores Vibrant Startup Ecosystem To Take Shots At Leading Tech Services

The latest issue of The Economist features an article that blames America’s leading tech services for allegedly quashing tech start-ups. The piece misses the mark in five key ways: 1. Investment in the sector is at a 20-year high, driving 57 startups to unicorn status last year — but only one in Europe. A World […]

ICYMI: Meeker Presentation Undermines Tech Critics’ Calls For Breakups

This week, Kleiner Perkins’ Mary Meeker released her annual Internet Trends presentation, which stands in stark contrast to much of the tech discussion in Washington and among self-interested VCs. The 295-slide deck delves into a number of topics, but can best be summarized by slide 43: Robust R&D and industry investment, lower consumer prices, dynamic […]

ICYMI: Stratechery’s Ben Thompson – Yelp’s Complaints Against Google Are “A Bit Rich.”

Last week, tech analyst and author of the Stratechery newsletter Ben Thompson responded to 60 Minutes’ report on Google and competition policy. Thompson’s piece pointed out not only the various biases of the segment, but the incoherence of Yelp’s chief argument against Google as well. Some key takeaways are below. As Thompson notes, 60 Minutes’ […]

ICYMI: DOJ Antitrust Division AAG Makan Delrahim – “Protect Competition, Not Competitors”

On the heels of 60 Minutes’ one-sided segment on competition in the tech sector, DOJ Antitrust Division leader Makan Delrahim noted, “The goal of the antitrust laws is to protect competition, not competitors.” A few highlights from his speech: “I don’t endorse that view,” said Delrahim on critics’ assertions that antitrust is unequipped to address […]