Be Afraid of Economic 'Bigness' (opens in new tab)

US GDP in 1955 was around $400 billion (it didn't reach $3t until the 1980s). GM's profit in 1955 exceeded $1 billion.[1] That produces a ratio very similar to Apple's today. That's despite immense global growth since 1955 giving Apple an enormous global market to play in. Most of GM's profit was derived from the US domestic market. If we went just by Apple's US profit today, their ratio would be slashed to closer to 1/1000.

US GDP in 2018 will be roughly $20.5 trillion. Apple's ratio against that is about 1/360 (their profit will be closer to $57b-$60b for 2018 than $50b).

[1] http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,807967,...

1) a person has the right to export their data and receive it in a usable format 2) a person has the right to use this exported data and give it to a competitor

There is no reason why switching between, say, Spotify, Google Play Music, Apple Music, and Amazon Music should be any harder than switching a cell phone carrier. Imagine how much faster Myspace or Digg would've imploded if you could just export to a competitor with a click of a button.

2. There are plenty of antitrust laws on the books from the early 1900s.

Over the years Facebook have acquired over fifty lesser known companies.

For starters, the part of my social network on Whatsapp can spin off to Whatsapp, and the part of my social network on Instagram can spin off to Instagram.

Example: personal data format standards, making it simple to export your data from one platform to another,

Another example: regular vertical spread of data companies, so they can collect but not utilize, and you must be notified of anything sold about you (e.g. inclusion on an email list)

Compare to the carrier and media conglomerate monopolies which don't receive any rhetorical pushes against them as monopolies. Despite them literally being the only option in many localities - and not even tiny ones either.

> If you owe the bank $100, that's your problem. If you owe the bank $100 million, that's the bank's problem.

> - J Paul Getty

The government wants the data that they provide and the tax revenue their employees provide.

It's unfortunate that populism has a name that leads to this misconception. People see the word and jump into discussion assuming that they know what is all about.

Populism is the claim that the people have a 'will'. There is no real disagreement of what the real people want or need for compromise. There are people who disagree but they are not the 'real people'. They are somehow compromised, the corrupt elite, misled or 'the others'. What 'people want' is already known, now you just need to vote populist into power to implement the will of the people. Laws and norms often make it difficult to implement this 'will' and they should be changed.

By contrast liberal[1] democracies are based on idea that the complex democratic process gradually produces something that people can live with. It's not exactly what anyone wants. There is no common agreement of what people want when people go and vote. The end result of working democracy is negotiated compromise. Laws and norms should be followed when this game of democracy is played.

---

[1]: liberal is another word that have different meanings in different contexts. Liberal does not mean leftist in this context.

As for GP's point, it may be the case for Trump but not so much for the newest populist in Brazil, for instance, who's more or less a sellout to the US of A and giant platform companies as many a breed of politician here down south have ever been.