I'm more of a collaborator than a competitor and always have trouble with that question of "how do you differentiate yourself from the competition." that VC's so love to ask.
Curious to know how folks define "competitor"
Is it someone your customers would choose instead of you?
Is it someone your customers also use a lot?
Just a company you feel threatened by?
That's pretty rough for people in web publishing/social media whose business model relies on advertisement, as basically anything retaining people attention other than their product is a competitor. Even having a having a face-to-face discussion with a friend over a meal may amount to competition.
There's direct competition, e.g. another business doing the same as you. And there's more indirect competition, perhaps another industry but that can lure eyeballs away from you.
You are competing against anything and anyone that might divert attention, sales, etc away from you.
I think it cannot be good for society, but regulation is tricky and I don't have any silver bullet solution to offer. Maybe some smart people will find a solution eventually. Though on the question of an alternative to ads as a source of income, I like the idea of partly subsidizing press through public library subscriptions.
However, while this "library model" already exists for paid online press, I absolutely don't see it working for social media like TikTok, Twitter, Reddit, etc. (but maybe it's just a lack of imagination from my part).
I think it's tricky when the product is truly unique. For example, I guess for Airbnb in the early days you could say that their competitor was couch surfer, craigslist or hotels...but also what they were doing was so different.
Some people say that if you don't have competition, it's not a good idea, but I don't believe that's entirely true. There are some completely innovative products.
