@samfbiddle Like the statement said, an “Instagram post isn’t a cigarette”.
It’s a false comparison.
English
Rule of Reason
182 posts
@jason_kint My uninformed guess is that being owned by Google was extremely important early on, but that if YouTube became an independent entity today it would continue to be roughly as successful as it is now.
English
And Google generates 4x as much ad revenue as YouTube. And guess what? Google owns YouTube and provides most user data "signal" and discovery that has boosted it. And Google is a 'recidivist monopolist' according to DOJ + 4 federal courts.
What are we doing here burying lede?
Ben Pershing@benpershing
YouTube now generates more ad revenue than Disney, NBC, Paramount, and WBD — combined businessinsider.com/youtube-ad-rev…
English
@austinahlman Just because private equity ownership of housing isn’t a major problem doesn’t mean that there wouldn’t be negative consequences from banning it.
Built-to-rent construction would decline, which would decrease the total supply of housing.
English
“My private-equity funded group is threatening to tank a popular housing bill over a provision that bans something we argue isn’t a problem in the first place. This definitively proves how hypocritical my critics are.”
Adam Jentleson@AJentleson
As the drama around the ROAD to Housing act shows, an irony of today's left-leaning advocacy world is that for all their slagging of "popularists" and poll-driven, consultant-tested policies, there is no more poll-addled faction that the one that basically invented and then elevated the idea that private equity ownership is a major driver of housing costs -- all because it polls well. Now that PE provision is threatening to bring down a bill that would actually address the affordability crisis and lower housing costs for families.
English
@matthewstoller Self-driving cars exist today. It doesn’t take a huge leap of faith to believe we’ll figure out self-driving trucks.
English
Why is everyone in elite forums in America obsessed with debating the politics of magic? Magic isn't real.
Brian Sozzi@BrianSozzi
JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon at an investor cocktail event last night on AI (part 2): "What if, I think there are 2 million commercial truckers in the United States, and there are lots of other examples you can give. There's a thought exercise, and you could push a button, eliminate all of them, and they make $120,000 on average. Save fuel, save lives, save time, a more efficient system, less disrupted highways, all that beautiful stuff. Would you do it if you put 2 million people on the street where even if there are jobs available, that next job is $25,000 a year, stocking shelves. I was saying, "That's kind of really bad, kind of civilly, should we as society agree to that?" I don't think so. I was talking about the business and government, and they should start thinking today, not when it happens, what would we do to deal with the [AI] issue? It's got to be business and government."
English
@matthewstoller Matt have you heard of this concept called technology? It makes things cheaper over time!
English
There is no way to make things more affordable without reducing corporate profits.
Lower prices require lower profits.
English
@matthewstoller There is a ~50 point difference in trust between some of those institutions.
English
There's an elite lament about how Americans don't trust institutions, but I think it's a good thing. Meta, Google, TikTok, CBS, Harvard, ICE, Wall Street - yes they are all full of liars and they are all out to get you.
English
@sandeepvaheesan Responding to polling showing how popular Amazon is by talking about labor just feels disingenuous. Is Lee going to disclaim ever advocating for Amazon being forced to sell AWS?
You can just accept that breaking up Amazon is not popular even if you think it is right.
English
Connection between labor and competition: Amazon's misclassification of Flex drivers as independent contractors robs them of employment rights, e.g., minimum wages, and hurts high-road rivals that comply with the law
New Jersey's AG made this exact point in his October lawsuit
Lee Hepner@LeeHepner
People love the convenience of Amazon. People don’t love drivers peeing in bottles, warehouse workers breaking their backs, bullying small businesses, price manipulation. I don’t understand what this reporter is suggesting. That we clam up about these copiously-documented harms?
English
First, a few caveats: I worked on this case while at FTC in 2021-23. These are only my thoughts as an academic and outside observer; they don't draw on any confidential info. And I'm not going to address one of the biggest problems w/ the ruling. (2/x)
English
With the FTC appealing its trial-court loss in the Meta/Insta/WhatsApp case, a few thoughts on some of the problems I see with Judge Boasberg's opinion: 🧵
reuters.com/world/ftc-will…
English
@musharbash_b More likely cause is that sellers are unwilling to take large losses by selling for below what they paid and are willing to hold out for a more favorable market.
English
@musharbash_b @sandeepvaheesan We haven’t built enough of it. Other countries regularly build nuclear plants and manage to solve these problems. Solar got cheap after we started building tons and tons of it.
English
While I am more open to it, nuclear power in the U.S. has failed to live up to its early promise in the 50s (“power too cheap to meter”) because of major construction delays, huge cost overruns, and poor operational performance. Third issue has been solved but first two remain.
Zephyr Teachout@ZephyrTeachout
Like do we really need to educate a whole new generation about why nukes are terrible? Right when solar and batteries are coming in full power?! All that stuff they couldn’t solve they didn’t solve.
English
@austinahlman I appreciate the source, but are these really meaningful measures of public opinion when it’s phrased like would you “support breaking up COMPANY to prevent it from becoming a potential monopoly”?
But I also acknowledge that topline favorability is aggregating a lot of opinions.
English
@rule_of_reason Oh whoops that one is D4P (highly reputable polling shop still though.)
Here’s a recent IBD poll to balance it:
English
I think using (questionable) top line favorability ratings for these corporations to bat away all political scrutiny is intentionally misleading. People love the military; they hate going to war with Venezuela. This isn’t hard.
Dave Vorland@DaveV15
@austinahlman Ah, to be honest I actually did miss it on first read. We disagree, but at least I get what you are saying!
English
@austinahlman Are they? The first one I checked is from Data for Progress.
English
@rule_of_reason These are all done by independent pollsters except the first, which was a partnership between an AI skeptics organization and an AI optimists organization.
English
@bigblackjacobin The law treats a founder’s “wealth” as the percentage of control they have, instead of the value of the shares.
Many founders have super voting shares so they can steer the company through multiple rounds of dilution.
A 20x voting share class would result in a 100% wealth tax.
English
sounds like he can’t do math. Maybe CA should use the wealth tax to fund some classes for the tax revolters!!
Austen Allred@Austen
A conversation I had with the founder of a company anyone in tech would recognize. The California wealth tax, as currently written, would literally take 100% of his net worth and leave him dead broke. This is insanity.
English
@BalanceCrafting Why is Patrick Collison catching strays?
English
@Wilbruh_ @musharbash_b Google aggregates information people put on the internet.
In the pre-internet era, lots of people knew the score from last night's game but couldn't share it widely. Newspapers were one way that information could be shared.
On the internet, a tweet or a blog has the same reach.
English
Industry specialist: Here’s a detailed article showing unfair competition and monopolistic strategies by Google and Facebook destroyed local newspapers
Dilettante Neolib: It’s just, like, the internet, dude, here’s a song from the 80s about radio stars
Jeremiah Johnson 🌐@JeremiahDJohns
@musharbash_b It is incontrovertibly true, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that the internet (and craiglist in particular) destroyed advertising markets. If you're going to be wrong all the time, you should try to be less of an asshole. academic.oup.com/restud/article…
English
@Wilbruh_ @musharbash_b Where do you think that communities got that information before the internet?
English
@rule_of_reason @musharbash_b This isn't about weather/sports/etc generally, this is about LOCAL stuff
English