title:: url:: author: [[@Lina Khan]] output: tags:: topic: # Notes - Platform companies have amassed power of commerce and communications. Public (US) feels that the government may not do enough to rein them in and see them as being unaccountable. - Forms of platform power - Gatekeeper power - Companies serve as infra for digital markets. - Market control protected by network effects and acquired data. *These are barriers to entry for new entrants*. - Can be used to/in - extort and get better terms for platforms themselves. - reinforce their own gatekeeper power - limit 3rd parties from reaching users directly. - Shaping content, production of news <!-- and distribution --> . - Can be tackled by - Mandating common carriage / platform neutrality - - Leveraging - Platforms play the role of infrastructure as well as participant in a market. - Can be used to - discriminate in favour of their own goods. - Can be tackled by - preventing platforms from becoming participants in markets where they are the infrastructure. - Information Exploitation - By collecting and processing large amounts of data, platforms generate information that they can use in many ways. - Can be used for - manipulating/selective information being provided to users. (privacy) - price discrimination between users. (privacy) - competitive diffentiation based on insights gathered. Experimentaion/risk borne by 3rd parties, platform dominates once established. (competition) - Not straightforward to tackle - Regulate conduct, limit the types/kinds of information that platforms can gather. - But underlying incentive (to collect more data) needs to be addressed - Reforms required to competition (block and undo acquisitions) and ending surveillance based business modesl (spinoff ad networks) - Historical Analogies - Gatekeeper and leveraging power have been dealt with in the past (in the US). - Mandating common carriage for railways (gatekeeper). <!-- will that work globally-->. Platform neutrality: require a platform to treat all commerce/transactions using its infrastructure as equal. <!-- So they cannot favour themselves, or any particular operator over others --> - Prevent platforms from entering certain lines of business / separations regime like railroad, telecom, tv networks and banks (leveraging) i.e. cannot be market infra and participant. - Disclosure regimes and public audits have been used to address information exploitation in the past. Distinct now because - volume of data that platforms have (privacy) - information about compeiting businesses (competition) # Further reference