In March, Elizabeth Warren rolled out an aggressive initiative to break up Big Tech. “Today's big tech companies have too much power,” she wrote, “too much power over our economy, our society, and our democracy.” What have they done with this power? They have “bulldozed competition, used our private information for profit, and tilted the playing field against everyone else. And in the process, they have hurt small businesses and stifled innovation.”
Her first claim is that they've “bulldozed competition.” What does this mean? Terms like “bulldozed” are tricky (as are “steamrolled” or “crushed” or similar terms in reference to competition) in that they could be describing behavior that is vigorous but ultimately morally permissible, or behavior that is definitely not okay. Netflix has been steamrolling competition, but that in and of itself doesn't suggest they've done something wrong. (Former execs for Blockbuster Video are FURIOUS with me right now.)
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