Comment by _heimdall
1 month ago
That can be one aspect of it, though I would argue that doesn't mean open standards are always better for competition.
I think you're also assuming the only competition that matters is long term. In the short term the potential for locking users into your own ecosystem can incentivize short term competition.
Long term competition seems like a good goal, but that assumption wasn't part of it at the beginning of this chain.
If we don't think about long term competition we end up in the scenario we are in now.
Two main players. No choice.
> that doesn't mean open standards are always better for competition
Yes, they are. Show us a counter-example.
The web is open and is famously very competitive. We have three whole browser engines and only two of them are implemented by for-profit corporations whose valuations have 13 digits. I mean other ones exist, but the average modern developer claims it's your fault when something doesn't work because you use firefox or safari and also demands the browser rewrap all the capabilities the operating system already provides for you because they can't be assed to do the work of meeting users where they are.
In a world with over 3 billion people we have 'three whole browser engines'.
I don't want to be mean, but this isn't a great counterpoint.
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Did you see my earlier comment? Car manufacturing for decades or so years didn't have open standards with regards to parts used or how they were built. We ended up with a huge number of competing car manufacturers compared to what we have today.
Didn't older cars rely on open standards making it possible to go to any repair shop? Or maybe it was effectively open stanards, i.e., nothing prevented you from learning how they worked and modifying them.
Nowadays, all cars became hostile to users thanks to the closed software: https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/06/mozilla_vehicle_data_... I wouldn't call it "better competition".
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