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Comment by papeda | Hacker News Reader

As some variant of millenial, I'm continually bemused by how many of my peers are on board with breaking up "big tech" and use "big tech" products multiple times every single day.

If I bring up federal contracting, which is an industry of comparable size, and which is dominated by companies founded well over 50 years ago [1], and which is way more politically opaque, and whose funding they cannot as tax-paying US citizens opt out of, the response is never anything more than "meh".

I understand that one is more relevant to daily in-their-face life. These aren't dumb people. They read, argue, write, vote. But the choice of what to agitate for is so odd to me.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Top_100_Contractors_of_the_U.S...

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As some variant of late 19th century man, I'm continually bemused by how many of my peers are on board with breaking up Standard Oil when we all rely on oil!

As some variant of mid 20th century man, I'm continually bemused by how many of my peers are on board with breaking up AT&T when we make phone calls practically every day!

etc.

(Also, point about federal contractors is pure Whataboutism)

I'll take a stab at this.

Perhaps it's because the internet (and surrounding technologies) are so much more foundational to society. Without information moving freely and fairly, we'll mostly never learn about any of the other big problems that need addressing (of which, the one you pointed out seems perfectly valid).

Also, I think the average person feels more empowered with regards to shaping the future of the internet, than they do with something so entrenched, opaque, political and corrupt (IMHO) as federal contracting.

Thanks for the response.

The first point makes sense, but it's hard for me to square with breaking up companies. I don't think any of FAANG has played a real censorious role on the internet. I'm just as free to spin up a random webpage to espouse whatever as I was in 1999. People move around the web differently, but I can still send it to whomever I want. I could also see an argument that AMP and similar technologies hurt journalism, but I hardly ever see that claimed.

If it's a question of agency, to me it feels much better to "vote with my feet" and not patronize companies I dislike than to write my congressperson and receive a form response from some intern. You may be right that people just expect better from the internet than federal contracting.

I agree. In believe such opinions are shaped mainly by the media. So I'd argue these people are in fact ill-informed and to be more blunt, not that intelligent after all.

This is classic Whatabout-ism.

Good is not the enemy of perfect. Google and Facebook should be shattered into a thousand little pieces. And we can also look into other monopolies.

I don't see this as "good is the enemy of perfect". I see federal contracting as a worse force for waste and bad outcomes than tech companies, so I suggest that targeting that industry would better improve people's lives.

Not every suggestion that we've misidentified a big problem is whataboutism. Especially when elected officials (in theory) look to their constituents to determine which problems to address/industries to threaten.

But it literally is whataboutism. If a friend of yours expresses concern about big tech firms, and then you say, "But what about this other industry?" you have not engaged at all with the original statement and attempted to shift the conversation to something else entirely.

We seem to disagree on what the original statement is.

When I talk to my peers, the original statement is some version of: "big tech is the most harmful monopoly in the USA today". Saying "what about monopolistic industry x?" is directly engaging with that statement.

It's possible that I'm conflating people's decisions to prioritize talking about tech companies with their actual priorities for which industries require government intervention.

You’re moving the goalposts. This article doesn’t say big tech is the most harmful monopoly in the USA. You made a top level comment so you weren’t responding to anyone, either.

This is an article about the justice department potentially bringing antitrust charges against Google and you made a top level comment saying “what about this other industry?”

This is whataboutism. As clear as the day is long.

I see. I'm interpreting the DoJ's choice as a claim that Google is the most harmful monopolist in the US, since they've chosen to go after Google (and not anybody else). That's why I wrote my original comment. However, that's not actually stated in the article.

I think my interpretation is reasonable, but I get why it's whataboutism in a discussion of the topic "is big tech monopolistic?".

Whataboutism is a fallacy when applied to moral arguments, not resource allocation arguments (which is what I at least read the OP as making). Everyone has a finite amount of time and resources for political participation, the DoJ (and every other prosecutor's office) has finite personnel and resources to devote to cases, etc. Unlike moral debate, choosing to protest/investigate some specific cause/company is a genuine zero-sum game because there are far more choices than there are resources to pursue them. Choosing one means not choosing another, so it's completely reasonable to question whether any given choice is providing the best ROI. That's a genuine major part of a prosecutor's job description, and it applies to citizens too. It's quite possible to put in a ton of time and effort and achieve nothing because it was a bad approach.

Thanks, this is a clearer expression of the argument I wanted to make.

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