I'd actually love to see companies, especially ones in winner-take-all/network-effect types of tech start out with some sort of unbreakable guarantee of being cool forever. All young platform providers wants to appear open and free and interoperable and trustworthy, but incentives will have their way with them once the valuation gets high enough.
Is there a legal or moral vehicle that could prevent this? Has anyone tried it? Would the invisible hand get pissed and remove the magic that makes growth happen?
Wouldn't a 501(c)(3) [in the US] work for this case?
(Or are there a lot of shady ways that companies work around being able to acquire one?)
This ensures there is no IP to capture, nor can you hold the audience hostage.
Maybe ot but it seems like the federated services are doing a really good job of keeping the crazies away. Nobody will link with hate groups so they can't recruit from the wider user base. Meanwhile Facebook and Reddit just leave hate groups alone and allow them to game algorithmic feeds for rage-engagement such that they have no trouble pulling vulnerable people from the wider community and radicalizing them.
That's not bad though — They'd probably be something more like Gumroad — independent and run by a small team, and fairly profitable, but hard to grow and IPO.
How come services like Digg and Slashdot weren't able to make sustainable revenue off of membership fees?