US FTC seeks to block Microsoft's acquisition of Activision -source

I think we're in such an odd spot. Companies are growing to such incredible size because of the inefficiencies of capitalism. For all the talk of markets and financial instruments the single greatest asset in our economy is cheap capital and we're simultaneously better than we ever have been at allocating it while also being abysmally bad.

We've invented feudalism all over again because paying tribute to your capital lord and uniting kingdoms through marriage is the best way forward. We've royally fucked something up when companies even want to merge. Vertical integration should be the coal mine in the canary that the incentives are all wrong.

Sony put Microsoft in this position of gobbling up game companies with their exclusivity agreements. Up until recently they had very weak exclusives compared to PlayStation and Nintendo. Halo, Forza, Gears of War, Flight Simulator, and Fable have a hard time competing with God of War, Gran Turismo, Drake’s Uncharted, The Last of Us, Death Stranding, and Horizon Forbidden West. In many ways the X Box Series X is a superior console, but it is severely let down by its game library, and I say all of this as someone who chose X Box over PlayStation for the past 2 generations. Game Pass is a phenomenal deal though!