#319: Remember FAANG?

Tech Policy Podcast

TechFreedom

Technology

4.8 • 45 Ratings

🗓️ 10 May 2022

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 2017 or so, people started to assert that the FAANG companies—Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google—were unstoppable juggernauts. Lately that claim has taken some hard hits, as Facebook (now Meta) and Netflix, facing stiff competition, have seen their stock prices tumble. Adam Thierer, senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center, joins the show to discuss how the Schumpeterian “gale of creative destruction” unseats dominant market players, why government antitrust cases so often look foolish in hindsight, and why we should celebrate innovation (spoiler: it leads to progress and human betterment). Adam also discusses his book Evasive Entrepreneurs and the Future of Governance: How Innovation Improves Economies and Governments. Corbin’s piece on monkeys and double pendulums—mentioned around 20:30—is “Can Experts Structure Markets? Don’t Count on It.”

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the tech policy podcast. I'm Corbyn Barthold.
0:12.6	Remember Fang, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google. These were the unstoppable big tech monopolists of 2017 or so.
0:25.8	These companies became so big that they could exert gatekeeper control over markets and
0:31.5	throttle upstart competitors. That was and remains the story. It's a story that's taken a few hard dings lately.
0:41.5	In February, Facebook, now meta, saw its stock price dive 25% in a day.
0:49.0	Their flagship social media platform lost daily active users,
0:52.6	and the company said its revenue would be hit by changes
0:55.4	to the privacy settings on Apple's iPhone operating system. Meanwhile, competitors like TikTok and
1:02.6	Snap have been thriving. Since October, Netflix's stock has dropped more than 70%.
1:10.8	The service lost 200,000 subscribers in the first quarter of 2022.
1:17.0	It expects to continue to bleed customers, more than 2 million of them, through the
1:23.1	rest of the year.
1:24.5	It faces stiff competition in the so-called streaming wars from Disney Plus, HBO
1:30.4	Max, Apple TV, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, and others. In brief, the Shumpeterian gale of
1:39.7	creative destruction appears to be alive and blowing. And that's a good thing because we want
1:46.2	innovation and creative destruction helps us get it. Or is that just another story too? I'm very pleased
1:53.9	to have a great evangelist for progress and innovation here to talk this through with me.
1:59.4	Adam Thier is a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center.
2:04.2	His most recent book is Evasive Entrepreneurs and the Future of Governance,
2:09.2	how innovation improves economies and governments.
2:13.6	He writes often at discourse, among many other outlets.
2:18.0	Also, be sure to check out his blog, The Technology Liberation Front.
	...

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