A classic pattern in technology economics, identified by Joel Spolsky, is layers of the stack attempting to become monopolies while turning other layers into perfectly-competitive markets which are commoditized, in order to harvest most of the consumer surplus; discussion and examples.
The Path to a Sovereign Tech Stack is Via a Commodified Tech Stack | TechPolicy.Press
Strategic standardization of cloud infrastructure backed by procurement power and market forces is the right way to tame the hyperscalers, writes David Eaves.
How the Tech World Turned Evil
Once upon a time, they were counterculture idealists bringing power to the people. Today they’re greedy monopolists who’d sooner destroy our democracy than be reined in by government in any way—and they have to be stopped.
Breaking Big Tech Companies Monopoly Power - SOMO
Big Tech companies control markets and rules for people, businesses, and public services. Big Tech's monopoly power needs to be broken up.
Cyber-Marx: Cycles and circuits of struggle in high technology capitalism - Nick Dyer-Witheford
The complete text of Nick Dyer-Witheford's 1999 book, which provides an analysis of information-age capitalism and the movements currently dissolving it. In PDF format.
Technology and Below-the-Line Labor in the Copyfight over Intellectual Property
Andrew Ross, Technology and Below-the-Line Labor in the Copyfight over Intellectual Property, American Quarterly, Vol. 58, No. 3, Rewiring the "Nation": The Place of Technology in American Studies (Sep., 2006), pp. 743-766
Seize the Means of Computation - ProMarket
To regain internet autonomy from Big Tech companies, lower switching costs with legislation that allows new services to subvert network effects and encourage adversarial interoperability. Too often, our discussion of Big Tech’s dominance starts and ends with a simplistic account of network-effects-driven inevitability, as though the winner-take-all market we have today could not have been […]
Techno-solutionism
“techno-solutionism,” the simplification of complex societal problems into apps and algorithms. Ed-Tech’s Inequalities “Technological solutionism” is the related tendency to identify simple answers — in all domains, not just the tech sector — “before the questions have been fully asked” or the problems fully articulated. Take, for example: “the Internet has changed everything about how […]
Technocracy References
References and Revisions “Should Scientists and Engineers Run Society?” References [1] Wikipedia: “Technocracy.” [2] Academic Paper: Gunnell, John G. "The technocratic image and the theory of technocracy." Technology and culture 23.3 (1982): 392-416. [3] Academic Paper: Oh, Kyunghwan. "A non-co...
Lambda Land | Book Review: Technopoly
In Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology, Neil Postman argues that our infatuation with technology has insidiously eroded our culture. We gain much through technology, but it comes at a price; all too often we are blind to that price. This book seeks to call attention to the costs of a technology-focused society. I felt this poignantly because I, as a technology worker, know what that infatuation feels like.
Design Rules, Volume 1: The Power of Modularity
We live in a dynamic economic and commerical world, surrounded by objects of remarkable complexity and power. In many industries, changes in products and t
Technological parables and iconic illustrations: American technocracy and the rhetoric of the technological fix
This paper traces the role of American technocrats in popularizing the notion later dubbed the ‘technological fix’. Channeled by their long-term ‘chief’, Howard Scott, their claim was that technolo...
Separating AI’s Technological Problems From its Capitalism Problems
Nathan E. Sanders and Bruce Schneier say integrating a technology as disruptive as AI responsibly requires deep structural reforms.
Cyber-Marx: Cycles and Circuits of Struggle in High Technology Capitalism
Cycles and Circuits of Struggle in High Technology Capitalism
Hacking Capitalism | A Guide To Exploiting The Tech Industry
This is an independently published book about modeling the tech industry as a system. Particularly this book will model computers, humans, and money and their subsequent relationships. Understand the alarming state of the tech industry for better or for worse.
Richard Geldreich's Blog: Tech company patterns
First off, I'm not finished with this blog post. Don't take it too seriously. This is not about any one company . Some aren't even from me....
When (not if) the Tech Monopolies come for the Atmosphere, can we create the institutional structures to protect what we have? Right now we're nowhere near ready. No company harmed the web more than Google, not even close, while claiming to help which many believed. What can we learn and how fast?
kottke.org
“The Metric Is Not the Mission is a ten-part examination of how Big Tech moved from building and expanding the open internet to increasingly shaping it around its own metrics, incentives and assumptions.” techdirt.com/2026/09/21/the-metric-is-not-…
