Monopoly abolitionist. Senior researcher & writer at @ILSR. || [email protected] || https://xitter.cf/t.co/eXQr6EDGnU Cool stuff here: https://xitter.cf/t.co/vd8piaZIMh
KC (Kansa/Osage/Wyandot land)
Joined August 2009
- Tweets18.3K
- Following1.4K
- Followers4.8K
- Likes14.7K
Pinned Tweet
Three years ago, the FTC and 19 states sued Amazon for its monopoly abuses. Most companies facing that level of scrutiny would stop their worst offenses. But not Amazon.
In that time, Amazon's abuse of shoppers and sellers has only accelerated, making Amazon even richer in the process. New from me in @TheProspect.
ron knox retweeted
"The rapid increase in state antitrust lawsuits has frustrated business executives... Uncertainty over whether and when states will intervene is acting as an invisible tax on dealmaking..." Good.
ron knox retweeted
Every one of these purchases was an illegal ‘killer’ acquisition designed to protect an existing incumbent brand from competition.
Pepsi paid $2bn for Poppi and now says it won't pay the $300m earnout. Everyone's acting surprised.
What happens when a giant buys a challenger brand, with the receipts:
- Honest Tea, Odwalla, Zico: all bought by Coke, all discontinued. Zico's founder bought it back.
- Bai: Dr Pepper paid $1.7bn, wrote most of it down.
- Bodyarmor: Coke paid $5.6bn, took a $760m impairment three years later.
- Rockstar: Pepsi paid $3.85bn, has lost share every year since.
- Freshly: Nestlé paid $1.5bn, shut it within three years.
- Dollar Shave Club: Unilever paid $1bn, sold it for a fraction seven years later.
- Bonobos: Walmart paid $310m, sold for $75m.
- Mirror: Lululemon paid $500m, wrote it off and shut it.
- Ballast Point: Constellation paid $1bn, sold for pocket change four years on.
- Reebok: Adidas paid $3.8bn, sold for $2.5bn fifteen years later.
- Snapple: Quaker paid $1.7bn in 1994, sold for $300m in 1997. The original.
The pattern isn't bad luck. The brand was bought to protect the original and core portfolio, not to grow. Once it's off the market, the job is done.
If you ever sell to one of these: the cash on day one is the price. Everything else is a promise from someone who is incentivized is not to keep it.
monopolies are the industrial wing of fascist governments
A brief review of recent technical “errors” at Meta:
1. Restricting the Facebook pages of Brazilian president Lula who is in a runoff election against a Trump-favored candidate
2. Shutting down the pages of Albanians protesting Jared Kushner’s plans to build a luxury resort in the country
3. Rejecting ads for a documentary critical of Elon Musk
4. Shutting down the No Kings instagram page in the middle of a major anti-Trump protest
ron knox retweeted
A good summary of how much Meta is in the tank for Trump. And a reminder that the authoritarian threat comes not just from within the Trump administration but from its oligarchic allies. Oligarchic power is now a clear and present threat to our democracy.
open.substack.com/pub/popula…
ron knox retweeted
At the @Arendt_Center conference, George Packer describes visiting Iowa and seeing how the local data center resistance is “really is about concentrated power in a few hands… it wasn’t just the light and the noise and the consumption of electricity it was that no one had really bothered to talk to them about it.”
fingers.email/podcast/s/the_…
Shout out to Dave from the Fingers Podcast for having me on!
Amazon is running a price fixing ring that is driving up the price of the stuff you buy online. This video shows how the scheme works:
ron knox retweeted
Once again, the plaintiffs' bar is at the cutting edge of uncovering and challenging corporate misconduct, which is why big business has spent the past 50 years trying to discredit them
Why are hotels so expensive? A new lawsuit alleges that travel website Expedia is rigging the entire market, exploiting its leverage over 80% of all online bookings to inflate hotel prices in every booking channel by 15-30%.
It's an economy-wide price fixing scheme, not unlike what Amazon does to retail. /
ron knox retweeted
Why did Amazon fight so hard to block discovery re Herbert Hovenkamp doing work "at our request"?
Class action plaintiffs will find out soon: Judge Chun just granted discovery motion
(Hope they asked how many copies of Hovenkamp's $9,995 treatise Amazon bought over years)
ron knox retweeted
I sat in a room last month with a woman who injured her hand at JFK8. She was told to keep working. That was her one hand. Her other arm ended at the elbow.
Another woman was sent to do Prime deliveries with a side mirror held together with tape. Another time, she was sent with a fully broken side mirror and was told “stop by a pharmacy, buy tape, keep driving.”
One time, she was sent to do deliveries in the summer, in Queens, with school out and kids out, with no reverse camera. When she told her boss she wouldn't be able to see kids behind her van, she was told “so don’t go in reverse.”
Another woman was assaulted by a mentally ill man *while making Prime deliveries*, was told by doctors to stay home to recover, and was never paid for that time.
Another driver, a young man in his 20s, was sent out to drive in broiling heat in a van with no AC. It was so hot he started vomiting while making deliveries. He asked for help. They told him keep driving.
When all of those *Amazon* delivery drivers asked *Amazon* for help, Amazon said 'you don't work for Amazon. You work for an independent contractor.'
These workers HAVE a solution, it's called the Driver Protection Act. It's supported by all but one NYC councilmember.
And yes, Jeff, most of them think you're a villain. Because that's what happens when you hurt people who work harder than you and get rich off of it.
BEZOS: When you're in the polling booth and you're thinking about who you're going to vote for, think about this. If there's a politician that is picking villains and pointing fingers, that's probably means they don't have a solution
If there's an executive at one of my companies, instead of working on a root cause and a real fix, all they did is point fingers and blame people, we would exit them quickly.
ron knox retweeted
This event is a good reminder that breakups and divestitures aren’t drastic or difficult. Corporations do it all the time.
🟡 NEW: Coca-Cola is seeking to unwind its $5 billion acquisition of a British coffeehouse, months after a sales process faltered earlier this year.
semafor.com/article/10/08/20…
ron knox retweeted
Unlike past bubbles like railroads and fiber optics, this current one is unlikely to leave behind much useful infrastructure
ron knox retweeted
California Dems have been exposed as actively pushing for the Paramount-Warner Bros merger. With David Ellison giving himself a $150 million bonus while firing Warner Bros' hitmakers, those Dems must own whatever happens next, writes @HaroldMeyerson.
prospect.org/2026/10/08/demo…
ron knox retweeted
The best new #antitrust podcast, no contest. Rebecca is a wonderful host -- smart, funny, thoughtful, curious, engaging.
MONOPOLIZER EP2 JUST DROPPED! Listen to me and @johnmarknewman talk about "Lawless Antitrust" and the hipsters who want to fix it. open.spotify.com/episode/7yF…
ron knox retweeted
So… proposed final remedies in U.S. v. Google - for its illegal adtech monopolies and conduct that harmed publishers - quietly posted Friday. That’s what happens when you file over a weekend! DOJ = green; Google = peach. Suffice to say, Google is still fighting every word. 1/2
ron knox retweeted
Sports economist David Berri @wagesofwins explains in @TheSlingOrg how 77 U.S. Senators were duped into voting for the Protect College Sports Act. With luck and more attention to its defects, the measure will fail to pass the House.
Berri provides six facts about the economics of college sports that the Act's proponents (hello @tedcruz) either don't understand or intentionally ignore.
Here's a preview, containing my favorite line.
ron knox retweeted
We have evidence about how the benefits will be distributed in the future: how they are being distributed *right fucking now*
