Those are important reasons, but there are other reasons as well, such as concentration of market power in a few companies, which allows those companies to erect barriers to entry and shape law in ways that benefit themselves, as well as simply creating network effects that make it hard for new social-web projects to establish a foothold.
That's an even harder problem to solve. I do agree we should make sure that policy isn't manipulated by vested powers and make things even harder to compete with.
But network effects seems to be a natural phenomenon of people wanting to establish a familiar routine. I look at Steam as an example here, where while it has its own shady schemes behind the scenes (which I hope are addressed), it otherwise doesn't engage in the same dark patterns as other monopolies. But it still creates a strong network effect nonetheless.
I think the main solace here is that you don't need to be dominant to create a good community. You need to focus instead on getting above a certain critical mass, where you keep a healthy stream of posting and participation that can sustain itself. Social media should ultimately be about establishing a space for a community to flourish, and small communities are just as valid.
> I look at Steam as an example here, where while it has its own shady schemes behind the scenes (which I hope are addressed), it otherwise doesn't engage in the same dark patterns as other monopolies.
For now. Google's motto was "don't be evil" until it wasn't.
> I think the main solace here is that you don't need to be dominant to create a good community.
I'm not so sure. I mean, yes, you can create a "good" community on a small scale. But when the system is geared towards larger entities, those communities are always at risk because they don't have a seat at the table, so to speak.
An example that's relevant recently is these laws about age verification. For small communities, things like age verification requirements can be an existential threat. One crazy person with a vendetta can sue them into oblivion for some technical violation, and unlike the big players, they don't have the resources to fight back. They also don't have the resources to lobby for verification mechanisms that are realistic at a small scale.
When the rules of the game are set by the big players, small players are always at risk of being declared in violation, or just having the rules changed in a way that ensures they can't win. I'm coming to think that small communities are not safe unless large networks are either destroyed or severely restricted in a way that involves ongoing monitoring and enforcement. (I hesitate to use the word "community" for these large networks because I don't think something like Facebook is really a community, although there are communities within it.)
