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> I’ve never had my searches for coronavirus related content restricted in any way by my ISP for example.

Your ISP isn't a search engine. It's also regulated more like a utility, unlike Google. If your ISP started black-holing IP addresses for reason of the content they carried, there would be Congressional action (if the FCC didn't get there first).




That’s exactly right - we have plenty of options for redress against an ISP abusing its power at the local, state, and federal levels.


And on the flip side of the coin, we can change our search engine if we don't like the results it vends.


Because of network effects that turns out to be a lot weaker protection against much more powerful companies.

Edit: Perhaps network effect is the wrong term - but it’s a bit like saying if you don’t like guns don’t buy a gun - that doesn’t really limit the negative impacts from guns...


How? What network effect is keeping Bing a poor alternative to Google search?




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