Four short links: 22 July 2019
Game Source, Procurement Graph, Data Moats, and Antitrust Regulation
- Game Source Code — Internet Archive has a collection of video game source code. The majority of these titles were originally released as commercial products and the source code was made available to the public at a later time.
- European Public Procurement Knowledge Graph — over 23 million triples (records), covering information about almost 220,000 tenders, built to support competitiveness and accountability by TheyBuyForYou. (via University of Southampton)
- The Empty Promise of Data Moats (Andreessen-Horowitz) — business model wonks reckoned that “data network effects” were a thing, but the benefits seen by companies claiming data network effects seem to be the benefits of simply having a lot of data. And that’s not as defensible as hoped. I liked this essay.
- Why Big Tech Keeps Outsmarting Antitrust Regulators (Tim O’Reilly) — designers of marketplace-platform algorithms and screen layouts can arbitrarily allocate value to whom they choose. The marketplace is designed and controlled by its owners, and that design shapes “who gets what and why”. […] Power over sellers ultimately translates into power over customers as well. When it comes to antitrust, the question of market power must be answered by analyzing the effect of these marketplace designs on both buyers and sellers, and how they change over time. How much of the value goes to the platform, how much to consumers, and how much to suppliers?
