One of the things that Google, among others, has argued is that data is non-rivalrous. Basically what that means is that other people can use data and it doesn't really devalue the data itself. Google has argued that this is why it doesn't have any market power.
I think that's no longer its position, but it is true that multiple entities can use data and derive value from data. One concern then is that if one entity then hoards that data, it's not shared with others who can derive benefits from it. That's one concern.
The other concern is this. Let's go back to this sort of frenemy dynamic. I remember when we were writing our book, Virtual Competition, and Uber's concerns were with the local taxi commissions. Its concern was how it could get itself into the various cities, but we pointed out that one of the overarching concerns was that, to survive, it had to be on a smart phone platform. There are two: there's Apple and then there's Android. What Uber needs to exist, its oxygen supply, is basically controlled on this platform. Then you can see that if the platform is starting to go into, let's say, the mapping technology and also the self-driving technology, eventually there can be a collision. When there is a collision such as that, the powerful platform then will promote its interest and not necessarily the interests of others with whom it competes on the platform.
That could be another concern. If you have now this platform and have all this data, this platform can then promote innovation but innovation that, for example, is complementary with its current products and the like. What are then the [Technical difficulty—Editor] companies that compete against the platform? How are they going to be able to survive? Then the concern is how the platform can tailor it in such a way to promote its interests and hinder the interests of, let's say, technologies that might pose a threat to its business model.
When I mentioned Disconnect earlier, there was a privacy app that was going to help us reduce tracking. Google kicked it out of its app store. When we presented our research, someone in the audience had a really good quote that said that in trying to promote privacy, Disconnect is like inviting an arsonist into one's home. That's the perception—that anything that might be a threat to this data-opoly could then be kicked off. That could have a significant chilling effect on innovation, so that's a risk that needs to be taken into account.