Re: Monopolies

["Keith Rowley" <Rowley@mc.edu>]

That presumes that the monopoly is "franchised" and not "natural." 
While, admittedly, most monopolies -- at least the ones we're familiar
with (e.g., public utilities, the maker of Prilosec) -- hold their
monopoloy power, at least in part, due to a governmental grant (e.g.,
exclusive franchise, patent), many monopolies historically arose due to
superior technology or other efficiencies combined with the nature of
the market for their goods or services.

Keith A. Rowley
Visiting Assistant Professor of Law
Mississippi College School of Law
151 E. Griffith St.
Jackson, MS 39201
Tel: (601) 925-7157
Fax: (601) 925-7113
E-mail: rowley@mc.edu

>>> Joe Shea <joeshea@cal.net> 08/02 4:31 PM >>>

	Charles, wouldn't it be more accurate to say that monopoly is
by
grant, i.e., of the government?  A monopoly created by a municipality
is
a 100 percent market share.  In Los Angeles, by the way, there are
four
cable companies in addition to the three now owned by AT&T, but to
your
point, AT&T's market share for high speed cable access could reach 80
percent under the Information Technology Agency's proposal.  That is
because there are some 14 cable service areas and each has a monopoly
provider, making market share a suspect measurement of monopoly.


Best,

Joe Shea

On Mon, 2 Aug 1999, charles carbone wrote:

> Audrie -
> 
> Monopoly is not by the number of competitors, it is by market
share!!!!
> 
> Charles C.
> 
> Audrie Krause wrote:
> 
> > Lewis,
> >
> > According to the SF Chronicle, AT&T has two competitors laying
fiber in SF
> > in order to offer cable Internet access.  Since I'm neither a
lawyer nor an
> > economist, I'm not an expert in monopolies.  But it seems to me
that if
> > there are three companies providing the same service, one of them
can't be
> > a monopoly.  And, as Joe Shea points out, there is also DSL and
wireless.
> > In SF, SBC/PacBell has at least two competitors already selling DSL
to
> > consumers.  So there, too, consumers have choices.
> >
> > Oh, and it is *not* my position that broadband access should be
sold only
> > by local monopolies.  Those are  your words, not mine.
> >
> > Audrie Krause
> >
> > >Date: Thu, 29 Jul 1999 07:31:45 -0700
> > >From: "Lewis A. Mettler" <lmettler@lamlaw.com>
> > >To: antitrust@essential.org 
> > >Subject: Re: M$ Monitor: Why You Haven't Heard From Us
> > >Message-ID: <37A065D1.4E3FF3B9@lamlaw.com>
> > >MIME-Version: 1.0
> > >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
> > >Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
> > >
> > >Audrie,
> > >
> > >Your stand on suggesting that broadband access should be sold only
by
> > >local monopolies is short sighted.
> > >
> > >Consumers simply do not want to be limited to only two choices for
high
> > >speed internet access (i.e. the local cable monopoly and DSL). 
That is
> > >a ridiculous suggestion.
> > >
> > >Right now consumers have a choice of 3 or 4 or more ISPs who can
provide
> > >comparable service.
> > >
> > >Your stand would cut that down to perhaps one or two based upon
who owns
> > >the wires.
> > >
> > >That solution will never serve consumers.
> >
> > --
> > Audrie Krause  <<NetAction>>  E-MAIL: audrie@netaction.org 
> > 601 Van Ness Ave., No. 631    San Francisco, CA 94102
> > TELEPHONE: (415) 775-8674     FAX: (415) 673-3813
> > * * *       WEB: http://www.netaction.org      * * *
> 
> 
> 
>