We already see this trend toward monopolization in the online world. The internet was supposed to be a place of freewheeling competition and a level playing field, but in a few short years many core online functions have turned into monopolistic empires. For much of the developed world, Google rules search engines, Facebook dominates social network

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Once upon a time, the Internet was predicated on user-generated content. The hope was that ordinary people would take advantage of the Web’s low barrier for publishing to post great things, motivated simply by the joy of open communication. But then ad sales came into play.

That business model is still what most of the Internet relies on today. Rev... See more

AOL's power eroded. In a growing web of millions of websites, the most valuable activity was no longer to tell people what to consume. Instead, it was to help people find what they were looking for. And so, Google emerged as the internet's primary gatekeeper — and moneymaker.