"Isn't that the sort of thing that we have anti-trust laws for?"
I might be wrong, but the way I understand it is that anti-trust relates to abuse of a monopoly position, not the monopoly position itself. So, if Amazon were doing things to force Nike to sell through them or get less money elsewhere, they'd be in violation. However, simply being so big that Nike would lose lots of money by not selling there is not.
To put it another way, if I make a video and I decide that I don't want it on YouTube for whatever reason, Google aren't guilty of anti-trust if I then realise that I'm losing a lot of money by not having it there. They're simply the dominant player with the most customers. If, however, Google did something to reduce my revenue from other sources if I don't also have it on YouTube, they would be guilty of anti-trust.
Flawed analogy and IANAL, etc., but that's my understanding.
That doesn't force Nike to do anything, and Nike gets properly paid for each product sold. Trademark aspects likely are covered by the first-sale doctrine (=as long as you actually sell legit Nike products, you can advertise them as such).
Amazon's saying "Hey Nike, you'll be selling through us whether you like it or not". And it's forcing Nike to actually explicitly sell through Amazon if they want to retain any control whatsoever over the product listings.
Sure, but that's the same with every other reseller: if you want more control over how they sell your things, you need to make a deal with them about it. Just because a seller is larger than others it's not suddenly a monopoly abuse if they legally resell your product. Saying "I don't want you to resell my stuff" is generally speaking not a right you have as a manufacturer (you might have leverage to stop misleading advertisement or misrepresentation of the product though).
So, nothing happens in your world to drive older people into poverty though no fault of their own? It all has to be because of what they did? No financial crises, stock market crashes, stolen pensions, healthcare related bankruptcies, etc?
Some people voluntarily help some other people with some costs. There's a lot of people who don't get the care they need for whatever reason, even in a system where there's a lot of volunteers.
To get the best deal for everybody, governments in most countries step in to create a system where everybody pays in and the best deal for everybody is made (with the option for extra private care if you can afford it). You get a basic guaranteed level of healthcare in return for your taxes, as part of your participation in society. Corporations are prevented from deciding they need to charge you more than your annual income for the medication keeping you alive, while you're free to change jobs and start businesses when you wish, because you're not trapped in an insurance plan that you'll lost the moment you do something else.
Only in America is this seen as wrong. Everywhere else gets cheaper bills with zero chance of personal bankruptcy just because you got the wrong disease/got ill before/etc.
But, by then treating the addiction as a medical condition rather than as criminal activity, that makes it much easier to overcome, and it's easier to intervene with someone performing a legal vs an illegal activity. Portugal experienced a lot of positive results with its decriminalisation of drugs, with the number of heroin users having significantly dropped since that was introduced.
It doesn't magically stop being dangerous, but prohibition clearly doesn't work for any substance.
"for the general public, the concept of "anonymous hacker" is not associated with anything good"
An association that's largely created by these tabloids in the first place.
"that's what "general public" wants to read about"
Maybe, but if that's what's required, they should be requesting an interview with him and only reveal what he agrees to reveal. If he wishes to, that could lead to a more insightful look at a man and his motivations rather than random paragraphs about pizza and surfing.
If he chose not to reveal anything, a responsible journalist would accept that and understand that the man has reasons for wishing to stay anonymous. Not dig into his information and publish it anyway, leading to both him and his friends being needlessly harassed for preventing crimes. At the very least, this could lead to future would-be Samaritans from deploying fixes or publicly detailing their methods.
At least they manages to increase their clicks with some facts rather than just making things up, I suppose.
I feel that you're trying to argue against some of my points, but we're not in disagreement.
I'm not saying that the current state of affairs is good or defending it; however, I think that the blame is misplaced and the problem lies in culture clash, not in malice (as often happens with the media).
Why would he be capable of only addressing one issue at a time? If I fight against racial discrimination, for example, why does that mean I'm not also battling for workers' rights?
I thought we were talking about purchases, not streaming. How would DRM-free streaming work?
I haven't seen regional releases in ages.
Platform exclusivity? Again, for streaming maybe, but we were talking about purchases, right? I buy my weekly releases in a digital, lossless format from a range of stores. The files I receive are mine. Non of the issues you mentioned apply these days.
Streaming, however, while convenient can have disadvantages like the ones you mentioned. More importantly, you don't own your collection, you just rent the music and albums may disappear at any point.
However none of this justifies piracy since there's a flawless alternative: Buying music.
You boycotted Nintendo because of what Rare did to their own game when porting it? Do you also boycott Microsoft now that they own Rare or do you have some kind of weird double standard?
They fact that they included videos they had specifically authorised or uploaded themselves in the list of supposedly infringing videos couldn't have helped.
"the jet fuel that's used to transport all the world's hipsters to “experience the world”"
What about the jet fuel that's used for the other 98% of people who fly on a regular basis? Is that less polluting, or are you just jealous of the people who travel internationally for leisure? You're not making any sense, unless you're deluded enough to think that those are the only people who fly.
"does that hit too close to home even for a person who doesn't own a car?"
Again, that makes no sense. Why would car ownership affect the impact of jet fuel pollution? If it's the "hipsters" you're concerned about, wouldn't those be the people who are already offsetting the environmental cost of air travel by using public transport and/or unmotorised travel and thus polluting less than car owners?
In other words, you seem to be more interested at attacking a threadbare strawman than evaluate what's actually happening. It's pretty sad, when the actual reason for taxation is pretty clear (to encourage less polluting methods of transport where one reasonably exists, which may not be the case for many air routes).
I might be wrong, but the way I understand it is that anti-trust relates to abuse of a monopoly position, not the monopoly position itself. So, if Amazon were doing things to force Nike to sell through them or get less money elsewhere, they'd be in violation. However, simply being so big that Nike would lose lots of money by not selling there is not.
To put it another way, if I make a video and I decide that I don't want it on YouTube for whatever reason, Google aren't guilty of anti-trust if I then realise that I'm losing a lot of money by not having it there. They're simply the dominant player with the most customers. If, however, Google did something to reduce my revenue from other sources if I don't also have it on YouTube, they would be guilty of anti-trust.
Flawed analogy and IANAL, etc., but that's my understanding.