I want to play a hypothetical game here. Hypothetical at least for now. Disney is a huge corporation, one of the biggest in the US. One of the biggest in the world for that matter. They have massive influence, and bottomless pockets.
Microsoft is another huge corporation with massive influence and bank accounts, and once upon a time in the distant year 1998, the United States engaged in an anti-trust lawsuit with Microsoft on the grounds of the technology giant becoming a monopoly. Microsoft lost that case, and was forced to restructure.
Microsoft and Disney have similar business practices. They both have something they do well, and rode that horse to riches. Once there, they shifted their focus to squiring. T His is not an unusual business practice. However, Disney may be an exception. The Disney corporation has spent a great deal of money in the past decade squiring not just IPs, but also entire studios. Pixar and Lucasarts have been some of the most prominent, but not the only ones. Disney has also been instrumental in influencing law, specifically copyright, however they control one of the largest lobby groups in the US that has also been involved in some of the Internets favorite attempts to civilize the internet with such propositions as SOPA.
SO that's the back story. Here's the hypothetical game. Given what we know, what would happen if Disney extended is influence by purchasing the likes of Paramount, Warner Brothers, and other big names in film industry? They've already shown they can, they have the ability. And if they did it would essentially create a monopoly in the film industry. If Disney owned the film industry, they could also own the theater industry, since theaters survive on showing movies and if Disney refused to give them, they would be out of their prime cash flow. The United States could engage in another anti-trust lawsuit, but Disney has the people, the power, and the influence to change or ignore the laws. They've done it with the Copyright law, rewriting it to suit them. So who would stop them and what would living in a Disney-controlled country be like?
Microsoft is another huge corporation with massive influence and bank accounts, and once upon a time in the distant year 1998, the United States engaged in an anti-trust lawsuit with Microsoft on the grounds of the technology giant becoming a monopoly. Microsoft lost that case, and was forced to restructure.
Microsoft and Disney have similar business practices. They both have something they do well, and rode that horse to riches. Once there, they shifted their focus to squiring. T His is not an unusual business practice. However, Disney may be an exception. The Disney corporation has spent a great deal of money in the past decade squiring not just IPs, but also entire studios. Pixar and Lucasarts have been some of the most prominent, but not the only ones. Disney has also been instrumental in influencing law, specifically copyright, however they control one of the largest lobby groups in the US that has also been involved in some of the Internets favorite attempts to civilize the internet with such propositions as SOPA.
SO that's the back story. Here's the hypothetical game. Given what we know, what would happen if Disney extended is influence by purchasing the likes of Paramount, Warner Brothers, and other big names in film industry? They've already shown they can, they have the ability. And if they did it would essentially create a monopoly in the film industry. If Disney owned the film industry, they could also own the theater industry, since theaters survive on showing movies and if Disney refused to give them, they would be out of their prime cash flow. The United States could engage in another anti-trust lawsuit, but Disney has the people, the power, and the influence to change or ignore the laws. They've done it with the Copyright law, rewriting it to suit them. So who would stop them and what would living in a Disney-controlled country be like?
