Do u use "monopoly" somewhat in the sense that Marx does below ? Centralization and concentration of capital ? Classically the inclusion of "oligopoly" within the meaning of "monopoly" is not much of a problem, because, it is the accumulation process which approaches one capitalist expropriating all the capital "as a limit", so to speak. There are patterns like inter-locking directorates across company boards, and conglomerates. By a strict, but academic definition for "monopoly", Walmart is not a monopoly. What use is the concept of "monopoly" then? It doesn't exist...except "approached as a limit". So, Apple is a Big Business, capital is concentrated and centralized there. I think Marx's sense of monopoly is more useful in the class struggle than the bourgeois concept.
Charles
"As soon as this process of transformation has sufficiently decomposed the old society from top to bottom, as soon as the labourers are turned into proletarians, their means of labour into capital, as soon as the capitalist mode of production stands on its own feet, then the further socialization of labour and further transformation of the land and other means of production into socially exploited and, therefore, common means of production, as well as the further expropriation of private proprietors, takes a new form. That which is now to be expropriated is no longer the labourer working for himself, but the capitalist exploiting many labourers. This expropriation is accomplished by the action of the immanent laws of capitalistic production itself, by the centralization of capital. One capitalist always kills many. Hand in hand with this centralization, or this expropriation of many capitalists by few, develop, on an ever-extending scale, the cooperative form of the labour process, the conscious technical application of science, the methodical cultivation of the soil, the transformation of the instruments of labour into instruments of labour only usable in common, the economizing of all means of production by their use as means of production of combined, socialized labour, the entanglement of all peoples in the net of the world market, and with this, the international character of the capitalistic regime. Along with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of capital, who usurp and monopolize all advantages of this process of transformation, grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, degradation, exploitation; but with this too grows the revolt of the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disciplined, united, organized by the very mechanism of the process of capitalist production itself. The monopoly of capital becomes a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and flourished along with, and under it. Centralization of the means of production and socialization of labour at last reach a point where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. This integument is burst asunder. The knell of capitalist private property sounds. The expropriators are expropriated."
On Wed, Jul 10, 2013 at 1:37 PM, Wojtek S wrote:
> Its type of computer products, of course. In the PC computer market, if
> you buy say an HP computer and want to add software or hardware - you do
> not have to go through the HP shop - you can order them on ebay from any
> manufacturer. You buy hardware from one manufacturer, software from other
> manufacturers, peripherals from still other manufacturers.
>
> Not so with Apple - you have to buy everything from their company store at
> inflated prices: hardware, software, parts, peripherals They even want to
> monopolize the shape of their devices - something unheard of in the
> computer world - and partially succeeded by legal maneuvering in US courts.
> They monopolized this particular computer market niche. If you were to
> compare to, say, shoes it is as if you wanted to buy sneakers, you would
> have to buy Nike.
>
> Monopoly is the only way businesses can make profit - according to
> Schumpeter, for example - so it is only natural that all businesses try to
> monopolize their market niches to the extent possible. But few do it as
> aggressively as Apple.
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 10, 2013 at 4:18 PM, Shane Mage <shmage at pipeline.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> On Jul 10, 2013, at 3:19 PM, Wojtek S wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Apple itself is a monopoly.
>>>
>>
>> A monopoly monopolizes something. What type of commodity does Apple have
>> monopoly control over?
>>
>>
>>
>> Shane Mage
>>
>> "All things are an equal exchange for fire and fire for all things,
>> as goods are for gold and gold for goods."
>>
>> Herakleitos of Ephesos, fr, 90
>>
>> ______________________________**_____
>> http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/**mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk<http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk>
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Wojtek
>
> "An anarchist is a neoliberal without money."
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