Quote:
Originally Posted by Cinisajoy
Now I also can't buy adult stuff at Walmart. So what? If I want it, I know where to find it.
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Wal-Mart isn't even remotely a monopoly, either, making that rather moot, but if it were, the legal problem would be one of discoverability. You know where to find adult goods because you know that adult goods exist. That's easy in a brick-and-mortar world.
Now jump fifty or a hundred years into the future. Print is dead. There's one search engine, and it blocks adult sites. One bookseller has 95% of the market, and it blocks adult books. Do your great grandkids still know where to find their porn? Do they even still know that porn exists?
And even that isn't a fully adequate example, because institutional knowledge keeps reminding us that porn exists. People don't forget things very quickly. But what about new ideas that challenge the status quo? If you're in a situation where the major search system and the major bookseller both decide to block some new, up-and-coming idea, they would effectively prevent anyone from discovering it in the first place.
Any serious discussion of freedom of expression must consider not just the known controversial subjects, but also any unknown controversial subjects that might come up in the future. That's why allowing any company to have too much control over a market—any market—is fundamentally a concern even if that company's current leadership has zero intent to abuse that position right now.