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Amazon should absolutely be investigated. Doesn't mean they should be convicted, but certainly looked into.
As with Msft back in the '90's....today's winners are both out competing/innovating AND engaging in anti-competitive behavior.
Amazon has out competed and out innovated in the FULFILLMENT aspect of online commerce. Their "all you can eat shipping" for $125, Amazon Prime was genius. All the money they've invested in fulfillment centers, trucking, etc. etc. that's made "two day shipping" the baseline with one day and same time coming on strong. Very tough to compete with.
I buy a lot from Amazon that I would buy from stores but it's more convenient to wait two days (or one day) than it is to drive to the store.
However, I still believe that Amazon used predatory pricing when launching the Kindle and putting all the NYT's best sellers on sale for $9.99. That made selling ebooks unprofitable for anybody else. It threatened the business models of the suppliers of those books. It would have kept Apple from entering the market (and anybody else) as nobody can compete against "losing money". I do hope that this investigation will revisit that situation. Apple was said to have colluded with the publishers...but the judge specifically ruled out even considering whether or not Amazon's practices where anti-competitive. They were.
Another area that needs attention is when a platform provider also uses the platform. Google selling ads and competing with it's own services against those buying ads. The accusation (likely to be true) is that Google favors it's own properties in an unfair, anti-competitive way.
Apple will fall under this same scrutiny for the App store. There is no doubt it is a conflict of interest for Apple to sell iBooks and want to charge Amazon 30% to sell Kindle books via the Kindle app.
Amazon and Google both use the data they collect from their platforms to steer which services and products they sell. If that data isn't available for others....is that anti-competitive?
I'm thinking of Amazon's growing collection of products that they make and market themselves. I realize that grocery stores have long sold house brands alongside the national brand name consumer products goods. Still, it's an area worthy of considering in terms of open and fair competition.
It's not having a platform that one company controls that's a problem IMHO. It's HOW they go about using that same platform as a competitor on it.
As it relates to book stores....I think for the most part, that was the result of Amazon coming up with a better mouse trap. Pretty much all the books, priced well, and delivered quickly.
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