Information technology monopoly

Introduction

A monopoly has long been known to impact the development of the countries negatively. This is because companies can make their own decisions and determine the price they offer to consumers. The main reason that made me select the topic is to try and expound on how the world economy is being controlled and damaged by tech companies. A clear understanding of these problems to the country’s economy will help determine the best solution to use to save the world economy. A monopoly is basically a company that solely produce or supply a particular product to the market. They have all the rights to a particular product, and there is no way a new company can come in between and produce the same products.

This means that they have the power to control the market in all the best ways they can to generate more in their favor if they have to. Technology is the most relied service providing platform, is purely featured with a monopoly to protect the developers of the product. This means that the companies can opt to develop less improved products so as to gain more after calculating their net profit. They also make sure that the advancement of technology is very slow since they are the only company with the rights to advance it. All these factors are lagging the economy of the world behind, and there is a need to revisit them. The main problem being, is it an easy approach that will have fewer barriers to ensure it is achieved or not?

Areas of interest, activity or issue

Tech companies are gaining more and more profit daily, and the margin tends to increase per day. This, on the other side, results in conducting less than what they are supposed to deliver t the outside world. They also have a barrier to new innovators since no one can produce a similar product outside the company. There no competition to ensure that what the people need is provided since they are blocking new people in the industry. The companies are using all their means to ensure that they protect their business, thus holding back the advancement of the existing and new technology.

Every company has the right to protect what it has developed; this is one mainly by acquiring the patent rights (Huang, Huang, & Hu, 2019). Hoarding patents keep off the other new developers or innovators to introduce a new product to the world. This brings out the aspect of monopoly in the tech world since no one else can bring out the competition. There is a need to work on the improvement of the product, so the best tech is provided. This is the main problem that will always make people run away since they cannot compete with the giant companies.

Costly and lengthy legal procedures are used to ensure that there are no opposing companies out there[1] (Lieto, Lebiere, & Oltramari, 2018). With big companies such as Amazon making millions in a matter of hours, it is hard for small upcoming companies coming in and competing with them. The techniques that the companies are using is ensuring that they got all the patents rights. Breaking any of them will involve payment of a huge amount of money to the company or even losing the whole project. This has been seen in software development when a company develops a similar product to other existing ones. Since it is very costly to fight and follow all the procedures that do exist, innovators tend to keep off.

Reputation acquirement by always taking over the small companies which are trying their best to come up with new ways[2] (Frank, 2017). This has been the main issues that have always made the advancement of technology in the world to lag behind. A good example is Google; it is one of the largest technology companies with many innovations that have been of great help to people all over the world. This makes it be all over the world, making billions of money within a short period of time. They can easily spot innovation and offer a huge amount of money to the new upcoming companies and by the product. This kills the innovation that would have changed the way the world is running since they acquire all the rights from that day onwards. There is a need to provide the companies with time and resources, such as funding, to ensure that they bring out new innovation to the world.

Research Findings

All of the tech companies are doing all they can to ensure that all the work that they have to achieve and that they are working on is protected. It all starts from the initial stage where it is advisable that if you got any invention, then it is good to get all the patent rights. It is a good thing to ensure that other people do not take advantage of the others, but this criterion is making us lag behind.

Tech companies are controlling the manner that the technology advancement is changing in the rate that they feel is better, which should not be the case[3] (Plaiss, 2016). There is no competition to ensure that they provide the services at a favorable price that exploiting the average person in the community. This is the reason that none of the tech companies is making any losses, but they continue to make a huge profit even if they don’t provide their best. The main reason behind being that everybody needs the technology that exists and there is no way that anyone can bypass this.

Entering this big market requires new ideas that are not similar to any of the existing ones, thus less makes it. Many people have big ideas which can be used to improve the technology that we are equipped with, but there is no chance that it is provided. This is because they need to follow long procedures, which mostly tends to keep them off the market. They end up working in giant companies such as Facebook, providing just a few skills that they are paid for.

Proposed ideas.

Everyone has a right to protect what they own from those people who usually take advantage of others. This, on the other side, does not mean that people should be granted excessive power threatening others from developing new ideas. This is the situation that does exist in the technological world, where very few are granted the power to provide for the majority. More has been done in recent years, but there is a need to improve on the rate that the technology is advancing. People who have ideas should not be threatened not to improve on what they have since there is a product that is close to that that do exist in the market. They need to be granted support and moral guidance o how they can ensure that their innovation is successful so that they can provide new ideas.

The government in every corner of the world should ensure that they fully support the innovation of young generations. This can be through guidance on the appropriate ways to ensure that they do not step on other companies’ work but work closely related to other successful innovators. It is not that there are no people with ideas, but most of them are left outside since their ideas look similar to that of other companies. This person can be granted the required resources such as funding and training to ensure that they provide a better but not similar product. This is the best way that we can ensure that technology companies are not left to be a monopoly and exploit the majority who rely on it.

Conclusion

Technological advancement has been the greatest innovation that the world has ever experienced; this is mainly after World War 1. The changes that have been experienced in different sectors such as transport, communication, health, farming, and many others are a great advantage to the majority in the economy. With this in mind, the advancement has been lagged behind by a few companies that have taken charge in different sectors and made it a monopoly business. This is through factors such as acquiring the patent right and making legal procedures to be costly and very long so that one can grant permission. This all factors will always hinder innovation from the upcoming young generation since the big sharks are continuing enjoying their large profit. The government needs to come up with strategies to ensure that people with new ideas are to provide platforms to bring out what they have and provide competition to existing companies.

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[1]. The knowledge level in cognitive architectures describes the challenges that may be experienced in trying to advance or bring out a change in the world of technology.

[2] Frank describes a market where a firm has all its power and can control all the operation of the market. This is in relation to the tech markets in the world with less interference.

[3] Plaiss provides information on the existence of a monopoly in technology and how it started and also an economic disadvantage to the country.

References

Lieto, A., Lebiere, C., & Oltramari, A. (2018). The knowledge level in cognitive architectures: Current limitations and possible developments. Cognitive Systems Research, 48, 39-55.

HUANG, J. Z., HUANG, M. A., & HU, S. N. (2019). Working Paper of Empirical Study on the Economic Effects of FDI on Natural Monopoly Industry. DEStech Transactions on Social Science, Education, and Human Science (icesd).

Frank, M. W. (2017). The impact of rate-of-return regulation on technological innovation. Routledge.

Plaiss, A. (2016). From Natural Monopoly to Public Utility: Technological Determinism and the Political Economy of Infrastructure in Progressive-Era America. Technology and culture, 57(4), 806-830.

[1]. The knowledge level in cognitive architectures describes the challenges that may be experienced in trying to advance or bring out a change in the world of technology.

[2] Frank describes a market where a firm has all its power and can control all the operation of the market. This is in relation to the tech markets in the world with less interference.

[3] Plaiss provides information on the existence of a monopoly in technology and how it started and also an economic disadvantage to the country.