Appelbaum: Why Google's antitrust loss is a victory for the Valley

"The giants of Silicon Valley have a lot in common with Laura Ingalls Wilder, who portrayed her life on the prairie as a triumph of self-sufficiency, barely mentioning that the government underwrote the railroads, provided the farmland and tided the family through rough winters. Tech companies, too, like to tell stories in which government rarely appears except as an outside force threatening to break the beautiful things they've created with their minds and their hard work."

"The part of the story that doesn't get told is how Silicon Valley's successes have relied on the steady support and occasional dramatic interventions of the federal government. On Tuesday, a federal judge ordered Alphabet, the company better known as Google, to share some of its search data with its rivals. The decision is intended to limit the dominance of the company's internet search engine, which was ruled an illegal monopoly last year."

"The government had sought to break up the company, which Alphabet decried as a radical intrusion on its business, and the court decided not to go that far. But the decision still marks an overdue return to the government's longtime role. Myth busters Antitrust regulators repeatedly intervened in the 20th century to limit the power of big tech companies, which created room for new firms to emerge."

Silicon Valley often portrays itself as self-sufficient while federal government support underwrote railroads, provided farmland and buffered hard times. Successes relied on steady support and dramatic federal interventions. A federal judge ordered Alphabet to share search data with rivals to limit its internet search dominance after a ruling that it was an illegal monopoly. The government had sought a breakup, which the court declined, but the order represents a return of federal action. Antitrust regulators in the 20th century repeatedly limited big tech power, creating room for new firms, while later lax enforcement allowed dominant firms to acquire rivals and entrench market positions.

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