197: Can North Dakota break the Apple/Google app store monpoly?

In the late 19th century hundreds of small, short-line railroads were being bought up and consolidated into larger companies. Our nation's burgeoning economy was (and still is, in many ways) dependent on those railroad lines which, increasingly, were under the control of a shrinking number of people.

Those people began using their monopoly over the transportation of goods to price gouge and manipulate markets.

"If we will not endure a king as a political power we should not endure a king over the production, transportation, and sale of any of the necessaries of life," Republican Senator John Sherman said at the time.

Sherman would ultimately give his name to the Sherman Antitrust Act, which continues to the basis of American antitrust law to this day.

The point is that corporate hegemonies should be allowed to suppress free trade. Some argue that's exactly what's happening in the enormous and growing market of app development.

That market is dominated by two companies. Apple, the manufacturer of iPhones, and Google, which operates the Android operating system used on phones from pretty much every single non-Apple manufacturer.

Companies that sell digital services through these apps - think a subscription to a fitness app, or an in-app purchase in a game like Candy Crush - have to use Apple and Google's payment services and they have to pay a 30 percent fee for the privilege.

"This is exactly the same thing" as the railroad monopolies of the 19th century says Lacee Anderson, spokesperson for the Coalition for App Fairness, said on this episode of Plain Talk.

It is in this context that North Dakota's lawmakers take up Senate Bill 2333, which was introduced by Republican Senator Kyle Davison of Fargo.

Mark Buse, who is a vice president for dating service Match.com, says his company supports the legislation. "The issue is that all app developers should be treated the same."

Anderson suggested that Apple and Google have used their control of the app markets to drive out competitors for their own services. She also noted the recent controversies over the tech industry censoring political content as an argument in favor of breaking up these company's controls over apps.

No other state has this sort of law in place, though others are considering it. Why should North Dakota lead the charge? It could encourage app developers to locate here in order to avoid Apple and Google's fees.

Could Apple and Google cut North Dakotans off from their stores if this legislation passes? After all, our state is but a fraction of the markets those tech giants serve.

Anderson says that would be an extreme and unlikely outcome.