The Threat of Tech Platforms to Our Economy and Democracy

Timothy Wu, professor at Columbia Law School and former White Houseadvisor on tech and competition policy, talks about his new book, The Age of Extraction: How Tech Platforms conquered the Economy and Threaten Our Future Prosperity. We discuss the initial promise of the Internet and what went wrong, how tech platforms choked off competition, platform power in health care and housing, the role of "couch lock" and convenience in creating dependency, whether AI will break platform monopoly power or extend it, the implications for our economy and democracy, and recommendations on how to address platform monopoly power.