/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/59772427/Zuckerberg_Day_2_House.0.jpg)
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is “probably a good guy,” NYU professor Scott Galloway says — but that doesn’t change the fact that he has an enormous amount of power, was not elected to that position and faces no checks or term limits.
“History is littered with terrible events started by people who started out good, but had too much power,” Galloway said on the latest episode of Too Embarrassed to Ask. “If you buy into the American way, you buy into checks and balances. We’re going to have Trump for a maximum of six years. Putin will be dead in 10 to 20. Mark Zuckerberg could be around for 70 years.”
“CalSTRS called him a dictator,” he added. “I think that’s being unfair to dictators. Most of them are going to go away!”
He said that despite the negative impact they may have on the world, it’s not the job of businesses like Facebook, Google and Amazon to leave money on the table that could go to shareholders. Rather, it’s the job of citizens to elect leaders who can rein in the tech giants with regulation and, possibly, by using antitrust laws. Unfortunately, he noted, Zuckerberg’s recent Congressional hearings displayed a total “lack of domain expertise and will in Washington.”
“A much better business model for General Motors and its employees and its shareholders would be if they could pour their mercury into the river,” Galloway said. “And we said, no, you’re now liable for that mercury, and we regulated them.”
The result of so much concentrated power is that erstwhile rivals like Snap are “the walking dead,” he argued.
“If the four largest retailers — Walmart, Kroger’s, Home Depot and CVS — got together every morning and said, ‘We’re going to focus all our resources on putting No. 5, Target, out of business,’ Target would go out of business,” Galloway said. “That’s what’s going on with Snap. The four biggest players — Instagram, Facebook, WhatsApp and [Facebook] Messenger — every morning meet and say, ‘How do we put these guys out of business?’”
You can listen to Too Embarrassed to Ask on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Overcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
On the new podcast, Galloway said breaking up the big tech firms “could unleash another 20 to 30 years of unbelievable innovation and shareholder growth.” He said it’s “ridiculous” that the Justice Department chose to go after AT&T’s attempted merger with Time Warner when the same criteria for that intervention would have merited the breakup of both Google and Amazon a decade ago.
Later in the show, Galloway noted that there are plenty of things to dislike about Apple, “the largest tax avoider in the history of corporate America.” But the company’s brand scored a major win when CEO Tim Cook criticized Facebook and Google’s attitudes about privacy on “Revolution.”
“They saw an opening, strategically, to put their finger in the wound of privacy for the other guys,” he said. “He talked about it as a human right, he’s super-likable, you get the sense he really believes what he’s saying. And they’re well positioned because they’ve gone the other way to say, ‘We don’t even want your data.’ To a certain extent, Apple has brilliantly taken advantage of the situation and starched their hat white.”
If you like this podcast, make sure to check out our others:
- Recode Decode, hosted by Kara Swisher, is a weekly show featuring in-depth interviews with the movers and shakers in tech and media every Monday. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Overcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
- Recode Media with Peter Kafka features no-nonsense conversations with the smartest and most interesting people in the media world, with new episodes every Thursday. Use these links to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Overcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
- And finally, Recode Replay has all the audio from our live events, such as the Code Conference, Code Media and the Code Commerce Series. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Overcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
If you like what we’re doing, please write a review on Apple Podcasts — and if you don’t, just tweet-strafe Kara. Tune in next Friday for another episode of Too Embarrassed to Ask!
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.