Or does it?
From Warren’s It’s time to break up Amazon, Google and Facebook, posted Friday on Medium:
These companies would be prohibited from owning both the platform utility and any participants on that platform. Platform utilities would be required to meet a standard of fair, reasonable, and nondiscriminatory dealing with users. Platform utilities would not be allowed to transfer or share data with third parties.
From CNBC‘s Jacob Pranuk and Tucker Higgins:
Though Warren’s post did not mention Apple, her campaign said the plan would affect the tech behemoth. The company could have to choose between running its App Store or building its own apps, Warren spokeswoman Saloni Sharma said.
My take: A) Not going to happen. B) If it did, Apple would come out of it, compared to the others, relatively unscathed.
UPDATE: Deepest Apple-centric analysis of Warren’s plan I’ve seen so far comes from Forbes contributor John Koetsier, who offers five reasons Apple got spared. A sample:
Five: Apple doesn’t impact political power
Facebook controls a lot of conversation. Google controls a lot of knowledge. Amazon controls a lot of purchase power … and which merchants can sell on the dominant commerce platform in the U.S.
What does Apple control? Mostly, where and when you buy new iPhones.
He exaggerates for effect, but you get the point.
UPDATE: From Nilay Patel’s Elizabeth Warren wants to break up Apple too, posted Saturday on The Verge.
Warren’s proposal didn’t mention Apple, which clearly matches the same set of criteria: the company makes far more than $25 billion a year in revenue, and it operates the iOS App Store, in which it distributes its own apps.
I spoke to Senator Warren after she appeared on stage at SXSW in Austin, Texas today, and she told me explicitly that she thinks Apple should be broken apart too — specifically, that it should not get to both run the App Store and distribute apps in it. “It’s got to be one or the other,” she said. “Either they run the platform or they play in the store. They don’t get to do both at the same time.”..
Q: There was one company that fits that description that you did not mention.
A: Apple. They’re in.
Q: You want to break up Apple as well.
A: Yep…
Q: Why not mention Apple in your letter yesterday?
A: No special reason. [more]
My second take: A) Not going to happen. B) But Warren is going to force the Democratic candidates to take a position on it, one way or another.
But in general I’m as suspicious of populism-from-the-left as I am of populism-from-the-right.