Marc Andreessen, one of the Valley’s most venerable characters, is blunt about this tendency toward monopoly: “The big technology markets actually tend to be winner take all. There is this presumption—in normal markets you can have Pepsi and Coke. In technology markets in the long run you tend to only have one, or rather the number one company.” That is the nub of it: In Silicon Valley, everything is one; it’s always been one.
