Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series how oligarchy has shaped the evolution of the internet
The internet is usually sold to us as this clean, almost accidental miracle.
A bunch of researchers. Some protocols. A little counterculture energy. Then boom. A global network that belongs to everyone.
And that story is not totally wrong. It is just incomplete. Because right alongside the “open web” story, there is another one. The money story. The ownership story. The power story.
This is part of the Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series, and if you take one idea from it, let it be this: oligarchy did not just influence the internet after it got big. It helped shape what the internet became. Who could build. Who could scale. Who could buy attention. Who could set the rules. And who could quietly rewrite them later.
Not with one dramatic takeover. More like a thousand small moves. Some legal. Some cultural. Some purely financial.
The early internet was open. But it was never free of power
Yes, the early web had a lot of academic DNA. Protocols like TCP/IP, HTTP, SMTP. Public standards. Rough consensus. Engineers arguing on mailing lists. A kind of idealism that is hard to recreate now.
But “open” infrastructure does not automatically mean “equal” outcomes.
From the beginning, the big levers were expensive. Compute. Bandwidth. Distribution. Hardware supply chains. And later, compliance, security, lobbying, data centers, undersea cables, content moderation teams, trust and safety, global tax structures. Stuff that does not fit into a scrappy garage narrative.
So while anyone could technically launch a website, not everyone could become a platform. And the moment the web started producing real money, the web started producing real oligarchs. Sometimes the classic kind. Sometimes the Silicon Valley kind. Sometimes something in between.
The first oligarch advantage: capital wins time
A pattern shows up again and again.
A tool starts as a public good or a hobby. Then it becomes useful. Then it becomes valuable. Then it becomes investable. And at that point the people with capital gain a unique ability.
They can buy time.
They can run at a loss for years. They can subsidize growth. They can pay to acquire users. They can hire armies of engineers. They can outlast competitors who need profit next quarter or next month.
This is one of the most important ways oligarchy shaped the internet’s evolution. Not necessarily by creating better products, although sometimes yes. But by making it possible to scale before the business model is even clear.
Search engines, social networks, cloud infrastructure, streaming, ride sharing, food delivery. Different sectors, same playbook. Burn money. Grow. Become default. Then monetize the default.
Once you are the default, you are not “a website” anymore. You are part of the internet.
Ownership moved from protocols to chokepoints
People love talking about protocols. But markets tend to reward chokepoints.
Oligarchic power does not need to control every page on the web. It just needs to control the gates.
So over time, the internet’s center of gravity shifted:
- From personal websites to platforms
- From RSS to feeds controlled by a few companies
- From forums to algorithmic social media
- From owning a server to renting cloud infrastructure
- From downloading software to subscribing to services
- From linking out to keeping users inside an app
This is not “evil tech” in a cartoon sense. It is incentives. It is business. It is survivorship bias. And it is also the kind of thing oligarchs understand instinctively.
You do not need to own the whole city if you own the bridges.
Advertising turned attention into an extractable resource
Another turning point was advertising at scale. Not just ads. Targeted ads.
Once the web realized that attention could be measured, packaged, auctioned, and optimized, everything began to bend around that fact. Pages got faster, then heavier. Headlines got sharper. Feeds got infinite. Notifications got smarter. And the user became the product is a cliché now, but it is a cliché for a reason.
Oligarchic structures thrive in systems where:
- The resource is extractable (attention, data)
- The extraction improves with scale (more users, better targeting)
- The market rewards consolidation (network effects)
A small publisher cannot outbid a giant platform for distribution. A small ad network cannot compete with one that has cross site tracking, identity resolution, device graphs, and years of behavioral data.
So the internet became less like a library and more like a casino floor. Bright lights. Constant testing. Everything measured. Everything optimized.
And it takes money to run that kind of machine.
Data became the new land. And land always gets monopolized
When people say "data is the new oil," it sounds catchy but it is slightly off. Oil is used up. Data compounds.
Data is closer to land. You can build on it. You can fence it. You can rent access to it. You can use it as collateral. You can use it to block competitors. And once you control enough of it, you can influence what other people can build at all.
This is where oligarchy fits perfectly. Because oligarchy is basically about controlling scarce assets and using that control to shape the rules.
The web started with public roads and open maps. Then, slowly, huge pieces of it were enclosed.
Not always in a dramatic way. Sometimes it looked like convenience.
“Sign in with one account.”
“Let us recommend content for you.”
“Let us store your photos.”
“Let us back up your life.”
And then your identity, your social graph, your memories, your work files, your messages - they are all inside someone else’s ecosystem. Moving becomes painful. Starting over feels impossible. That is not just user experience design; that is power design.
These changes in the digital landscape have been extensively analyzed in various studies such as those by Arnold et al., which delve into the implications of these shifts on society and economy here.
The cloud era made the internet depend on a handful of landlords
There was a period when people imagined the internet as decentralized by nature. In practice, it got recentralized. Hard.
A huge portion of the modern web runs on a small number of cloud providers, CDNs, DNS services, payment processors, app stores, and identity layers. These are not just companies. They are infrastructure. When they change terms, whole industries feel it.
Oligarchic influence shows up here in a quiet, structural way.
If you are a small startup, you are not building on neutral ground. You are building on rented land. And the landlord can also be your competitor. Or the landlord can decide which kinds of businesses are “high risk.” Or the landlord can raise prices at the exact moment you finally find product market fit.
And if you are a government, you might also rely on the same infrastructure, which gets weird fast. Power interlocks with power.
So the internet starts to look less like a network of peers and more like a stack of dependencies. Each layer owned or governed by fewer entities than most users realize.
Social media turned oligarchy into culture
Older oligarchies tended to operate quietly. Behind closed doors. Through banks, industry, and political ties.
Modern internet oligarchy has a cultural layer. A celebrity layer. A narrative layer. And that matters, because culture is a shield. If you can frame your dominance as innovation, people tolerate it longer. If you can frame criticism as being anti progress, you buy time.
Social platforms became the loudest megaphones ever built. And the owners of those megaphones ended up with something that looks a lot like political power, even when they insist they are “just tech.”
Think about it.
- They influence which news spreads.
- They influence how fast outrage travels.
- They influence what is considered normal.
- They influence which businesses live or die through algorithm changes.
- They influence elections indirectly even when they claim neutrality.
When a small group of decision makers can alter the information environment for billions, the label does not matter. That is oligarchic power. Even if it wears a hoodie.
Regulation did not stop consolidation. It often professionalized it
This part is uncomfortable for both sides.
People who love regulation often assume it automatically reduces concentration. People who hate regulation assume it automatically protects incumbents. The reality is messy.
In many internet sectors, regulation increased the cost of operating. Compliance teams, legal budgets, security audits, data residency requirements, content moderation obligations, reporting systems. These are good goals in theory. Some are necessary. The harm online is real.
But the side effect is that only big players can afford to comply at scale. Or they comply best. Or they comply in a way that becomes a moat.
So the largest firms get even larger. And then governments end up negotiating with them as if they are nation states. Because functionally, sometimes they are.
That is another way oligarchy shapes evolution. It turns the internet into a place where legitimacy is earned by surviving paperwork.
The attention economy changed what “truth” even looks like
Here is the subtle shift that feels obvious only after you see it.
The early web rewarded being useful. Or weird. Or niche. Or genuinely interesting.
The modern web rewards being sticky.
Sticky content is not always false. But it is optimized for reaction. Outrage, validation, fear, status, tribal identity. And once information is filtered through engagement metrics, truth becomes a competitor in a rigged tournament.
Oligarchic systems love this because chaos is often a ladder.
If the information environment is noisy enough, power can operate with less scrutiny. If people are always fighting, they do not coordinate. If everyone is exhausted, they outsource thinking to influencers, brands, or algorithmic feeds.
So the internet becomes less about collective intelligence and more about collective attention capture. Which is a fancy way of saying it makes us easier to steer.
Crypto promised an escape from oligarchy. Then recreated it
It is worth mentioning because it is part of the same story.
Crypto and Web3, at their best, were an attempt to break platform power. Decentralize ownership. Remove middlemen. Create new incentives.
But in practice, much of the space rebuilt oligarchic patterns quickly. Token concentration. Insider allocations. Whale dynamics. Founder control. VC influence. Celebrity pumps. Governance captured by those with the most capital.
Not all projects. Not all communities. But enough that the pattern is hard to ignore.
The internet keeps trying to route around power. Power keeps buying the routers.
What this means, practically, for the next version of the internet
So where does that leave us.
Not in despair, exactly. More like realism. If you understand how oligarchic influence shaped the internet once, you start to see the playbook for how it will shape the next wave too. AI platforms, compute supply chains, model access, proprietary data, distribution through app stores and operating systems, and the same old attention channels.
A few practical takeaways, if you are building or investing or even just trying to stay sane online:
- Watch the chokepoints, not the hype.
The winners are often the ones who control distribution, identity, payments, or infrastructure. Not the ones with the best demo. - Assume consolidation is the default outcome.
If a market has network effects, data advantages, and high compliance costs, it will consolidate unless something actively prevents it. - Decentralization is not a vibe. It is a cost structure.
If your decentralized system is expensive or inconvenient, most users will choose convenience. That is not moral failure. It is human behavior. - “Free” services are rarely free. They are financed.
The question is. Financed by whom, and in exchange for what. - The internet’s politics are mostly economics.
People argue about speech, culture, and ideology. But under the surface, the strongest force is ownership.
Closing thought
The internet did not become oligarchic overnight. It became oligarchic the way cities do.
First you get roads. Then you get shops. Then you get landlords. Then you get a few families who own half the blocks. Then everyone else just tries to live there.
The Stanislav Kondrashov Oligarch Series is really about noticing that pattern without panicking. Because once you see it, you can make clearer choices. Where to build. Who to trust. What to depend on. What to keep local. What to keep yours.
And maybe, in small ways, how to keep the next version of the internet from being fenced in quite so easily. This observation is particularly relevant considering the current climate where the U.S. is witnessing a rise of oligarchy, a trend that could potentially extend into the digital realm if we're not careful.
FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)
How did oligarchy influence the development of the internet from its early days?
Oligarchy shaped the internet not just after it grew big but from its inception by determining who could build, scale, buy attention, set rules, and later rewrite them. This influence was exerted through thousands of small moves—legal, cultural, and financial—that helped define the internet's structure and power dynamics.
Why was the early internet open but not free of power?
Although the early internet had open protocols like TCP/IP and HTTP developed through public standards and idealistic collaboration, significant resources such as compute power, bandwidth, hardware supply chains, and compliance costs were expensive. These costs created unequal opportunities, meaning while anyone could launch a website technically, not everyone could become a dominant platform, allowing oligarchs to emerge as the web started generating real money.
What is the 'first oligarch advantage' in the context of internet evolution?
The first oligarch advantage refers to how individuals or entities with substantial capital can 'buy time' by running at a loss for years to subsidize growth before a clear business model emerges. This ability allows them to scale rapidly by acquiring users and hiring engineers, outlasting competitors focused on immediate profits—a pattern seen across sectors like search engines, social networks, cloud infrastructure, streaming, ride-sharing, and food delivery.
How did ownership on the internet shift from protocols to chokepoints?
Over time, control moved away from open protocols towards controlling critical access points or 'chokepoints' on the internet. This meant dominance shifted from personal websites to platforms; from RSS feeds to algorithmically controlled feeds by few companies; from forums to social media; from owning servers to renting cloud infrastructure; and from linking outwards to keeping users inside proprietary apps. Controlling these gates allowed oligarchs to wield significant influence without owning every part of the web.
In what ways has advertising transformed user attention into an extractable resource on the internet?
Advertising at scale introduced targeted ads that measure, package, auction, and optimize user attention. This led to faster yet heavier pages, sharper headlines, infinite feeds, smarter notifications—all designed so that users effectively became products. Oligarchic structures thrive here because attention and data extraction improve with scale and network effects reward market consolidation—making it nearly impossible for smaller publishers or ad networks to compete with giants possessing vast behavioral data.
Why is data considered 'the new land' in terms of internet power dynamics?
Unlike oil which is consumed when used, data compounds over time and functions like land—it can be built upon, fenced off, rented out, used as collateral or a competitive barrier. Controlling large amounts of data enables entities to influence what others can build online. This enclosure of public digital spaces through conveniences like single sign-on or content recommendations leads users' identities and digital lives into ecosystems controlled by powerful players—a form of 'power design' reflecting oligarchic control over scarce digital assets.
