The recent buy-out of Red Hat by Big Blue (creating Purple Haze?) reminded me of the Accretion Theory which describes planet formation.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accretion_(astrophysics)
Essentially, gravitational forces cause particles to be drawn to each other, forming larger clumps of space dust. Eventually, the larger clumps become so large their gravitational pull "sucks in" the smaller clumps that have already formed, leaving just a handful of very large clumps. Or planets in our Solar System.
In this business example, IBM (an already large clump) sucked up Red Hat (a smaller clump) and formed an even bigger clump. Sometimes, a regulator steps in to prevent the clump becoming too big:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-09/woolworths-opts-for-plan-b-selling-petrol-buisness-to-ukretailer/10483868
We all shed a tear for poor Woolworths when the ACCC blocked their large-clump-forming plot to offload their fuel stations to BP. Now, thanks to those meanies at the ACCC, Woolworths will only receive $1.7B instead of $1.8B, and the large clump formed by their offloaded fuel stations is just slightly smaller than the Woolworths fat cats dreamed of.
Back to IBM's recent embiggening of their already large clump, does anyone else worry that the world will eventually end up in a similar state to the interesting but frightening future portrayed in The Fifth Element?
http://aliens.wikia.com/wiki/Zorg_Industries
One large organisation, Zorg, seems to operate everything from real estate to taxi companies, food stores to weapons supplies. Of course, we already know Zorg is simply the fictional representation in that movie of the real world organisation, Alphabet (best known as Google).
