I'm all for free market competition etc., although in truth I've never seen it being 'good for innovation' quite as people describe.

The first big player in a space e.g. Atlassian just acquires any competition and guts it. Sure, that's as free market as it gets (ignoring anti-trust?) but I don't see the benefit to the consumer.

Or, at the other end, as a Canadian, UK taxpayer (and many others) your money goes to keep afloat gov't subsidized startups that could never compete in the free market otherwise... is this beneficial as well?

I just write ANSI C so maybe it's all lost on me somewhere.