That's a strange statement. What about all the regulation that doesn't come to be? To take your statement to its logical conclusion would allow no company to do anything on its own.
Also, a statement like "no company can be trusted to do the right thing on its own" is obviously untrue, doesn't account for many of us with companies out here, and harms your overall point when you make these kinds of broad generalizations.
Of course they aren't the same. I still don't agree with the statement. And if the pitchforks weren't out, most people would realize that they trust companies to do the right thing quite frequently even when there are no regulations to prevent the wrong thing from being done instead.
I don't think bakeries or flower retail companies doing the right thing are the crux of the argument here, on HN of all places. We're talking about startups that are braving new grounds in terms of what they're able to do, mostly without a legal framework to restrain them. These companies, once they reach a certain size will eventually need to be regulated because they come to wield too much power. See AirBnB, Uber, 23&Me, Amazon, Google, etc., etc.
Also, a statement like "no company can be trusted to do the right thing on its own" is obviously untrue, doesn't account for many of us with companies out here, and harms your overall point when you make these kinds of broad generalizations.