Mark Zuckerberg personally lost the Facebook antitrust case
I'm on a 20+ city book tour for my new novel PICKS AND SHOVELS. Catch me at NEW ZEALAND'S UNITY BOOKS in AUCKLAND on May 2, and in WELLINGTON on May 3. More tour dates (Pittsburgh, PDX, London, Manchester) here.
It's damned hard to prove an antitrust case: so often, the prosecution has to prove that the company intended to crush competition, and/or that they raised prices or reduced quality because they knew they didn't have to fear competitors.
It's a lot easier to prove what a corporation did than it is to prove why they did it. What am I, a mind-reader? But imagine for a second that the corporation in the dock is a global multinational. Now, imagine that the majority of the voting shares in that company are held by one man, who has served as the company's CEO since the day he founded it, personally calling every important shot in the company's history.
Now imagine that this founder/CEO, this accused monopolist, was an incorrigible blabbermouth, who communicated with his underlings almost exclusively in writing, and thus did he commit to immortal digital storage a stream – a torrent – of memos in which he explicitly confessed his guilt.
Ladies and gentlepersons, I give you Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Meta (nee Facebook), an accused monopolist who cannot keep his big dumb fucking mouth shut.
At long, long last, the FTC's antitrust trial against Meta is underway, and this week, Zuck himself took the stand, in agonizing sessions during which FTC lawyers brandished printouts of Zuck's own words before him, asking him to explain away his naked confessions of guilt. It did not go well for Zuck.
In a breakdown of the case for The American Prospect, editor-in-chief David Dayen opines that "The Government Has Already Won the Meta Case," having hanged Zuck on his own words:
The government is attempting to prove that Zuck bought Instagram and Whatsapp in order to extinguish competitors (and not, for example, because he thought they were good businesses that complemented Facebook's core product offerings).
This case starts by proving how Zuck felt about Insta and WA before the acquisitions. On Insta, Zuck circulated memos warning about Insta's growth trajectory:
they appear to be reaching critical mass as a place you go to share photos
and how that could turn them into a future competitor:
[Instagram could] copy what we’re doing now … I view this as a big strategic risk for us if we don’t completely own the photos space.
These are not the words of a CEO who thinks another company is making a business that complements his own – they're confessions that he is worried that they will compete with Facebook. Facebook tried to clone Insta (Remember Facebook Camera? Don't feel bad – neither does anyone else). When that failed, Zuck emailed Facebook execs, writing:
[Instagram's growth is] really scary and why we might want to consider paying a lot of money for this.
At this point, Zuck's CFO – one of the adults in the room, attempting to keep the boy king from tripping over his own dick – wrote to Zuck warning him that it was illegal to buy Insta in order to "neutralize a potential competitor."
Zuck replied that he was, indeed, solely contemplating buying Insta in order to neutralize a potential competitor. It's like this guy kept picking up his dictaphone, hitting "record," and barking, "Hey Bob, I am in receipt of your memo of the 25th, regarding the potential killing of Fred. You raise some interesting points, but I wanted to reiterate that this killing is to be a murder, and it must be as premeditated as possible. Yours very truly, Zuck."
Did Zuck buy Insta to neutralize a competitor? Sure seems like it! For one thing, Zuck cancelled all work on Facebook Camera "since we're acquiring Instagram."
But what about after the purchase. Did Zuck reduce quality and/or raise costs? Well, according to the company, it enacted an "explicit policy of not prioritizing Instagram’s growth" (a tactic called "buy or bury"). At this juncture, Zuckerberg once again put fingers to keyboard in order to create an immortal record of his intentions:
By not killing their products we prevent everyone from hating us and we make sure we don’t immediately create a hole in the market for someone else to fill.
And if someone did enter the market with a cool new gimmick (like, say, Snapchat with its disappearing messages)?
Even if some new competitors spring up, if we incorporate the social mechanics they were using, these new products won’t get much traction since we’ll already have their mechanics deployed at scale.
Remember, the Insta acquisition is only illegal if Zuck bought them to prevent competition in the marketplace (rather than, say, to make a better product). It's hard to prove why a company does anything, unless its CEO, founder, and holder of the majority of its voting stock explicitly states that his strategy is to create a system to ensure that innovating new products "won't get much traction" because he'll be able to quickly copy them.
So we have Zuck starving Insta of development except when he needs to neutralize a competitor, which is just another way of saying he set out to reduce the quality of the product after acquisition, a thing that is statutorily prohibited, but hard to prove (again, unless you confess to it in writing, herp derp).
But what about prices? Well, obviously, Insta doesn't charge its end-users in cash, but they do charge in attention. If you want to see the things you've explicitly asked for – posts from accounts you follow – you have to tolerate a certain amount of "boosted content" and ads, that is, stuff that Facebook's business customers will pay to nonconsensually cram into your eyeballs.
Did that price go up? Any Insta user knows the answer: hell yes. Instagram is such a cesspit of boosted content and ads that it's almost impossible to find stuff you actually asked to see. Indeed, when a couple of teenagers hacked together an alternative Insta client called OG App that only showed you posts from accounts you followed, it was instantly the most popular app on Google Play and Apple's App Store (and then Google and Apple killed it, at Meta's request):
But why did the price go up? Did it go up because Facebook had neutralized a competitor by purchasing it, and thus felt that it could raise prices without losing customers? Again, a hard thing to prove…unless Zuck happened to put it in writing. Which he did, as Brendan Benedict explains in Big Tech On Trial:
I think we’re badly mismanaging this right now. There’s absolutely no reason why IG ad load should be lower than FB at a time when . . . we’re having engagement issues in FB. If we were managing our company correctly, then at a minimum we’d immediately balance IG and FB ad load . . . But it’s possible we should even have a higher ad load on IG while we have this challenge so we can replace some ads with [People You May Know] on FB to turn around the issues we’re seeing.
So there you have it: Zuck bought Insta to neutralize a competitor, and after he did, he lowered its quality and raised its prices, because he knew that he was operating without significant competitors thanks to his acquisition of that key competitor. Zuck's motivations – as explained by Zuck himself – were in direct contravention of antitrust law, a thing he knew (because his execs explained it to him). That's a pretty good case.
But what about Whatsapp? How did Zuck feel about it? Well, he told his board that Whatsapp was Facebook's greatest "consumer risk," fretting that "Messenger isn’t beating WhatsApp." He blocked Whatsapp ads on Facebook, telling his team that it was "trying to build social networks and replace us." Sure, they'd lose money by turning away that business, but the "revenue is immaterial to us compared to any risk." Sure seems like Zuck saw Whatsapp as a competitor.
Meta's final line of defense in this case is that even if they did some crummy, illegal things, they still didn't manage to put together a monopoly. According to Meta's lawyers – who're billing the company more than $1m/day! – Meta is a tiny fish in a vast ocean that has many competitors, like Tiktok:
There's only one problem with this "market definition" argument, and that problem's name is Chatty Mark Zuckerberg. On the question of market definition, FTC lawyers once again raised Zuckerberg's own statements and those of his top lieutenants to show that Zuckerberg viewed his companies as "Personal Social Networks" (PSNs) and not as just generic sites full of stuff, competing with Youtube, Tiktok, and everyone else who lets users post things to the internet.
Take Instagram boss Adam Mosseri, who explained that:
Instagram will always need to focus on friends and can never exclusively be for public figures or will cease to be a social product.
And then there was Zuck's memo explaining why he offered $6b for Snapchat:
Snap Stories serves the exact same use case of sharing and consuming feeds of content that News Feed and Instagram deliver. We need to take this new dynamic seriously—both as a competitive risk and as a product opportunity to add functionality that many people clearly love and want to use daily.
And an internal strategy document that explained the competitive risks to Facebook:
Social networks have two stable equilibria: either everyone uses them, or no-one uses them. In contrast, nonsocial apps (e.g. weather apps, exercise apps) can exist [somewhere] along a continuum of adoption. The binary nature of social networks implies that there should exist a tipping point, ie some critical mass of adoption, above which a network will organically grow, and below which it will shrink.
Sure sounds like Facebook sees itself as a "social network," and not a "nonsocial app." And of course – as Dayen points out – when Tiktok (a company Meta claims as a competitor) went up for sale, Meta did not enter a bid, despite being awash in free cash flow.
In Zuckerberg's defense, he's not the only tech CEO who confesses his guilt in writing (recall that FTX planned its crimes in a groupchat called WIREFRAUD). Partly that's because these firms are run by arrogant twits, but partly it's because digital culture is a written culture, where big, dispersed teams expected to work long hours from offices all over the world as well as from their phones every hour of day and night have to rely on memos to coordinate:
When Dayen claims that "the government has won the Meta case," he doesn't mean the judge will rule in the FTC's favor (though there's a high likelihood that this will happen). Rather, he means that the case has been proven beyond any kind of reasonable doubt, in public, in a way that has historically caused other monopolists to lose their nerve, even if they won their cases. Take Microsoft and IBM – though both companies managed to draw out their cases until a new Republican administration (Reagan for IBM, GWB for Microsoft) took office and let them off the hook, both companies were profoundly transformed by the process.
IBM created the market for a generic, multivendor PC whose OS came from outside the company:
Trump being Trump, it's not inconceivable that he will attempt to intervene to get the judge to exonerate Meta. After all, Zuck did pay him a $1m bribe and then beg him to do just that:
But as Dayen writes, the ire against Meta's monopolistic conduct is thoroughly bipartisan, and if Trump was being strategic here (a very, very big "if"), he would keep his powder dry here. After all, if the judge doesn't convict Meta, Trump won't have wasted any political capital. And if Meta is convicted, Trump could solicit more bribes and favors at the "remedy" stage, when a court will decide how to punish Meta, which could be anything from a fine to a breakup order, to a nothingburger of vague orders to clean up its act.
If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
A few hours late, but I'm making a double entry for Day 5 of The Long Walk Black History Month Prompt Week, run by my friend @collie-parkers-carbine!
The 'Music' prompt really got me thinking about what TLW characters' tastes would be for rap music.
This fandom is so painfully White, I've noticed that most character playlists tend to only include White artists and there's rarely any sort of rap or hip-hop songs associated with the cast... Despite half the notable characters being Black. Lots of untapped potential here!
To make things easily digestible, I tried to narrow down on just one rap artist to associate per character (and even down to the album I feel they might like the most).
Explanations and typed out Image ID under the cut!
...
Pete McVries: Megan Thee Stallion
Pete loves Megan’s tough attitude, sharp wordplay, and being unapologetically queer. He wishes nothing but good things in her future and that she finally gets both the recognition and peace she deserves. He also loves Kendrick Lamar and Childish Gambino.
Ray Garraty: Kendrick Lamar
Kdot’s the main rapper Ray knows. His dad showed him To Pimp a Butterfly and he’s been following Kendrick since. Pulitzer Prize winner Kendrick Lamar is peak rap music to him. Once the Kendrick and Drake beef started, Ray wouldn’t stop talking about it to the Musketeers, much to Hank’s irritation and Art’s dread.
Hank Olson: Notorious B.I.G.
One wouldn’t think Hank knows rap, but he’s born and raised in Brooklyn. He grew up listening to Biggie Smalls, Busta Rhymes, Jay-Z, and Lil’ Kim. He’s a bit of an old man with his tastes. Listens to Sir-Mix-A-Lot in the car with his wife.
Art Baker: Drake
Art’s grandma doesn’t let him listen to rap music. Too crass, strays too much from God. She makes an exception for Drake since his hit songs are practically pop music, so that’s the only rapper Art knows. The Kendrick and Drake beef saddened him, mostly because of his disappointment in Drake’s less than stellar character.
Billy Stebbins: Missy Elliot
Raised by a single mother, Billy has just sort of absorbed all his mama’s tastes by accident. This includes popular Black 90’s acts like Brandy, Aaliyah, TLC, and Salt-N-Pepa. Truly no one expects him to name Missy Elliot when asked who his favorite rapper is, or think he’d have one whatsoever. He likes to keep people on their toes.
Collie Parker: Denzel Curry
Collie will support fellow Native Americans whenever possible, and even hip-hop and rap spaces have some notable figures. Collie loves going on Bandcamp or Soundcloud for his music, which is where he found Denzel Curry. He really likes Denzel Curry’s punchy rap style and versatility.
Richard Harkness: Cardi B
That’s his Latina queen! I Like It was a song that played nonstop in his household. When WAP dropped, he was fighting for his life to listen to it without blushing. Enjoys her new album, but still mostly attached to her old stuff.
Gary Barkovitch: Eminem
Gary is peak racist White guy who swears he’s not racist because he’s got Black friends. Eminem isn’t Gary’s favorite rapper just because he’s White, the man is one of the best rappers there is, okay! Unironically loves the Slim Shady persona.
Tressler: Tupac Shakur
Why mess with a classic? To Tressler, 2pac’s the best that ever was, and ever will be, when it comes to rap music. Everyone’s just trying to chase his magic.
Pearson: Nicki Minaj
Pearson is a Barb for sure. Onika can do no wrong to him. He’s bought all her albums and singles that feature her. He is out there defending her like he’s getting paid to do it. Pearson being a Barb is why Pete doesn’t fuck with him.
Zuck: Doja Cat
Zuck’s a simple guy. If he thinks the songs are fire and the beat’s good, he can get behind any rapper. Bonus points if they’re a beautiful girl like Doja Cat. He follows her on tiktok and thinks she’s funny as fuck, too.
Clementine Olson: Doechii
If her husband is an old timer with his taste, Clementine loves listening to new blood in the rap industry, especially female rappers. Doechii’s been on her radar for a while. After getting acclaim with Alligator Bites Never Heal, Clementine’s never felt more vindicated. Also loves Ayesha Erotica, Cupcakke, Sexyy Red, and GloRilla.
…
[Start Image ID:
A series of images of characters from The Long Walk paired with different rap album covers.
Pete McVries with Megan The Stallion’s album Megan (2024)
Ray Garraty with Kendrick Lamar’s album To Pimp a Butterfly (2015)
Hank Olson with The Notorious B.I.G.’s album Life After Death (1997)
Art Baker (Face Claim as Miles Caton) with Drake’s album Views (2015)
Billy Stebbins with Missy Elliot’s album Da Real World (1999)
Collie Parker with Denzel Curry’s album TA1300 (2018)
Richard Harkness with Cardi B’s album Invasion of Privacy (2018)
Gary Barkovitch with Eminem’s album The Marshall Mathers LP (2000)
Tressler with Tupac Shakur’s album All Eyez on Me (1996)
Pearson with Nicki Minaj’s album Pink Friday (2010)
Zuck with Doja Cat’s album Hot Pink (2019)
Clementine Olson (Face Claim as Ayo Edebiri) with Doechii’s album Alligator Bites Never Heal (2024)
First of all, everyone say a BIG thank you to @collie-parkers-carbine for putting this whole thing together. This was a magnificent way to celebrate the Black characters of the TLW universe. I really look forward to more events like this one!
Secondly, this list is just the opinion of one lil lesbian in this community. This is by no means an end all be all; there were so many meaningful fics as part of this event but I can't fit them all in one post! The collection I've put together are ones that either made me really feel something, or ones that spoke to me personally. A massive thank you to everyone who participated in this event - fic writers are truly the backbone of any fandom, and your work does not go unnoticed!
can you see the stars? by emialex (1.7k words)
Art Baker loves the stars, and wants to go to the moon someday. Wishing on a star…
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This one hurts! But it's also so beautiful. The part that really got me is the idea that there were things left unsaid between Art and his grandmother, the person he loved the most. My chest feels achey but this was exceptional.
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Virgo by Lolo (The LittleLo) (1.2k words)
Art Baker contemplates the stars while on the Long Walk
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I love astrology and mythology and this felt like a really great way to bring in the idea of Clementine.
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Not a shirt on his back, not a penny to his name, Lord he can't go back home this way by Get_below_my_line_of_vision (4.6k words)
Before he had departed for the last time, Art had actually tuned into the radio. As always, he put the volume on low and tried to listen out for news from Algeria.
As Art listened to the low volume rumbles of the broadcast, Art had thought about how chaos had unleashed throughout the globe. The people came together to fight the oppressors, and with respectable fervour, they fought for independence and freedom.
But America was untouched. This closed-off country never bore that kind of chaos. The fires of revolution could spread everywhere but not here.
If Algeria was to win, they had a chance, too. ‘Win,’ Art wished, ‘Win, so I can have hope.’
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I cannot begin to describe the impact that Frantz Fanon has had on me personally, and to have a TLW fic reference his work so clearly truly means the world to me. If you have never heard of Fanon, I would HIGHLY encourage you to look him up. Black Skin, White Masks and Wretched of the Earth are pivotal decolonial texts. I remember the first time I read Wretched of the Earth; it felt like I had opened my eyes for the first time. Sorry, I'm realizing now that I'm talking about Fanon instead of the fic lol. Point is, this is great, I feel inspired, one of my new favorites for sure.
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Interstellar Academy Interstitial Moments by Ursa_Minor_Is_In_Love (series)
So this series takes place at Interstellar Academy, a military space training camp. I'll be completely honest, I wasn't sure how I was going to feel about this series when I first encountered it. It seemed like an interesting concept but I wasn't sure if the freeform vibes of this would appeal to me. But I ended up enjoying it, and I'm really excited to see how the author continues it! My favorite fics in this series are Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child (Nina Simone I love you and of COURSE Tressler would be a fan), Wish I May, Wish I Might (Pete I love you), and Blessed Be The Mystery of Love (gayyyyy).
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know just what to say by kopycat_101 (2.2k words)
Pete was struggling with making friends in college, despite the encouragements from his best friend and roommate, Priscilla.
He tried to put himself out there. Made a few friends. But maybe he could find one from his Music classes, too?
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This is another one where I wasn't 100% sold on this pair when I first heard about it. I think I feel a bit haunted by Tressler's death in the movie - the way he just runs off plagues my memory fr. However, I was once again proved wrong, because this description of Tressler is one of my faves. I definitely think that Pete is the kind of guy who could fall in love with someone's voice first, and everything else would follow. Also: LOVED Priscilla and Pete's relationship here, it was so cute.
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Dandelion Wishes by brashtea (931 words)
"Reckon we can make some wishes on those,” He nodded, watching Ray follow the direction of his pointing finger.
As a kid, he loved to gather the seed heads, letting them scatter on the wind with an exhale and a wish. Even if it was all pretend for his childish self, his current self could use the softness of an old habit such as this. Something fun to spread to his fellow walkers.
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Ahhhhh this was so cute! As someone with the personality of a grumpy old man, I sometimes have a hard time appreciating whimsy. Despite my crotchety ways, I still really enjoyed this fic.
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love me long, be my sunlight by kopycat_101 (4.5k words)
Pete has a lot of love to give, especially for his boyfriend.
One night after working out, Ray shows him just how much love he's willing to give Pete in return.
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Oh, you thought smut written by Kopy WOULDN'T make it onto this list? You FOOL: Kopy is truly my favorite smut writer in this fandom. And this one was more than just smut, it had me genuinely laughing out loud. Favorite.
These three groveling billionaire nerds,
Mouths wide open just like baby birds.
'Fore their Master they kneel;
That's just "part of the deal."
My contempt for them goes beyond words.
Can you drop some couples he’s? Romantic or platonic I’m not fussed, I just wanna hear your thoughts. It can be whoever you want, main characters, background, I don’t mind x
Sure! I'll give u a few hc for each duo (including me leaking the first trio!)
Ray Garratty x Peter Mcvries
- They're absolutely the mom and dad of the group
- Such cuddle birds
- Ray always chooses funny movies for the two to watch
Art Baker x Hank Olsen
- Art is the man in the relationship
- The two love reading books together
-Olsen makes fun of Art for being so tall sometimes
Stebbins x Richard Harkness
- Stebbins will take off Richard's glasses when he falls asleep writing
- They love to sit and look out the window into the sunlight
- Richard sleeps like a log ever since he started dating Stebbins since the blonde snores
Collie Parker x Gary Barkovitch
- If you fuck with one of them, the other will kill you
- Collie always helps Barkovitch with his anxiety, and Barkovitch helps keep Collie from exploding
-Barkovitch hates everyone calling him by his first name except for Parker
Patrick Smith x Percy Grimes
- Percy likes to sit on Patrick's wheelchair/lap when he gets tired
- Patrick loves to yap sometimes for no reason
- They are both the leader of the Losers
Ewing James and Pearson
- It's a platonic romance and they both love it
- If anyone flirts with Ewing, expect Pearson to show up saying "Erm, actually he signed a paper saying he's with me ☝️🤓"
- Both find so much comfort in each other's voice
Rank Sanders and Curly Adams and Marty Wyman
- Sibling dynamic. Ranks the oldest, Marty is the middle child, and Curly is the youngest.
- Rank is the only one who can truly control the two
-Marty likes to prank the other two
Tressler x Zuck
- Zuck likes to sing to Tressler softly
- They own matching necklaces that have a small black rock on it
