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Meta antitrust trial kicks off in federal court

(www.axios.com)
431 points c420 | 1 comments | 14 Apr 25 13:18 UTC | HN request time: 0.285s | source
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paxys ◴[14 Apr 25 19:40 UTC] No.43685386[source]▶
I don't understand the FTC's strategy here. Their entire case hinges on the fact that the judge will accept that Instagram, WhatsApp, Snapchat and MeWe (?) are direct competitors of Facebook in the "personal social networking" space while TikTok, YouTube, X, iMessage and all the rest aren't. Unsurprisingly that is what Meta's legal team is spending all of its efforts debating. I really can't see the judge allowing such a cherry-picked definition of what Facebook's market is.
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whatshisface ◴[14 Apr 25 20:31 UTC] No.43685979[source]▶
The definition of a trust isn't a business with no competitors. In fact, a business with no competitors is legal. Antitrust law limits "anti-competitive actions," which are possible even for commodity producers in an efficient market.
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the_clarence ◴[14 Apr 25 23:03 UTC] No.43687242[source]▶
Exactly! So what is anti competitive here?
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stackskipton ◴[14 Apr 25 23:43 UTC] No.43687485[source]▶
Facebook knew that Instagram was up and coming and instead of competing, it just bought it.

You can read more about initial complaint and following the trial here: https://www.bigtechontrial.com/p/zuckerberg-on-the-stand-the...

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the_clarence ◴[15 Apr 25 16:41 UTC] No.43695321[source]▶
Are we talking past each other? How is that anti competitive? This is literally the opposite: they embraced and validated their competitor by making them a huge offer, showing that it pays off to compete
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AnimalMuppet ◴[15 Apr 25 16:49 UTC] No.43695422[source]▶
And once they bought them, then Instagram wasn't a competitor any more. That's how it's anti-competitive.
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1. the_clarence ◴[17 Apr 25 05:24 UTC] No.43713378[source]▶
I disagree that it is anti competitive, it is not "killing" competition. Killing competition is setting prices that makes the competition go bankrupt, it's assassinating people, it's pushing for changes that prevent the competition from working in the same environment, etc. here nothing prevented instagram from saying no and getting bigger.