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.
We’re in post law society, I can’t even believe the trump admin is going after tech giants. So i believe anything is possible here. I can’t imagine anything the admin does will be good for society so maybe its safe to assume they will be broken up so elon can buy a chunk?
I share the disbelief. I think it is mostly a power play against not just Google, but all tech giants, which must be watching this closely, given most of them operate in a similarly anticompetitive manner: kiss the ring or else. The Trump administration could give Google reprieve in exchange for axing DEI further and helping push their political agenda.
I think so too: if Google doesn’t satisfy Trump and his administration, parts of it will be forcibly sold as private equity, outside of shareholder scrutiny and beyond the reach of the SEC. Such a private company would be easier to control than a publicly traded one.
Yea i guess the most simple explanation, that is most coherent with the rest of the administration’s actions, is that it’s just a mob style shake down of every major economic player. Pure extortion as the japanese said.
But ya its funny to see the SEC and DOJ neutered and then actually used against big tech. Ironic and poetic, and fucking stupid. It really burns at the senses, and creates confusion.
Tech giants welcomed Trump because they thought he would enable two things. A roll-back of regulations, and to increase profits. The thing is, the monkey wrench in this situation is twofold. The first problem is Elon Musk being placed in a position of power that enables him to detrimentally effect the profits and regulations of these industries to benefit his companies first and foremost while also being detrimental to these other tech companies. We see that a lot with the data he’s been stealing from all kinds of government agencies under the guise of saving the government money.
This means that even regulations that are removed that pave the way for these companies to enact policy or even just products to enrich themselves are hindered by Musk being a direct competitor to a lot of them. Facebook/Instagram vs Twitter, Tesla vs Ford, SpaceX vs Blue origin.
The second problem is the tariff situation. It cuts off a majority of tech companies from the cheap manufacture of components, devices, and even just consumer electronics that a lot of tech companies rely on in order to get their products into the hands of users so they can siphon up user data.
A third problem is that Musk has his hands in so much stuff that he’s pressuring the government to place his companies first in the running for. SpaceX and Tesla especially for things like bullet proof vehicles (where previously the government had contracts with other automotive manufacturers), and SpaceX being used for missions that NASA might have previously handled using Boeing products etc.
All these tech companies went to Washington DC to “Kiss the Ring” with the intention not just of avoiding a lot of legislation being leveled at them by previous administrations, but also in the hopes that they could position themselves as Musk had. For further government contracts. Because long after Trump is dead and buried, the contracts would be lucrative.
But that assumes they survive all the upheaval his administration is causing (and not just survive it, but come out largely economically and financially unharmed).
Anything may be possible, but the market has to survive in order for these companies to remain supreme.
Absolutely. As an investor and enjoyer of US markets and economy, I am truly terrified at the ramifications of all this. No safe harbors left to hide in and it appears to be hit the economy with a wrecking ball, and funnel the remaining funds to elon. I’m not so interested in US markets anymore and i can imagine this will have a lasting effect on investor confidence and companies bottom line.
What confuses me is if you steal all the money and destroy the stock market and USD in the process, what do you even do with the stolen wealth?
Buy things up in the fallout. The power vacuum the collapse will create will be ripe for anyone who comes out financially ahead in such a situation.
Yea time to fill up the garage with portable generators and nintendo switch