Re:Judge dismisses FTC and state antitrust complaints agains...
by dragonwriter on Monday June 28, 2021 @09:59PM
(#27670805)
> I also don’t see why a judge wouldn’t accept something like “online communications platform” as being the right market in this case
Because lots of things that could be described as “online communication platforms” are probably fairly simply demonstrable to not participate in competitive substitution, and as such arr not direct contributors. I mean, HN is an online communications platform, and so is GMail, but if service on HN is bad, I don’t think people move from HN to Gmail.
If Facebook convinces the judge to accept a broad market definition, game over for the FTC.
If the FTC convinced the judge of the reverse, bad news for Facebook.
The judge has basically told the FTC that they did a terrible job exactly on the market definition issue. This is a big problem for them.
I also don’t see why a judge wouldn’t accept something like “online communications platform” as being the right market in this case. Then all of the players you list are plausible competitors and the FTC’s job becomes much harder (or IMO impossible).