{"id":25935,"date":"2025-04-14T14:07:36","date_gmt":"2025-04-14T14:07:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=25935"},"modified":"2025-04-14T14:25:28","modified_gmt":"2025-04-14T14:25:28","slug":"u-s-argues-meta-built-a-social-media-monopoly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/?p=25935","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Argues Meta Built a Social Media Monopoly"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The tech giant went to court on Monday in an antitrust trial focused on its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. The case could reshape its business.<\/p>\n

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The Federal Trade Commission on Monday accused Meta of creating a monopoly<\/a> that squelched competition by buying start-ups that stood in its way, kicking off a landmark antitrust trial that could dismantle a social media empire that has transformed how the world connects online.<\/p>\n

In a packed courtroom in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia, the F.T.C. opened its first antitrust trial under the Trump administration by arguing that Meta illegally cemented a monopoly in social networking by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp when they were tiny start-ups<\/a>. Those actions were part of a \u201cbuy-or-bury strategy,\u201d the F.T.C. said.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, the purchases coalesced Meta\u2019s power, depriving consumers of other social networking options and edging out competition, the government said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than 100 years, American public policy has insisted firms must compete if they want to succeed,” said Daniel Matheson, the F.T.C.\u2019s lead litigator in the case, in his opening remarks. \u201cThe reason we are here is that Meta broke the deal.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cThey decided that competition was too hard and it would be easier to buy out their rivals than to compete with them,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The trial \u2014 Federal Trade Commission v. Meta Platforms \u2014 poses the most consequential threat to the business empire<\/a> of Mark Zuckerberg, the company\u2019s co-founder<\/a>. If the government succeeds, the F.T.C. would most likely ask Meta to divest Instagram and WhatsApp, potentially shifting the way that Silicon Valley does business and altering a long pattern of big tech companies snapping up younger rivals.<\/p>\n

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The tech giant went to court on Monday in an antitrust trial focused on its acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp. The case could reshape its business.The Federal Trade Commission on Monday accused Meta of creating a monopoly that squelched competition by buying start-ups that stood in its way, kicking off a landmark antitrust trial that could dismantle a social media empire that has transformed how the world connects online.In a packed courtroom in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia, the F.T.C. opened its first antitrust trial under the Trump administration by arguing that Meta illegally cemented a monopoly in social networking by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp when they were tiny start-ups. Those actions were part of a \u201cbuy-or-bury strategy,\u201d the F.T.C. said.Ultimately, the purchases coalesced Meta\u2019s power, depriving consumers of other social networking options and edging out competition, the government said.\u201cFor more than 100 years, American public policy has insisted firms must compete if they want to succeed,” said Daniel Matheson, the F.T.C.\u2019s lead litigator in the case, in his opening remarks. \u201cThe reason we are here is that Meta broke the deal.\u201d\u201cThey decided that competition was too hard and it would be easier to buy out their rivals than to compete with them,\u201d he added.The trial \u2014 Federal Trade Commission v. Meta Platforms \u2014 poses the most consequential threat to the business empire of Mark Zuckerberg, the company\u2019s co-founder. If the government succeeds, the F.T.C. would most likely ask Meta to divest Instagram and WhatsApp, potentially shifting the way that Silicon Valley does business and altering a long pattern of big tech companies snapping up younger rivals.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and\u00a0log into\u00a0your Times account, or\u00a0subscribe\u00a0for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber?\u00a0Log in.Want all of The Times?\u00a0Subscribe.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25937,"comment_status":"close","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25935"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25938,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25935\/revisions\/25938"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medexperts.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}