[HN Gopher] FTC files new antitrust complaint against Facebook
___________________________________________________________________
FTC files new antitrust complaint against Facebook
Author : dmix
Score : 335 points
Date : 2021-08-19 16:04 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.ftc.gov)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.ftc.gov)
| theptip wrote:
| The tone of the FTC's post is quite aggressive:
|
| > FTC Alleges Facebook Resorted to Illegal Buy-or-Bury Scheme to
| Crush Competition After String of Failed Attempts to Innovate
|
| Ouch.
|
| It's important to analyze this in the context of the initial
| complaint, which was rejected because they didn't show enough
| evidence of a monopoly (and many commenters here questioned that
| assertion too, discussed many times, but here for example:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27666439). This amended
| complaint seems to make their claims more explicit.
|
| Note that if I'm following correctly, the main thrust of the
| complaint is not that they are a monopoly now, it's that they
| were in the early 2010s, and they abused that monopoly position
| at that time. Though they do also spend some time making the case
| that they currently have monopoly power, I'm not sure that they
| need to substantiate monopoly in 2020; they might just need to
| substantiate it in 2012 (Instagram) and/or 2014 (WhatsApp).
|
| > By 2011, Facebook was touting to its advertising clients that
| "Facebook is now 95% of all social media in the US."
|
| I find that more specific argument much more convincing, although
| I'm convincable that they have a 2020 monopoly too.
|
| > According to the amended complaint, a critical transition
| period in the history of the internet, and in Facebook's history,
| was the emergence of smartphones and the mobile Internet in the
| 2010s. Facebook's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, recognized at the time
| that "we're vulnerable in mobile" and a major shareholder worried
| that Facebook's mobile weakness "ran the risk of the unthinkable
| happening - being eclipsed by another network[.]"
|
| > After suffering significant failures during this critical
| transition period, Facebook found that it lacked the business
| talent and engineering acumen to quickly and successfully
| integrate its outdated desktop-based technology to the new era of
| mobile-first communication. Unable to maintain its monopoly or
| its advertising profits by fairly competing, Facebook's
| executives addressed this existential threat by buying up the new
| mobile innovators, including its rival Instagram in 2012 and
| mobile messaging app WhatsApp in 2014
|
| > The amended complaint bolsters the FTC's monopoly power
| allegations by providing detailed statistics showing that
| Facebook had dominant market shares in the U.S. personal social
| networking market.
|
| The detailed claims seem to be found around paragraph 180 in the
| filing (https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/cases/ecf_75-1
| _ft...). This cites Comscore numbers, does anyone know if they
| are any good?
|
| Also, another claim might be that TikTok is a viable competitor;
| they claim TikTok is in another market:
|
| > TikTok is a prominent example of a content broadcasting and
| consumption service that is not an acceptable substitute for
| personal social networking services.
|
| It seems that a lot of antitrust complaints come down to where
| you draw the dotted line of the "market" in which they compete.
| This seems quite technical and IANAL so I'll just note this as
| interesting, without opining.
| Calvin02 wrote:
| > After failing to compete with new innovators, Facebook
| illegally bought or buried them when their popularity became an
| existential threat.
|
| Illegally bought or buried them?
|
| 1) FTC approved all the mergers. So, it is surprising that they'd
| say that these were illegally bought.
|
| 2) Facebook seems to be operating all key acquisitions (Instagram
| and WhatsApp) as separate products and hasn't made their usage
| conditional to having a Facebook account.
|
| This is re-writing history and it is just as dangerous when the
| FTC does it as it is when a political party does it.
| ajoseps wrote:
| I thought Instagram and Facebook were tied/unified under a
| single account now
| mgraczyk wrote:
| Linking accounts is optional, and combined cross account data
| is used when they are linked. Otherwise, subsets of the apps
| may or may not "know" about the link between your accounts
| via your phone number, email address, or access patterns.
| [deleted]
| srhngpr wrote:
| they are not. you can do cross-messaging between FB and IG if
| both parties have accounts linked, but otherwise you can have
| an IG account that is not linked to FB.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| Instagram.com tries to execute a script from Facebook.com.
|
| So your data is almost certainly linked.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| The origin of a script of unknown functionality to be
| executed on the client can only tell you so much about
| the linkage of accounts on the backend.
| radicalbyte wrote:
| It tells the site owning the endpoint at which the script
| it hosted your current IP address and in most instances
| the site you visited (referrer).
|
| Large internet companies can combine this information
| across other properties / sources to have a very good
| idea of who you are.
| asdfasgasdgasdg wrote:
| Internet companies of all sizes can do all sorts of
| things to identify you. Instagram could also do things
| server side to link your accounts without any scripts
| from other origins. The fact a script from FB.com is
| loaded tells you zero information about account linkage.
| dessant wrote:
| Facebook lied about its intentions to keep Instagram and
| WhatsApp user data fully independent, and in that light the FTC
| is reevaluating its position.
| mgraczyk wrote:
| That isn't true. Did you read the complaint?
|
| https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/cases/ecf_75-1_ft.
| ..
|
| It specifically discusses the 2012 consent order, approved by
| the FTC, in which it penalized Facebook and allowed future
| uses consistent with the consent order. It's not relying on
| that as a basis for reevaluating the legality of the mergers.
|
| The complaint does not explicitly describe why the FTC has
| changed its mind, but the general idea seems to be that over
| time Facebook has demonstrated a pattern of buying
| competitors that wasn't apparent to the FTC in 2012 or 2014.
| It has nothing to do with data per se.
| yalok wrote:
| did they really promise that with Instagram? and as for
| WhatsApp - they do keep that promise, user data is separate.
| josefx wrote:
| Wasn't there a larger change to the privacy policy of
| WhatsApp that stated otherwise?
| joecool1029 wrote:
| Yeah, no: https://www.wired.com/2016/08/whatsapp-privacy-
| facebook/
|
| This year they were pushing to expand more data sharing
| between the platforms, but the profiles have been linked
| internally by phone number for years now.
| gentleman11 wrote:
| Facebook also lied about requiring a Facebook account on
| oculus. Now they have cameras and microphones in peoples homes
| and a spectacular privacy history
| hardtke wrote:
| There is a link to a dissenting opinion from one of the
| commissioners specifically calling out your first point [1]
|
| [1]
| https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/public_statements...
| nikkinana wrote:
| Another shakedown with a big payday for the liberal elite
| politicians. bravo!
| irfn wrote:
| Who even has that much money to buy them?
| elliekelly wrote:
| They could spin off Instagram and/or WhatsApp into separate
| (perhaps publicly traded) companies.
| Snitch-Thursday wrote:
| I know it's just boilerplate that probably goes on a lot of news
| articles, but I find it so ironic that they are releasing a press
| release about ongoing legal action against Facebook, yet include
| the below call to action to 'like' them on that very same
| website!
|
| > The Federal Trade Commission works to promote competition, and
| protect and educate consumers. You can learn more about how
| competition benefits consumers or file an antitrust complaint.
| Like the FTC on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, read our blogs,
| and subscribe to press releases for the latest FTC news and
| resources.
| mrkramer wrote:
| Without Facebook Instagram wouldn't exist since Instagram used
| Facebook's social graph aka "Log in with Facebook" in order to
| kickstart and grow its userbase.
| sprafa wrote:
| Are you sure about this? I know Whatsapp was on an exponential
| growth curve before it was acquired, what was IG's future
| looking like?
| mrkramer wrote:
| Instagram was growing like crazy[0]; it launched in October
| 2010 and by April/May 2012 it had 50 million users. So they
| gained 50 million users in one and a half year. There were
| other photo sharing apps as well at the time on the Iphone so
| the growth is even more impressing.
|
| Future for them was bright but they needed more engineers and
| more professional management to cope with the rapid growth
| since they had only 13 employees at the time of proposed
| acquisition which eventually happened. Zuckerberg said
| Instagram was about to hit the wall if it wasn't Facebook
| because their backend wasn't good enough for millions of
| users but if they got more engineers and a good CTO and a
| good COO they could've survived and grow on their own.
|
| [0] https://techcrunch.com/wp-
| content/uploads/2018/06/Instagram-...
| gordon_freeman wrote:
| > "The Facebook social network is known internally at Facebook as
| "Facebook Blue" and has more than <hidden> monthly users in the
| United States. Instagram attracts more than <hidden> monthly
| users."
|
| I don't understand why some of the publicly available info in FB
| earnings reports is redacted from the complaint[1]. Does anyone
| know who determines what to redact and why?
|
| [1]
| https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/documents/cases/ecf_75-1_ft...
| darkwizard42 wrote:
| The information from FTC might be more recent than the last
| released numbers during an earnings call. That would be my best
| guess!
| barbazoo wrote:
| I know it's cynical, but what will come out of this? Another $10m
| fine for a company that makes $3.5b a month (1)?
|
| (1) https://investor.fb.com/investor-news/press-release-
| details/...
| bingdig wrote:
| The proposed remedy in the complaint is the divestiture of
| Instagram and / or WhatsApp (extremely unlikely) and increased
| oversight on Facebook in the future that would make similar
| acquisitions much more difficult (more likely).
| waynesonfire wrote:
| thus, further strengthening FBs moat as their competitors
| will have a cap on their growth.
| cwkoss wrote:
| Spinning Instagram and Whatsapp off of Facebook seems like it
| would benefit everyone except facebook stockholders.
| Wohlf wrote:
| It would be great for shareholders, much like splitting
| Standard Oil was.
| jessaustin wrote:
| As Scott Galloway has been saying for years, it would be
| _great_ for stockholders. Facebook is an old-n-busted
| service for old-n-busted people. (You might think I 'm one
| of those, using such an old-n-busted idiom, but even _I 'm_
| young enough not to be on Facebook.) IG and Whatsapp both
| would thrive if they weren't chained to all that dead
| weight.
|
| Divestiture wouldn't be so good for Facebook execs, but
| does anyone care about them?
| blitzar wrote:
| These companies are now too big to fail and too big to
| meaningfully prosecute, even a $1bn fine is not really going to
| trouble the likes of facebook. Any more meaningful punishment
| would have pretty adverse financial market and political
| impacts, which people would get over eventually but would take
| some serious conviction to inflict.
|
| The only real recourse is to stop more of the same happening
| again in the future.
| kbenson wrote:
| > These companies are now too big to fail
|
| I'm not sure why you would think that, and I don't think
| anything you explained supports that. I'm also not sure it
| makes any sense at all when applied to Facebook.
|
| Facebook is not going to "fail" over a weekend like Bear
| Stearns. If it dies, it will be a slow hemorrhaging death,
| and there will be plenty of time for employees and investors
| to deal with it. Even if a law were to be passed tomorrow
| saying they couldn't collect and monetize non-provided
| personal information and that they couldn't advertise to
| uses, there would still be a year or two of them wildly
| trying to pivot, not a collapse over a few days, and the
| effect on the wider ecosystem of tech wouldn't be all that
| important.
|
| Saving major financial institutions because they were too bug
| to fail was not just because they were _big_ , but because
| the finance sector is all intricately connections, and if a
| large enough player collapses the cascading effects of
| missing money could have a very outsized effect and drag the
| economy down. Facebook? Nobody would really care. A
| competitor or new alternative would absorb the users fairly
| quickly. The only thing of value that would be lost, and
| probably not even that, is the list of people you're friends
| with.
|
| Honestly, Google might not be much more important, other that
| they just employ way more people. Probably not Apple either
| (having to switch to Android/Window is an inconvenience, not
| a major life change). Amazon would actually have a big effect
| though. The amount they've integrated themselves into the
| supply chain for normal people and how many people sell on it
| would cause major disruptions if it were to disappear within
| a year or two. Or maybe not, I'm sure Walmart would love for
| you to use them instead, or Alibaba. Nothing says the
| American company has to be the preferred one for Americans.
| blitzar wrote:
| In the case where actual prosecution was conducted, as you
| suggest - what would be the opening price on the Monday
| morning for the share price? Bear Sterns peak valuation was
| 20billion, Facebook sits at 1,000billion. Just wiping half
| that value off over a weekend would be 'not a great day in
| the financial markets' - if no other stock moves (and they
| will), it's -5% on the Nasdaq on the first tick of the day.
| People would lose money, some probably a lot of money, in
| May 2021 Facebook was the most widely owned stock by hedge
| funds.
|
| Now I am not suggesting anyone should lose sleep over some
| billionaires losing a bit of money - 'people would get over
| eventually'. However it would come down to a question of
| political will rather than points of law to persue a
| meaningfully prosecute or reduce the power of Facebook (and
| others) in any way, and any aftermath, as short term as it
| may be, would be considered to be self-inflicted by the
| politicians that conducted the exercise.
|
| Tech is, through its collective behavior and practices,
| interconnected. If the political will emerges to curtail
| tax evasion, monetization, etc in the sector, the
| valuations of every tech company conducting their affairs
| similarly would be called into question.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| >"Facebook lacked the business acumen and technical talent to
| survive the transition to mobile. After failing to compete with
| new innovators, Facebook illegally bought or buried them when
| their popularity became an existential threat," said Holly
| Vedova, FTC Bureau of Competition Acting Director. "This conduct
| is no less anticompetitive than if Facebook had bribed emerging
| app competitors not to compete. The antitrust laws were enacted
| to prevent precisely this type of illegal activity by
| monopolists. Facebook's actions have suppressed innovation and
| product quality improvements. And they have degraded the social
| network experience, subjecting users to lower levels of privacy
| and data protections and more intrusive ads. The FTC's action
| today seeks to put an end to this illegal activity and restore
| competition for the benefit of Americans and honest businesses
| alike."
|
| Shouldn't the FTC be a neutral body?
|
| How did the FTC miss this criminal activity for 10 whole years? I
| think an investigation should be called for. The supposed
| antitrust laws have failed miserably. This must be the one of the
| FTC's worst failing ever, by their own admission.
|
| This gem: "Facebook lacked the business acumen" FB has a market
| cap of 1T USD. That's $1,000,000,000,000. She sounds deluded.
| cmdli wrote:
| > Shouldn't the FTC be a neutral body? How did the FTC miss
| this criminal activity for 10 whole years? I think an
| investigation should be called for. The supposed antitrust laws
| have failed miserably. This must be the one of the FTC's worst
| failing ever, by their own admission.
|
| So, _should_ the FTC have blocked these mergers? If the FTC has
| failed to the extent you have said, then it sounds like this is
| a step in the right direction. Either the FTC was correct
| before or is correct now.
| [deleted]
| legitster wrote:
| > After suffering significant failures during this critical
| transition period, Facebook found that it lacked the business
| talent and engineering acumen to quickly and successfully
| integrate its outdated desktop-based technology to the new era of
| mobile-first communication. Unable to maintain its monopoly or
| its advertising profits by fairly competing, Facebook's
| executives addressed this existential threat by buying up the new
| mobile innovators, including its rival Instagram in 2012 and
| mobile messaging app WhatsApp in 2014.
|
| Man, I hate FB as much as the next guy, but this argument is weak
| as hell.
|
| FB was still the #1 mobile app in the world when they bought up
| both of these companies. Hell, neither were even direct
| competitors any more than Oculus was.
|
| FB's play is clearly a horizontal integration - they want as many
| _different types_ of products to fall under their single
| advertising pane of glass as possible. The FTC is going after
| them for doing _the exact opposite thing_.
| slownews45 wrote:
| Agreed - the idea that facebook was "outdated desktop based
| technology" is laughable.
|
| It was one of the first apps most people installed - and they
| actually made it run on an INSANE number of platforms. Wasn't
| there versions of facebook for things like symbians and nokias
| and low bandwidth devices in developing countries?
|
| Instagram had a pretty small team when facebook bought them,
| and facebook was active on mobile before that.
|
| This complaint is such trash - I can't believe they can't find
| better arguments to make.
|
| Edited: It looks like in 2010 or so facebook had something like
| 150 million mobile users (using this "outdated desktop
| technology"). I don't doubt it wasn't perhaps best of breed,
| but there were lots of mediocre approaches back then. Did the
| FTC even have an app? Did the fortune 500 all have amazing
| apps?
| legitster wrote:
| "Facebook lacked the business acumen and technical talent to
| survive the transition to mobile."
|
| It's also crazy to think knowing that Facebook was developing
| React before the bought Instagram.
| slownews45 wrote:
| Interesting! I didn't actually know that. I just remember
| being in a developing country and like Nokia's had facebook
| or messenger or something? Skype and Facebook were showing
| up a lot of places way back. I remember the office I was in
| ran everything on skype - period. Months with no phone
| calls really, but you could somehow get on facebook.
| Symbian / Nokia I'm trying to remember how this worked back
| then. I'm sure they dropped them, and I may be confusing
| who was on these crap devices but I vaguely remember
| thinking damn, facebook and snake are like the advanced
| apps on phones.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| As part of this investigation, does the FTC have access to
| internal FB communications that we do not?
| croes wrote:
| Of course were Instagram and WhatsApp competitors. Not on the
| service side but at the user base. FB users switched to
| Instagram and WhatsApp, that's why they bought them.
| jensensbutton wrote:
| They didn't "switch" they just _also_ used those apps, which
| meant they were competing for people's time.
| croes wrote:
| If they spend their time on Insta instead of FB, they
| switched. You don't have to delete your account if it's
| enough to abandon it.
| munk-a wrote:
| Their stock price hasn't appeared to notice - so I'm guessing
| that investors (like the majority of us I'd assume) are cotinuing
| on with the theory that even outright identifying a company as a
| monopoly isn't going to result in any serious anti-trust
| legislation in this modern world.
|
| Obviously Facebook itself is going to try and play it cool
| throughout this entire proceeding - but the investors will
| usually jump ship if they're concerned.
| riazrizvi wrote:
| If this succeeds, the USA is going to enjoy another innovation
| boom, similar to the one that happened after ATT and IBM were
| challenged in the 70's.
| andrewmcwatters wrote:
| Out of Bell Labs came C. Out of Facebook came React. I'm not so
| certain about that.
| slownews45 wrote:
| Uhhh.
|
| ATT's bell labs generated 9 noble prizes. Per wikipedia Bell
| Labs developed radio astronomy, the transistor, the laser, the
| photovoltaic cell, the charge-coupled device (CCD), information
| theory, the Unix operating system, and the programming
| languages B, C, C++, S, SNOBOL, AWK, AMPL.
|
| Yes, they are broken up, and now the separate baby bells (pac
| bell etc) I don't remember anything close coming from them.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| Bell Labs wasn't great because of anti-competitive behavior,
| they were great in spite of it. Are you saying that if we
| break up Facebook or other anti-competitive mega-corps that
| we will be missing out on untold innovation?
| bink wrote:
| Sure, but on the consumer side there was basically nothing. I
| imagine the person you're replying to was referring to things
| like Caller ID, Call Waiting, Three-way calling, etc.
| smoldesu wrote:
| Why, because people who otherwise occupied themselves with
| Facebook won't find something better to do with their time?
| bpodgursky wrote:
| Most long-term research comes out of monopolies, which by
| definition have slack time and money to invest in speculative
| projects.
|
| (obviously not all monopolies choose to invest this way, but
| absolutely no companies which live or die by quarterly earnings
| b/c of market competition can do this)
| docom wrote:
| I always think about how apps like Instagram and WhatsApp would
| look like in a timeline where Facebook doesn't acquire them.
| codingdave wrote:
| Does anyone have information on what, exactly, makes an
| acquisition illegal in this context?
| beckman466 wrote:
| It's only 30 years too late...
| kahrl wrote:
| Facebook didn't even expand beyond universities until September
| 2006, only 15 years ago? What?
| NotSammyHagar wrote:
| Okay, 15 years too late
| avalys wrote:
| I thought the deadline for re-filing this had passed (July 29?)?
| elliekelly wrote:
| It's not unusual for deadlines to be changed. It looks like the
| FTC filed a motion for an extension a week before the initial
| deadline (6/23) and Facebook didn't oppose.[1] (Typically
| opposing counsel will discuss and agree before these motions
| are even filed so it's not surprising that Facebook did nothing
| in response to the motion.) The linked press release makes it
| sound like the Commissioners voted on whether or not to re-file
| the complaint so I'm guessing 30 days wasn't enough time for
| the FTC go through whatever that governance process entails.
|
| [1]https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/District_Of_Columbia_Distr
| ...
| astlouis44 wrote:
| Fakebook
| numair wrote:
| Please keep in mind that one of (perhaps THE?) largest donors of
| "dark money" campaign contributions to the current administration
| was Dustin Moskovitz, who, last I checked, held the super-voting
| shares that are voted by default in Mark Zuckerberg's favor,
| granting him a de facto corporate monarchy.
|
| The best way to control the game is to own your opposition, and
| make sure they're loud, credible, and totally ineffective.
| slownews45 wrote:
| I can't believe how weak these cases have been - are these more
| of a posturing thing?
|
| * These were all approved at the time. This is going to make for
| a crazy world if folks act on an approval and then they are
| reversed.
|
| * The focus of a lot of these seems to be on harm to other
| (sometimes very scammy) businesses. The Apple case has this issue
| as well. Match group can't do non-cancelable auto-renewing
| billing in their own app store. Rando app can't get your email
| and other details but you can route via apple. Etc. Why not focus
| on consumer harm more - that was traditional focus. The complaint
| is Facebook doesn't make an easy api for others to scrape their
| platform - uh, hello cambridge analytic?
|
| * These social network things seem somewhat fragile. Myspace came
| and went, Friendster was hot. Now I see a lot more folks on
| tiktok. Are kids still even active on facebook?
|
| * Instagram wasn't that big when purchased, and many folks
| (including same people writing the articles now about monopolies)
| said that facebook wildly overpaid.
|
| https://twitter.com/rockspindeln/status/189416024058245121
|
| What's crazy is there is so much straight pure scam crap on the
| internet the FTC does nothing about. I mean, stuff that is
| obvious consumer harm. In my case I tried to cancel a
| subscription 30 days in advance recently (nearly 1K per year). It
| turns out you have to cancel 90 days in advance but not more than
| 120 days in advance?? So now I'm on the hook for another 1K. That
| is just total trash behavior online. And instead of the click to
| sign up, I had to go through endless hoops. Talked to someone,
| then they wanted me to submit a case, I did that, then back and
| forth to "verify" me etc etc.
|
| The FTC is crickets on just endless false advertising, misleading
| internet offers etc (stuff that's not even close to OK).
| Nicksil wrote:
| >What's crazy is there is so much straight pure scam crap on
| the internet the FTC does nothing about.
|
| >In my case I tried to cancel a subscription 30 days in advance
| recently (nearly 1K per year). It turns out you have to cancel
| 90 days in advance but not more than 120 days in advance?? So
| now I'm on the hook for another 1K.
|
| >And instead of the click to sign up, I had to go through
| endless hoops. Talked to someone, then they wanted me to submit
| a case, I did that, then back and forth to "verify" me etc etc.
|
| >The FTC is crickets on just endless false advertising,
| misleading internet offers etc (stuff that's not even close to
| OK).
|
| I share your frustration, however I suspect this is more an
| indictment of our industry than FTC's apathy. Of course the FTC
| and other regulatory bodies are pursing enterprises for
| behavior other than that described in the link, but it may
| understandably be perceived that _nothing_ is being done about
| those other egregious behaviors due simply to the sheer volume
| of occurrence.
|
| This industry is rife with user-hostile behavior. It's become
| so commonplace you'll find these purveyors openly discussing it
| as if there isn't anything wrong with what they are doing;
| industry "best practices."
|
| It's insane.
| mountainb wrote:
| They do bring suits against scammers pretty regularly, but
| they only really go after very successful scammers who have
| stolen 7-8 figures+ from their victims. The FTC does not have
| the resources to go after smaller claims. They leave that up
| to civil plaintiff to at least somewhat rectify. They're not
| as inactive as you think it's just that there's a LOT of
| federal crime that goes unpunished. The federal government in
| general is only capable of effectively pursuing a small
| sample of federal crimes that occur.
|
| This has a lot to do with the way that we finance our
| regulators -- a lot of these crimes could be handled on a
| bounty system, which would fix the manpower problems.
| slownews45 wrote:
| But even going against big players like Amazon, why can't
| they say - hey, you are selling products with totally false
| descriptions, refund everyone who but the fake "apple
| certified" device, or the "UL listed" device. Just do mass
| refunds across 10's of thousands of customers.
|
| Instead they are going after Apple. In my experience at
| least least scammy company out there. My refunds go
| through, the warranty / applecare stuff works, subscription
| renewals are fair and easy to cancel, no * fine print on
| trials.
| Nicksil wrote:
| >But even going against big players like Amazon, why
| can't they say - hey, you are selling products with
| totally false descriptions, refund everyone who but the
| fake "apple certified" device, or the "UL listed" device.
| Just do mass refunds across 10's of thousands of
| customers.
|
| Do we know for a fact that there is no activity here,
| that the FTC (or other bodies) aren't currently building
| cases or performing investigations?
| ipaddr wrote:
| We as in the public have not been told this is underway.
| Nor have we heard hints, leaks or anything of the sort.
|
| This is not happening right now based on the available
| information.
| Nicksil wrote:
| >We as in the public have not been told this is underway.
| Nor have we heard hints, leaks or anything of the sort.
|
| >This is not happening right now based on the available
| information.
|
| If we continue with that logic -- an apparent lack of
| information regarding active investigations -- the only
| conclusion that makes sense is "we don't know."
| kube-system wrote:
| > Just do mass refunds across 10's of thousands of
| customers.
|
| > Instead they are going after Apple.
|
| They _have_ ordered Amazon to do mass refunds in the past
| for other reasons.
|
| https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-
| releases/2017/05/refun...
| jessaustin wrote:
| Khan has only held the chair for two months. FTC has had
| other priorities in the past, but given her publishing
| history it's a good bet that Amazon is now under scrutiny
| as well.
| fshbbdssbbgdd wrote:
| Civil litigation is one version of a bounty system.
| Nicksil wrote:
| >They're not as inactive as you think
|
| I don't think they're inactive. I tried to convey that by
| describing what may be _perceived_ as "doing nothing" is
| really the inundation of awful behavior in this industry.
| hellbannedguy wrote:
| "In my case I tried to cancel a subscription 30 days in
| advance recently (nearly 1K per year). It turns out you have
| to cancel 90 days in advance but not more than 120 days in
| advance?? So now I'm on the hook for another 1K."
|
| I believe you can put a stop payment at the bank. At my bank
| they charge $30. When the creditor calls the bank, they will
| read to the creditor the reason you are not paying.
| mattlondon wrote:
| Not paying does not absolve you of your contractual
| obligations though.
|
| I had a service that I just stopped paying for once,
| assuming that they'd cancel my account when the money
| stopped coming. False - they kept billing me then sold my
| "debt" to a debt-collection firm who called me at work etc.
| slownews45 wrote:
| When I was young I learned this the very hard way. I
| moved. Called to cancel my cable service. Person said no
| problem, box up modem and leave it outside. I did that.
|
| Never thought of it again for 4-5 years until I was
| trying to rent a place in my own name. Yep, the retention
| specialist 5 years ago met his numbers by NOT cancelling
| me out. So I had something like an extra 12 months of
| charges plus modem cost plus a credit hit.
|
| Because I really need this place to live in (3 others
| were depending on it/me) I ended up coughing up a ton of
| money. Lessons learned.
| bickeringyokel wrote:
| Sounds like in that case you were a victim of fraud
| rather than avoiding your contractual obligations?
| ABCLAW wrote:
| >This industry is rife with user-hostile behavior. It's
| become so commonplace you'll find these purveyors openly
| discussing it as if there isn't anything wrong with what they
| are doing; industry "best practices.
|
| The interesting part is that the comment you're replying to
| attempts to normalize a number of anti-competitive strategies
| employed by Facebook in the exact same way.
|
| Supernormalization at work - if your institutions get
| defanged, people 'learn' to accept the new status quo as the
| way of things.
| 5faulker wrote:
| Sadly Facebook is really a faceless corporation after all.
| mig39 wrote:
| Kids haven't been on Facebook for more than a decade. It's all
| TikTok and Discord for my 3 kids.
| dleslie wrote:
| Facebook Kids Messenger is popular with my kids and their
| friends; AFAICT, it's the only messenging app that allows
| preschool and primary school kids to communicate with each
| other under the watchful eye of their parents.
|
| It's got solid parental controls, fun little mini games,
| loads of photo editing and video tools that are appealing to
| kids.
|
| Pretty much kept my kids' cohort of friends connected during
| the lockdown.
| bhb916 wrote:
| Facebook Kids Messenger is decent (for all the reasons you
| mentioned), however, I am pessimistic about it being
| genuinely appealing to kids. It's staying alive because
| middle-aged parents are forcing it on their children - they
| are the consume and decision-maker. My experience is once
| kids are allowed to make their own decisions they quickly
| move away from it.
| robbrown451 wrote:
| Of course once kids are allowed to make their own
| decisions, the main value of FKM is gone. (parental
| controls and such)
|
| So it isn't the best example, and it isn't really
| facebook per se but more of a separate product, but
| still.... it is squarely aimed at kids that aren't old
| enough to make decisions for themselves, by design.
| r00fus wrote:
| It's a pity I distrust Facebook so much that I'd never give
| this a try (my kids simply don't social except sorta on
| Nintendo).
|
| My kids connected with their friends through outside
| activities properly masked up.
| dleslie wrote:
| Outside gatherings were banned for a while here, so even
| masked groups in public parks were not feasible.
| bhb916 wrote:
| Ugh. Sorry to hear that. IMHO the damage done to the kids
| here is worse than the risks they would face from the
| virus.
|
| Kudos to you for doing what you can to keep your kids
| connected socially.
| cwkoss wrote:
| >Are kids still even active on facebook?
|
| 10 years ago in college, about 90% of my friends were using
| Facebook every day.
|
| Today, we're ~30 y/o. I'd estimate about 10% of my friends use
| facebook every day, and more than 50% of them use it less than
| once week.
|
| I wouldn't be surprised to hear that many people younger than
| me are barely using facebook at all. Most of the people I
| interact with on facebook these days are older relatives.
| slownews45 wrote:
| Right - similar boat. I haven't posted in a year or two plus?
| I used to work with kids when it was basically the be all end
| all of everything. For me the endless politics just was a
| turn off - keep friends updated other ways (icloud shared
| albums are fun!).
| jessaustin wrote:
| Could you instruct the payment vendor not to pay this charge?
| I've found that to be quite effective for "free first period"
| offers that refused to turn off.
| djeidpdd wrote:
| >These social network things seem somewhat fragile. Myspace
| came and went, Friendster was hot. Now I see a lot more folks
| on tiktok. Are kids still even active on facebook?<
|
| Not until they need it for a job or coordination need. Laying
| all the platforms out as competitors is sort of misguided imo
| though. Most social media platforms aren't competing for the
| same space they're competing to be the first to establish that
| space. Insta and Snapchat compete as did Myspace and Facebook.
| But Facebook, Insta, Discord, Whatsapp, Tiktok, Twitch, and
| Clubhouse are wildly different beasts as far as the experiences
| they offer and encourage even if the millenials and older
| generations just lump everything under 'social media business'
| because they see feeds and instant messaging. Most of these
| platforms might share demographics but they're wildly different
| products.
| micromacrofoot wrote:
| Don't forget that Facebook has nearly 3bn active users. They
| eclipse every social media company that has ever existed...
| combined. Facebook is synonymous with internet access in some
| corners of the world.
|
| They're not going to disappear with a trend (as much as I'd
| enjoy that). They've already weathered a few. They've expanded
| far beyond kids and their average user is above 35. This limits
| their growth, but they could probably continue to exist in a
| massive way for a few decades if they stopped trying anything
| new.
| nsizx wrote:
| It's incredible how this purchase was approved at the time and
| a few years later they want to reverse it without anything
| having changed at all.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| It is a hard requirement that my two non-profit organizations
| have a FaceCrook presence. It is the same for a majority of
| businesses. This is clearly a monopoly position.
|
| The level of service that they are providing to the user pales
| in comparison to the value of the data they extract in
| exchange. There is clear harm to the users.
|
| That this is not a simple case against them is a clear failing
| of the regulators and/or their laws.
| abduhl wrote:
| Why is it a hard requirement?
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| In the US at least, not having a social presence is
| indicative of an outdated enterprise. FB is the primary
| expectation. (along with a Google and Apple Maps link for
| your address)
| [deleted]
| Calvin02 wrote:
| Sadly this is what happens when an office, like the FTC, is
| politicized.
|
| FTC caters to the current party and pursues an aligned agenda
| over other things that can bring a tangible benefit to the
| population.
| annadane wrote:
| >These were all approved at the time
|
| With specific conditions, which Facebook violated
| slownews45 wrote:
| Ugh - I hate this HN type of misinformation. It just seems
| reactionary.
|
| Please post to the conditions facebook violated around their
| instagram acquisition. Remember, instagram had 13 staff or
| something - it was pretty tiny!
|
| Even folks who are arguing for breakups admit this fact:
|
| " Yet the Federal Trade Commission approved the merger
| without conditions. "
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2018/09/28/case-
| break...
| [deleted]
| SteveGerencser wrote:
| We used to refer to these things as press release politics.
| There is no goal to enforce any rule or punish anyone, they are
| designed for those on the political side to say, see, look how
| hard we are working for you, then the business consents to some
| minor thing with zero punishment and gets to say, see, we
| worked with the people in politics and we have all made things
| better.
|
| You can see this see this at all levels of politics and
| business.
| slownews45 wrote:
| Sure - but there are folks getting straight scammed endlessly
| online - can't they do these press releases AND do some
| enforcement of just stuff with direct consumer harm?
| kube-system wrote:
| > Instagram wasn't that big when purchased
|
| That's... the point. Instagram was a _very_ rapidly growing
| threat to Facebook 's market position. Facebook took drastic
| action to ensure that they didn't become big.
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| The last case against FB, that was thrown out of court was also
| very weak. Now, the new head of the FTC had spoken out against
| monopolies. It isn't surprising that a hardliner who is
| emotionally invested in bringing down Big Tech won't accomplish
| much. I think we can expect similar cases brought against
| Google, Amazon etc.
| slownews45 wrote:
| I think there are probably good cases to be made in areas.
|
| Maybe something around consumer harm - ie, people bought
| oculus devices being told no facebook login, now required to
| use a login - do something like a 70% refund for those who
| want one and return their device?
| bickeringyokel wrote:
| Or 100% refund in cases like this
| https://www.tomshardware.com/news/oculus-quest-2-users-
| banne...
| FridayoLeary wrote:
| But "getting" Big Tech shouldn't become their focus.
| Protecting consumers should come first.
| arrosenberg wrote:
| Reversing mergers is completely appropriate when the merger is
| found to have caused harm to competition after the fact. It
| would be a crazy world if the FTC didn't pursue that.
| unmole wrote:
| The current FTC chair was appointed for her well publicised
| hipster antitrust stance.
| bjt wrote:
| What's the basis for saying they're "crickets" on such scams?
| Those shady operators tend to be much smaller and less
| newsworthy than Facebook, so you don't read about them, but
| that doesn't mean it's not happening.
|
| I interned with the FTC's consumer protection division in Los
| Angeles during law school. My job was calling up people who had
| filed Better Business Bureau complaints and helping them to
| provide affidavits against the companies that scammed them. At
| the time we were focused on prepaid debit card scams.
|
| Have you complained to the FTC about the company with the 1k/yr
| subscription? Made a BBB complaint? Filed a small claims court
| suit?
| handrous wrote:
| > * These social network things seem somewhat fragile. Myspace
| came and went, Friendster was hot. Now I see a lot more folks
| on tiktok. Are kids still even active on facebook?
|
| Facebook's only role in my life is as the _main_ web presence
| for lots and lots of small organizations. They may have other
| things--even a website--but FB will be the first, and sometimes
| only, place content is posted. HOA, kids ' schools, small area
| businesses, almost all treat FB is their main outlet for
| information, even if they do communicate some on other
| channels.
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| > not more than 120 days in advance
|
| Are such clauses binding, or can you send your cancellation by
| registered mail now and do a chargeback if they try to bill you
| beyond that?
| AlbertCory wrote:
| I will just deal with the cancellation issue:
|
| Use privacy.com for this. For every online subscription, you
| create a new credit card number, which can have preset limits.
| I like to give it enough money for ONE payment, and then it
| expires. You can also make it a one-time-use card.
|
| These temp cards are all backed by your "real" card. There's no
| fee. You don't get _real_ privacy (i.e. the payments still show
| up on your bank statement) unless you pay $10 /month, but if
| all you want is the ability to cancel immediately, this is for
| you. Take back the control.
|
| Some web service makes it difficult for you to cancel? Screw
| 'em -- just cancel the credit card you gave them.
| slownews45 wrote:
| One issue - I like actually that Apple is big enough to
| negotiate (ie, screw over) third party developers.
|
| You have to notify of renewal terms of trial in same font
| (ie, $1 for 1 week, $100 per month after).
|
| You have to allow people to use your app anonymously (ie,
| with an apple sign in).
|
| I KNOW I could never negotiate terms like these - but Apple
| can.
|
| Yes, it probably is a sign they have too much power, but they
| seem to direct a lot of their headaches to third parties,
| which makes my consumer experience better not worse.
|
| Good tips on the privacy.com thing.
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| Is there a reason not to name the company.
| narag wrote:
| _What 's crazy is there is so much straight pure scam crap on
| the internet the FTC does nothing about. I mean, stuff that is
| obvious consumer harm. In my case I tried to cancel a
| subscription 30 days in advance recently (nearly 1K per year)._
|
| These situations are solved with regulation. But not the
| regular kind of regulation, but one that forces business of a
| certain type to have _simpler_ procedures for actions like
| canceling, procedures that also keep a public record that some
| authorities can readily inspect and do instant arbitration.
|
| It's possible to make it work. Once there is no incentive for
| the companies to stall your cancelation or complaints, they
| suddenly lose interest and use their resources to do productive
| work. How do I know it works? I've seen it in action for the
| last decade or two: if you want to change mobile providers (in
| Spain, not sure about the USA) you just start a suscription
| with the new one. The former receives the notification and you
| don't even need to deal with them, except for one call offering
| you a counter-proposal.
|
| A similar system could be implemented for many other
| suscriptions services.
| hogFeast wrote:
| Saying that Facebook has an impenetrable competitive position
| when they aren't even the dominant social network for young
| people anymore, and haven't been for years. They made a good deal
| with Instagram but that hasn't stopped innovation in the space at
| all.
|
| What is particularly unfortunate is that Facebook are in the
| firing line because they became the lightning rod for
| politicians...and there are actually companies out there doing
| anti-competitive things. Google has bought up digital
| advertising, they have a piece of all parts of the value
| chain...how is this legal? Apple and Google have sewn up the
| market for apps? Nothing.
|
| Also, Facebook has been the most responsive to politicians but
| the fatality was being seen to have helped Trump in 2016 (even
| though they didn't do so as actively as they helped Obama). FB
| are terribly rapacious but you feel bad for them in that there is
| literally no way for them to win (I suspect the core social
| network will eventually get spun off as it gets overwhelmed by
| govt claims against it).
| catalyst7 wrote:
| fuck you zuck
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