Antitrust analysis worth yodeling for
Plus, our thoughts on what Justice Breyer's departure from the Supreme Court means for tech policy, and a conversation on obstacles to regulating social media algorithms.
I wouldn’t blame you if the last two years were such a blur that you don’t recall anything beforehand, but if you can, think back to 2018. Remember that video of a little boy yodeling “Lovesick Blues” inside of a Walmart? His name is Mason Ramsey, and he is back with a vengeance.
Well, technically, he has been back with a vengeance. His EP, Twang (an American classic, truly), came out in 2019. But one of the songs on the album, “Before I Knew It,” is finally going viral this month. The chorus, which goes, “Before I knew it, I was holdin’ all the doors, holdin’ your hand, gettin’ off of work just as fast as I can,” raises some obvious questions. Wouldn’t a country boy like Ramsey already have been holding the door? What kind of job was this 12-year-old leaving so quickly?
Now that Ramsey is 15, we have an answer to that question: he works at his local Subway. You have to respect the humility of someone who probably made more money off his music than any teenager could need, and is still happy to roll up his sleeves and roll up some sandwiches!
Competition. Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s American Innovation and Choice Online Act would impose, on Big Tech platforms, a duty to deal. This would make it much easier for sites that cater to extremists, like Parler, Getter and Gab, to claim that mainstream platforms “unfairly” excluded them from app stores, etc. Reason and Protocol noted our concerns that the bill would “be easily weaponized against content moderation, especially by a highly politicized FTC.” So why are Democrats giving Josh Hawley what he’s always wanted? Why are they making it easier for Republican state attorneys general, and the next Republican administration, to sue mainstream sites for refusing to deal with those who cater to misinformation and hate speech? It boggles the mind.
More generally, the bill would transform antitrust. Instead of focusing on the welfare of consumers, the law focuses on the welfare of competitors, as Bilal explains an op-ed in the Billings Gazette. The result? Less innovative service.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce hosted a webinar on Competition in the Marketplace: Ensuring a Level Playing Field for Business. Andy live-tweeted the webinar, which featured FTC Commissioner Noah Phillips touching on topics like inflation, revisions to the merger guidelines, and FTC rulemaking authority. Notably, Commissioner Phillips agreed with our September comments to the agency: The FTC lacks legal authority to issue competition rules.
Supreme Court. Justice Stephen Breyer’s retirement leaves everyone wondering how the Court might change. Politico’s Morning Tech asks what these changes might mean for tech policy. Berin noted one probable consequence: The court often leaned on Breyers’ extensive antitrust background in court decisions, and losing that expertise “makes the court more likely not to take antitrust cases.” Berin says more on Twitter about what Breyer’s retirement might mean.
Social Media Regulation. Corbin and Ari welcomed Daphne Keller, a fellow at Stanford University’s Center for Internet and Society — and one of the nation’s foremost experts on social media policy — onto a new Tech Policy Podcast. Daphne is the author of “Amplification and Its Discontents,” a seminal paper on algorithmic amplification — the latest hot topic in the (seemingly endless) debate over social media content moderation. In short, legislators are introducing bills that would regulate when and how social media websites may “amplify” content by placing it near the top of people’s newsfeeds. But are these bills constitutional? Do they even address the problems the legislators claim to care about? There are serious obstacles to regulating speech-related algorithms, and, as Daphne explains, there is no “un-amplified” social media Eden to return to. For more, read Daphne’s paper, and check out Corbin’s op-ed last month in The American Spectator: “Government Is Not Conservatives’ Social Media Friend.”