#monopolies — Public Fediverse posts

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/bb-5Kw30yaQ?is=8lTsmc-ucwPdBfnv

#LizOyer #OyerLawyer #ToddBlanche #DOJ #ConsumerProtection #Law #Justice #Politics #USA #tRump #Republicans #GOP #Congress #Activism #Protest #Election #Vote #Corruption #Grift #Lobbyists #Corporatocracy #Oligarchy #EatTheRich #Senate #Cronyism #Mergers #Maga #Affordability #AntiTrust #Monopolies #Enforcement #MikeDavis #RealEstate #Investigations #Tax #Corporate #Prices

"In 2021, the virtual world was the future of the internet. The pandemic had sequestered everyone indoors, heightening the appeal of digital communities. Facebook rebranded to Meta — a sign of the tech giant’s investment in and commitment to the metaverse as the future of the internet. Despite losing billions in VR, Meta released an upgraded version of the Quest 2 headset and began focusing on launching a higher-end Quest Pro. At the end of the year, it announced its plan to plunk down a rumored $400 million to buy the independent VR gaming studio Within, maker of a popular fitness game called Supernatural. Less than five years later, however, it shut the game down, leaving a community of avid fans bereft.

To former FTC chair Lina Khan, there’s a lesson in the ultimate fate of Supernatural, and the community that had grown up around it. She’d know — because she tried and failed to block Meta from acquiring Within.

“You need to have some regulatory humility because you don’t always know on the front-end how certain products are meaningful for certain communities,” says Khan. The FTC’s Meta lawsuit was often framed as an abstract attempt to rein in Big Tech. But in the end, the acquisition’s human cost was obvious — and an example of precisely why antitrust law matters. “Bringing to light that [Supernatural] was a core way for communities to stay healthy shows that there were real stakes here.”"

https://www.theverge.com/report/896820/lina-khan-ftc-meta-supernatural-antitrust

#USA #SocialMedia #VideoGames #VR #Meta #Facebook #Monopolies #FCT #LinaKhan #Antitrust

"Then, back lit, filling the saloon doors, amid swirling dust, staring down the debauch...comes Lina Khan."

https://3m.fyi/posts/the-redemption-of-lawyers/

#LinaKhan #CoryDoctorrow #Monopolies #lawyers #PowellMemo #PowellMemorandum #Bork #Nixon #Reagan #AntiTrust #Oligarchs #Oligarchy #Plutocrats #Plutocracy #Trump #Law #BreakEmUp #Litigate #democracy #FTC #Mamdani #Zoran #NYC

...#thepeople have become so addicted to aggressive #consumption and so dependent on the mega monster #monopolies supplying their #addictions that they have forgotten how little they actually need and how much power they already possess within themselves to create what they need for themselves!

#wakeup now please. these "#machines" keep us embryonic to make us feel weak while feeding off our strenths to #empower only themselves.

#anticapitalism #anitconsumerism #thematrixisalie

“In the 10 years after a Walmart Supercenter opened in a given community, the average household in that community experienced a 6 percent decline in yearly income—equivalent to about $5,000 a year in 2024 dollars—compared with households that didn’t have a Walmart open near them.”

New research examines more than “low prices” to gauge community health.

Walmart hurts the communities it assimilates.

#USeconomics
#USpolitics
#monopolies
#giftLink

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/12/walmart-prices-poverty-economy/681122/?gift=V2Xz1LHbTiPfZ3uourZyW7REJcSz6uA6UdEv69aOVug&utm_source=copy-link&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share

The payoff from Thiel’s early gamble in Trump is a lesson that has not passed others by.

As with their other obsession, #crypto, the best time to have invested in Trump was 2016,
and the second best time is today.

We already have a word for what we’re watching now:
it’s #oligarchy.

And we’ve already seen how this plays out.

In Putin’s Russia, political and commercial interests are one and the same.

Thiel is betting
– again
– on the same phenomenon in America.

Betting that he will be first among a new breed of tech bro oligarchs
– a new super-class of #broligarchs.

In Trump’s America, there will be hard choices for everyone, including the billionaires. --
Though it may be less hard for them.

Vance has said he wants to #deregulate crypto and
unshackle AI.

He’s said he’d #dismantle Biden’s attempts to place safeguards around AI development.

And while he has it in for the #legacy #monopolies of Google and Facebook
– the platforms that his ideological bedfellows in the “new right” see as part of the “censorship industrial complex” suffocating rightwing speech
– Silicon Valley is betting on a gloves-off, regulation-free, pro-business #goldrush.

Another Peter Thiel acolyte was on stage at the Republican National Convention last week,
electrifying the crowd:
#Hulk #Hogan.

Hogan is less well known as one of Thiel’s longterm bets, though in some ways he’s even more instructive than Vance.

In 2007, the online magazine #Gawker outed Thiel and ran a series of unflattering articles about him.

It took him years, but he ultimately got his revenge, covertly funding Hulk Hogan to the tune of $10m to sue the publication for invasion of privacy and forcing it into #bankruptcy.

On stage at the RNC, the wrestler, a permatanned orange, ripped off his shirt for the man who increasingly looks like he’ll be America’s next president.

Or, if JD Vance, is correct, the man who will prove to be the #Caesar he says America needs.

A man who he has already urged to fire the nation’s civil servants to
💥 “replace them with our people”,
to defy the courts and rule his own way.

Or, to put this in simple terms:
to foment a #coup.

Thiel knows what every investor knows. That a crisis is an opportunity.

And that if Trump succeeds in tearing up the federal administration,
there is not only billions to be made in the ensuing market #turmoil but that a new breed of oligarchs,
close to Caesar’s throne, will be the first to share the spoils.

And chief among them will be Thiel.

It’s not a stretch to see how #Palantir, his data-mining company
– that under the Conservatives got its teeth into the NHS
– will profile and surveil and target Caesar’s enemies.

And Thiel’s track record in winning, in successfully betting on the longest of odds, on biding his time, is maybe the most chilling of all the factors in a fortnight that has started to feel like the start of a run on the bank.

Biden’s debate disaster,
Trump’s victorious assassination survival,
and now Silicon Valley’s ascension to the presidential ticket.

The broligarchs have made their move
– and the rest of us need to understand exactly what that means.

#tech #elite #Sandberg #Page #Bezos #Peter #Thiel #tech #bro #Vance #Elon #Musk #Marc #Andreessen #Ben #Horowitz #Winklevoss #Chamath #Palihapitiya #David #Sacks #Palantir #Vance #Mithril #Capital #Narya #Capital

@chu Unfortunately that only hurts the #littlepeople and creates increased rates and #insurance #monopolies for #bigcorporations willing to take the gamble. These states should actually hold #bigcorp accountable through financial sanctions. This includes #bigoil #bigtech #bigdata #BigEnergy

But you know, the won't because #lobbyistslinepockets

This video deals with topics you cover such as #monopolies and #housing and buildings (in this video explaining the five - related to your Apr 2 @pluralistic post "Public Resource sets the law free: Rogue archivist Carl Malamud strikes again" dealing with standards bodies).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UX4KklvCDmg

#homogeneity
#buildings
#BuildingCode
#environment
#franchise
#franchisee
#bushiness
#economics
#cities
#cityplanning
#city
#standards
#cookiecutter
#StandardsOrganization

Take care!