It's realpolitik. By the numbers Apple is worse, but Facebook has more influence over the political discourse, so they get more government pressure. The point of the pressure isn't to make them do something good (e.g. federate, or divest Instagram and WhatsApp and stop buying competitors), even though it could be.
The real point is to demonstrate the ability to penalize them. Then if they do what the government wants, i.e. censor the people the government wants censored, their problems will go away. A slap on the wrist instead of a breakup.
I also get the impression that the public perception of the brand matters a lot. The public image of Facebook has been repeatedly tarnished in the last 5-7 years. The general public sentiment seems to be best summer up by "fuck Facebook".
Apple on the other hand is generally well-liked. Even though, like you said, they engage in a lot of anti-competitive practices. By all accounts, Apple is a key player in making computing platforms more locked down and tightly controlled, fighting against the right to repair, using weird proprietary screws everywhere. Things that should make everyone on Hacker News frown... But no, Apple products are expensive status symbols, the Prada of computing, and Steve Jobs was the messiah of the modern computer age, even though he routinely threw fits and treated everyone like shit. Apple can do no wrong.
Sure, but how do you reconcile a survey which measures people's feelings with their most recent quarterly earnings report which measures people's actions? [1] "Sure, I hate FB but I still want to know what my friends are up to"?
> Facebook daily active users (DAUs) – DAUs were 1.93 billion on average for September 2021, an increase of 6% year-over-year.
> Facebook monthly active users (MAUs) – MAUs were 2.91 billion as of September 30, 2021, an increase of 6% year-over-year.
> Family daily active people (DAP) – DAP was 2.81 billion on average for September 2021, an increase of 11% year-over-year.
> Family monthly active people (MAP) – MAP was 3.58 billion as of September 30, 2021, an increase of 12% year-over-year.
For one thing, the survey and the earnings report are measuring different people.
The survey measured Americans (who have mostly had the longest exposure to Facebook from a global perspective), the reports (presumably) measure globally, including communities that haven't had Facebook as a pervasive part of their social discourse for the last decade+.
That's true. But digging a bit deeper, you can find DAU in US/Canada as broken out by the most recent FB earnings report slides [1]
The punchline for DAU/MAU seems to be that it has ~flatlined in US/Canada since 2019. But certainly not the drop that would be implied by commentary here and elsewhere in the tech echo chamber.
My original reply was intended as a general warning about not assuming that your worldview is the same as everyone else's worldview.
What does this mean? That they really don't know what the percentages are? There's a really big chasm of those numbers. Maybe I should have taken more statistics classes, but this makes no sense to me
I think that means 76% think FB makes society worse, 11% think FB makes it better, the rest have no opinion or are neutral. The 11% could also include be inclusive of the neutrals, i.e. FB doesn't make society worse.
>divest Instagram and WhatsApp and stop buying competitors
I actually thought that was the point of antitrust action. The thing that FB monopolizes is the social graph, in any incarnation. (It is a remarkable innovation, to realize that this is a defensible moat; I personally would not have guessed that. But yes, it's a politically meaningful position and so will inevitably be either attacked or (worse) coopted by government)
Not everything is a monolith. There exist people who want to actually do something about their market power, as there exist people who want to actually do something about Apple's. The people doing it to pressure them will use the same arguments, because the arguments are good.
But if Facebook is sufficiently compliant, the lack of meaningful consequences will increase in probability.
None of this is perfectly immutable. If the public wanted Facebook broken up really bad, it might happen. But there's a strong chance it goes the same way as Microsoft, i.e. people want something done, so there is a case filed against them, people assume something is being done, and then years later they settle the case without addressing anything and the company is now ten times bigger than they were when they were already too big.
It's not that public pressure doesn't matter, it's that there isn't currently enough of it to make change. Especially when the targets control the discourse.
Who wants to make odds that social media algorithms are deprioritizing criticism or critics of social media market power?
Is there any data which shows Facebook is not compliant?
If anything Apple is definitely more non compliant and has publicly opposed FBI requests for data even in cases with poor optics and pushed publicly more for e2e encryption and user privacy over law enforcement needs.
> Is there any data which shows Facebook is not compliant?
Maybe they are. The case is the Sword of Damocles. If they're compliant, it hangs over them to keep them that way, to be settled for a nominal fee some years from now. You'll know non-compliance if the sword comes down and chops off their arms and legs.
> If anything Apple is definitely more non compliant and has publicly opposed FBI requests for data even in cases with poor optics and pushed publicly more for e2e encryption and user privacy over law enforcement needs.
That's a different fight. Unelected officials trying to score PR points in favor of increased spying powers, as opposed to elected officials who have different means and goals.
It is anti-trust suit to divest Instagram/WhatsApp by the DoJ, other actions against them are also by agencies/ officials who are not elected either . Same DoJ does not pursue any monopoly action against Apple, even when customers its hurts consumers pockets directly like with the App Store 30% cut.
I do not see any difference between types of agencies and actions for either company.
Apple makes distinct public steps towards making life harder for the government and do not invite retribution/reaction from the government. Facebook does not publicly do much to oppose government policy and they need a sword hanging over them ?
The real point is to demonstrate the ability to penalize them. Then if they do what the government wants, i.e. censor the people the government wants censored, their problems will go away. A slap on the wrist instead of a breakup.
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