> <i>Authorities haven’t done a good job of articulating why privacy is an antitrust issue. Here, the German regulator makes it clear. ‘The FCO’s theory is that Facebook’s dominance is what allows it to impose on users contractual terms that require them to allow Facebook to track them all over,’ Khan says. ‘When there is a lack of competition, users accepting terms of service are often not truly consenting. The consent is a fiction.‘</i><p>Huh, a legal theory linking Facebook’s market position to consumer harm.
> According to the FCO, Facebook had 32 million monthly active users in Germany at the end of last year, amounting to a market share of more than 80 percent.<p>I am not sure I understand: that’s Facebook penetration Facebook accounts/adult digital population), not their market share - which would be Facebook accounts/(sum of accounts of all social media, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, ...Spotify)<p>> The regulator argues this dominance gives it jurisdiction to oversee the company’s data collection practices.<p>...and why only the data collection practices? Why would the other parts of the T&C of Facebook be not subject to it? Why should consumers not be forced to accept just the data collection practices of the T&C? Shouldn’t the German antitrust then, logically, prevent Facebook from enforcing their entire T&C? So, large companies now cannot have T&C enforced even when they do not cause economic damage to the market? Is there an economic gain for a person to join Facebook? My friend does not have a Facebook account, I don't think she is poorer because of it. ...because if there is no economic harm, I don’t see why the antitrust office would have jurisdiction.
Maybe the gain/harm is not economic, maybe the gain from a Facebook account is not economic, it’s “social”. Well isn’t then the “social” gain greater when Facebook offers a unified experience (across Facebook, Instagram and WhatsUp)? How does the antitrust office action make any sense?
What am I missing?
Even if FB stops tracking Germans so much (and hopefully all the other EU countries) they'll still be able to sell ads. FB is where people go and where ads are more likely to be seen.<p>FB might discover that it makes the same amount of money at a lower cost.