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Is it really crazy town? What he’s alleging here is that there is a cartel of advertisers that are behaving in anti-competitive ways. And I think that is obviou

Is it really crazy town? What he’s alleging here is that there is a cartel of advertisers that are behaving in anti-competitive ways. And I think that is obviously true when you look at how the ad agencies and their clients (whose spend is controlled by these agencies) act at the same time in politically charged situations. There are a few big ad agencies and they happen to control advertising through various means like their size, network effects, various practices, and also by trying to outsource their collusion into frameworks like GARM. I am honestly surprised at the hostile response to this from HN. The right to associate freely is not what is being debated here - the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Corporations do not have the right to just do whatever they want. But leaving aside the technicalities - the existence of powerful corporate lords that control what speech is allowed is just bad. If this situation were reversed, where a small group of powerful advertisers were colluding to suppress your speech, you would definitely be upset and not would not be defending corporate power hindering free speech, which is a foundational piece of democracy.

ab5tract 2y ago
Ad agencies may consult with corporations as to whether a given venue is worth their investment. However, it is ultimately up to the company whether they follow that advice. They don’t “control” the advertising spend for that corporation. According to the logic of this ruling, however, a corporation could be sued for deciding to stop spending ad money with a given agency.
- ab5tract 2y ago
  Downvoting on HN was never supposed to be about punishing inconvenient truths.
JohnFen 2y ago
> the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Yes, I just don't see how anti-trust laws apply here. > Corporations do not have the right to just do whatever they want. Correct. And the main thing (in terms of cartel/monopoly behavior) is that they can't abuse a monopoly position in order to give themselves an unfair advantage. If they avoid doing that, it's entirely legal to be a cartel or monopoly. I am failing to see how choosing not to do business with Twitter is giving themselves any kind of unfair advantage. > If this situation were reversed, where a small group of powerful advertisers were colluding to suppress your speech, you would definitely be upset I certainly would! But I don't think that's what's happening here. Nobody's speech is being curtailed here. It's companies choosing what sort of thing they do and don't want to be associated with. Twitter can continue to do whatever it likes, and even if there are enough advertisers avoiding it that it ends up putting the company out of business (which I seriously doubt), everyone on it can still speak freely as they always could. They'll just use any of the numerous other outlets to do that with. In any case, we're just the peanut gallery and what we think isn't actually important. It's what happens in court, and in court, I am very confident that Musk will lose hard.
- add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
  I believe you're overthinking it. It's the northern district of Texas. It's intended to be theater.
peutetre 2y ago
> Is it really crazy town? Yes. > What he’s alleging here is that there is a cartel of advertisers that are behaving in anti-competitive ways. No, he's just trying to find excuses for his business losing revenue. Most of Twitter's revenue comes from advertising. If you run a business that's dependent on ad sales then guess what: you're dependent on advertisers. They are your customers. That's where the money comes from. If your customer doesn't like what you're selling then they're not going to buy it. And when you then tell your customers to go fuck themselves your business is unlikely to thrive.
nobody9999 2y ago
>The right to associate freely is not what is being debated here - the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Corporations do not have the right to just do whatever they want. A fair point. But does X (and by extension Elon Musk) have the right to demand that advertisers purchase ads specifically on X? If so, I'd love to get on that gravy train! "What? You're not spending advertising dollars on my platform? That's anti-trust! You are required to pay me!" Which is pretty much X/Musk's argument. Which isn't very compelling, is it? Feel free to disagree, but what specific law (anti-trust or otherwise) guarantees X the right to force folks to pay them to run ads they don't want to run on that platform. How would you justify that? I'd be very interested to know, because if Musk can do it, so can I and I could use a few hundred million in ad revenue too.
acdha 2y ago
> I am honestly surprised at the hostile response to this from HN. The right to associate freely is not what is being debated here - the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Ads say that if I change a few shopping decisions I’ll be at the popular shows surrounded by attractive people who are totally into me, but it’s worth entertaining the possibility that’s not true. They are presenting an argument they think is going to do best but the fact that they had to shop for the most sympathetic judge in the country suggests a certain lack of confidence in the merits. In the absence of involvement by an actual competitor it’s hard to see a successful antitrust case especially when anyone who dislikes their current ad agency has many alternatives, including simply buying ads directly – it’s hardly like there’s some law requiring Twitter to refuse payment from anyone who doesn’t go through one of these groups.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

ab5tract 2y ago

Ad agencies may consult with corporations as to whether a given venue is worth their investment. However, it is ultimately up to the company whether they follow that advice. They don’t “control” the advertising spend for that corporation. According to the logic of this ruling, however, a corporation could be sued for deciding to stop spending ad money with a given agency.

ab5tract 2y ago
Downvoting on HN was never supposed to be about punishing inconvenient truths.

JohnFen 2y ago

> the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Yes, I just don't see how anti-trust laws apply here. > Corporations do not have the right to just do whatever they want. Correct. And the main thing (in terms of cartel/monopoly behavior) is that they can't abuse a monopoly position in order to give themselves an unfair advantage. If they avoid doing that, it's entirely legal to be a cartel or monopoly. I am failing to see how choosing not to do business with Twitter is giving themselves any kind of unfair advantage. > If this situation were reversed, where a small group of powerful advertisers were colluding to suppress your speech, you would definitely be upset I certainly would! But I don't think that's what's happening here. Nobody's speech is being curtailed here. It's companies choosing what sort of thing they do and don't want to be associated with. Twitter can continue to do whatever it likes, and even if there are enough advertisers avoiding it that it ends up putting the company out of business (which I seriously doubt), everyone on it can still speak freely as they always could. They'll just use any of the numerous other outlets to do that with. In any case, we're just the peanut gallery and what we think isn't actually important. It's what happens in court, and in court, I am very confident that Musk will lose hard.

add-sub-mul-div 2y ago
I believe you're overthinking it. It's the northern district of Texas. It's intended to be theater.

peutetre 2y ago

> Is it really crazy town? Yes. > What he’s alleging here is that there is a cartel of advertisers that are behaving in anti-competitive ways. No, he's just trying to find excuses for his business losing revenue. Most of Twitter's revenue comes from advertising. If you run a business that's dependent on ad sales then guess what: you're dependent on advertisers. They are your customers. That's where the money comes from. If your customer doesn't like what you're selling then they're not going to buy it. And when you then tell your customers to go fuck themselves your business is unlikely to thrive.

nobody9999 2y ago

>The right to associate freely is not what is being debated here - the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Corporations do not have the right to just do whatever they want. A fair point. But does X (and by extension Elon Musk) have the right to demand that advertisers purchase ads specifically on X? If so, I'd love to get on that gravy train! "What? You're not spending advertising dollars on my platform? That's anti-trust! You are required to pay me!" Which is pretty much X/Musk's argument. Which isn't very compelling, is it? Feel free to disagree, but what specific law (anti-trust or otherwise) guarantees X the right to force folks to pay them to run ads they don't want to run on that platform. How would you justify that? I'd be very interested to know, because if Musk can do it, so can I and I could use a few hundred million in ad revenue too.

acdha 2y ago

> I am honestly surprised at the hostile response to this from HN. The right to associate freely is not what is being debated here - the article clearly says this is about anti trust. Ads say that if I change a few shopping decisions I’ll be at the popular shows surrounded by attractive people who are totally into me, but it’s worth entertaining the possibility that’s not true. They are presenting an argument they think is going to do best but the fact that they had to shop for the most sympathetic judge in the country suggests a certain lack of confidence in the merits. In the absence of involvement by an actual competitor it’s hard to see a successful antitrust case especially when anyone who dislikes their current ad agency has many alternatives, including simply buying ads directly – it’s hardly like there’s some law requiring Twitter to refuse payment from anyone who doesn’t go through one of these groups.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]