The Boston Tea Party’s Warning for Facebook and Google
The revival of a longstanding antimonopoly tradition in the U.S. is bad news for Big Tech.
It was not about price; it was about principle.
Photographer: Ed Vebell/Archive PhotosBack in November, it was possible to dismiss the Trump administration’s antitrust suit against Google as too weak, too narrow and too late. But now more than 40 states – and the Federal Trade Commission – have filed suit against another tech giant: Facebook. It seems unlikely to be the last major lawsuit against technology giants.
Though these cases are ostensibly about antitrust violations, they are a sign of something bigger: the revival of a longstanding antimonopoly tradition in the U.S. This particular view of large, powerful corporations – as threats to the political order – has repeatedly played a significant role in the nation’s history.