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Google, Facebook Agreed To Team Up Against Possible Antitrust Action, Draft Lawsuit Says (wsj.com) 29

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
Facebook and Google agreed to "cooperate and assist one another" if they ever faced an investigation into their pact to work together in online advertising, according to an unredacted version of a lawsuit filed by 10 states against Google last week. From a report: The suit, as filed, cites internal company documents that were heavily redacted. The Wall Street Journal reviewed part of a recent draft version of the suit without redactions, which elaborated on findings and allegations in the court documents. Ten Republican attorneys general, led by Texas, are alleging that the two companies cut a deal in September 2018 in which Facebook agreed not to compete with Google's online advertising tools in return for special treatment when it used them. Google used language from "Star Wars" as a code name for the deal, according to the lawsuit, which redacted the actual name. The draft version of the suit says it was known as "Jedi Blue." The lawsuit itself said Google and Facebook were aware that their agreement could trigger antitrust investigations and discussed how to deal with them, in a passage that is followed by significant redactions. The draft version spells out some of the contract's provisions, which state that the companies will "cooperate and assist each other in responding to any Antitrust Action" and "promptly and fully inform the Other Party of any Governmental Communication Related to the Agreement." In the companies' contract, "the word [REDACTED] is mentioned no fewer than 20 times," the lawsuit says. The unredacted draft fills in the word: Antitrust.
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Google, Facebook Agreed To Team Up Against Possible Antitrust Action, Draft Lawsuit Says More

Google, Facebook Agreed To Team Up Against Possible Antitrust Action, Draft Lawsuit Says

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  • Isn't that exactly what you're not to do? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by blastard ( 816262 ) on Tuesday December 22, 2020 @10:06AM (#60856510)

    So, you're forming a trust to fight being accused of forming a trust?

    • So, you're forming a trust to fight being accused of forming a trust?

      I feel "trust", is far too good a term for this blood alliance.

      I'm thinking collude and openly conspire would be the more criminal terms we should be using.

      You thought Too Big To Fail was hard to fight as a taxpayer before? Wait until the rest of social media jump in to collude with their Donor-grade billions. Find out how deep the Swamp really is.

      Monopolies and mega-corps might be put in check in the 21st Century, but most likely at the expense of the average citizen.

    • So, you're forming a trust to fight being accused of forming a trust?

      In this case it's just mutual lobbying for laws or regulation that benefit them in different segments. It's not like they're looking protect a duopoly.

      • So, you're forming a trust to fight being accused of forming a trust?

        In this case it's just mutual lobbying for laws or regulation that benefit them in different segments. It's not like they're looking protect a duopoly.

        Oh never mind it's exactly that. Still... if they were taking a gamble on potentially monopolistic behavior, it would be par for the course to discuss how to deal with scrutiny.

    • This looks Trusty. I suppose Google's defense will be: See, we aren't a monopoly because Facebook had enough leverage to get special terms. Facebook's defense will be: we aren't really an advertising company and decided it was a good deal after Google approached us in a dark alley.

  • They got away with a massive conspiracy to limit the upward mobility of each other's workers, a conspiracy that included over a dozen players in the industry. That was reported on Slashdot a while back. There was a whole network of major SV companies whose HR departments had a gentleman's agreement to not try to hire each other's employees. It probably never even occurred to Facebook and Google that such a large coalition might go after them.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by wdr1 ( 31310 ) *

      That's incorrect.

      I believe what you're referring to is the "High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation"[1] where Adobe, Apple Inc., Google, Intel, Intuit, Pixar, Lucasfilm and eBay were alleged to have a "no cold call" policy to recruit each other's employees:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

      Facebook specifically was not part of the arrangement:
      https://www.reuters.com/articl... [reuters.com]

  • ... maybe Apple is involved #AppleSux #MyKarmaIsBurnedBecauseThereIsSoMuchAppleFanboisHere

  • So we'll do the one thing that provides you with even more evidence of what we're getting sued for!

    At this point, these people have disappeared up their own assholes.

    • These are both relatively young companies that are ignoring anti-trust laws developed because of similar history with age old companies they probably never heard of. When I was in school we learned about the Sherman Antitrust Act, I guess they stopped teaching it just after I graduated, or those running these new companies simply cheated their way through school so didn't really learn anything.

      Those who ignore history...

  • Is there a good non-paywalled copy of this article? I searched recent news for other sources but only found the same half-assed AP summary. Although, I did search for the article on Google....

  • Openly conspiring to circumvent the law, manipulate the law, and harm people via hostile psychological manipulation ("advertisement") on a massive scale.

    I'd say 20 years in prison for treason, if it was a person instead of a coproration.

    • Are corporations not supposed to be people too in the US according to the supreme court? Or do I remember wrong?

      So should they not go to jail then too?

      • No. The whole point of corporations is to limit one's liability. They are made up of people. But those people are not subject to the same legal repercussions as individuals.

        This is why the first knee-jerk reaction to corporate malfeasance should be to wipe out the shareholders and dissolve the corporation. It's the only way to properly balance the power of limited liability.

        • Ok, so I must have misunderstood the first amendment free speech to corporations cases. My understanding is that their argument was that they are people too.

          But then I am not from the US, so mostly follow such things out of interest how such reflect here.

          • Yes, because corporations are simply legal groups of people. They're are legally a bit like a political party. You can't stop a group of people from expressing their views. And in the U.S., money is speech. So, you can't stop a group of people from choosing to express their political opinions by spending money.

            On the other hand, corporations limit liability on the individual for their actions taken for the corporation. That's the whole reason people form corporations in the first place. Without that protect

  • So just Google and Facebook? (Score:3)

    by h33t l4x0r ( 4107715 ) on Tuesday December 22, 2020 @11:38AM (#60856754)
    I'm confused, were Martin Shkreli and Bernie Madoff not available?

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