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Declare Facebook a public utility and eliminate advertising by replacing with a fee or what you call a tariff. Breaking up does not always work. Facebook is like a natural monopoly - people want one site to connect with all their 'friends'. No one is going
to use several Facebooks as social media platform. They want one. <br>
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Regards, <br>
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Roderick. <br>
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<div id="divRplyFwdMsg" dir="ltr"><font style="font-size:11pt" face="Calibri, sans-serif" color="#000000"><b>From:</b> John Levine <johnl@iecc.com><br>
<b>Sent:</b> Sunday, January 10, 2021 11:57 PM<br>
<b>To:</b> nanog@nanog.org <nanog@nanog.org><br>
<b>Cc:</b> Rod Beck <rod.beck@unitedcablecompany.com><br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: not a utility, was Parler</font>
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<div class="PlainText">In article <MWHPR13MB1742905824973AB606D9B80BE4AC0@MWHPR13MB1742.namprd13.prod.outlook.com> you write:<br>
>-=-=-=-=-=-<br>
>Unless the courts rule or the legislators enact legislation making them a public utility. In legal circles there is a theory that<br>
>platforms like Facebook, messaging services, etc. might achieve such importance to public life and discourse as to merit regulation<br>
>under the grounds they are an essential utility. I am neutral regarding this idea - I have not studied it and also realize that Amazon<br>
>is not strictly speaking a social media. So my point is tangential.<br>
<br>
That is a dream of some factions, but it is not realistic.<br>
<br>
You can certainly make an argument that Google and Facebook are<br>
monopolies, but the remedies for that are to break them up or to<br>
require them to provide access to their competitors to some of their<br>
internal facilities, e.g., allow other ad networks to bid on and<br>
provide the ads that show up with your Google search or Facebook page.<br>
<br>
Utilities have tariffs under which everyone who orders the same kind<br>
of service gets the same service at the same price. I understand how<br>
to apply that to a railroad or a power company or a telephone company,<br>
but I do not understand how to apply it to a search engine or social<br>
media provider or online megastore and neither does anyone else.<br>
<br>
R's,<br>
John<br>
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