US Antitrust Enforcer Continues Fighting Microsoft/Activision Deal, Calls it 'A...
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US Antitrust Enforcer Continues Fighting Microsoft/Activision Deal, Calls it 'A Threat to Competition'
Yesterday America's Federal Trade Commission said it remained focused on its appeal opposing Microsoft's deal to buy Activision, reports Reuters.
Reuters notes that Microsoft and Activision closed their transaction Friday "after winning approval from Britain on condition that they sell the streaming rights to Activision's games to Ubisoft Entertainment." But the U.S. Federal Trade Commission "has also fought the deal, and has an argument scheduled before an appeals court on December 6. The agency said on Friday that it remained focused on that appeal." An FTC spokesperson had this comment for Reuters. "The FTC continues to believe this deal is a threat to competition."
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...and it is a shame the GOP tarred and feathered Biden's FCC pick, Gigi Sohn [wikipedia.org] and Gigi Sohn subsequently chose to withdraw her candidacy for government service [wikipedia.org]. It was our Nation's loss.
That being said, Biden's FTC choice Lina Khan [nytimes.com] is taking names and kicking ass!
Khan also defended the agency’s record in court when it comes to merger cases. She said that of the 13 to 20 cases the agency has brought — depending on the criteria used for counting — the FTC has lost two in federal court.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/t... [nbcnews.com]
https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/2... [cnbc.com]
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How many of those cases did the FTC win? Maybe the FTC lost two, but other departments lost more. At least four, as of a year ago.
https://www.reuters.com/legal/... [reuters.com]
And the FTC has dismissed or settled more cases.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news... [yahoo.com]
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at some point you need to make a stand. Why this one? Well, for one thing it's an easy and obvious sell. It's painfully obvious Microsoft shouldn't be allowed to buy yet another pillar of the games industry. There's also tons of emails found during discovery that show Microsoft is doing this specifically to hurt competition and violating the law.
If the FTC can't win this one then our courts are too packed for them to win *anything*. But when you're fighting against something that fundamentally breaks capitalism and the US economy (anti-trust) you can't just throw in the towel. You keep fighting the good fight and hope the voters come to their senses at some point.-
Got a source on that?
I agree it's obviously probably bad for consumers so I don't understand why both the EU and UK have approved it.
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Here's Biden's initial FCC choice, Gigi Sohn speaking about Net Neutrality [youtube.com] four years ago. Last March Sohn withdrew her nomination.
Last May, Biden nominated US official Anna Gomez to chair the FCC [arstechnica.com] after the seat had been open for two years due to GOP obstruction.
Although that factoid pales in comparison compared to what a single GOP senator has done to the US Military [politico.com].
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Leadership has nothing to do with rank and file failure. This is about legal case, not the theatrical political appointee who sits in a cushy chair getting blowjobs when not on camera.
Actual problem is that Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Apple, etc went on a hiring spree during last five years to get every single good anti-trust attorney in US. And they can offer a hell of a lot more than government can on the budget allocated. So these cases haven't been going well, because corporates have best of the best in their legal department, while government has mandatory diversity quota hires.
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