Platforms

Nations and regions with wildly differing political systems and cultures have converged on a shared set of responses to the power of big tech firms: rein in the companies, avoid dependencies and subsidize critical networks and technologies. China, which has long been accused of protecting domestic companies, has recently been 

Facebook did something US technology giants have done countless times before: it bought a smaller company and closed the deal without notifying competition regulators. But this transaction -- the $400 million acquisition of image library Giphy -- was particularly bold. Giphy used a common -- and legal -- maneuver that lets companies avoid scrutiny from merger watchdogs: it paid a dividend to investors.

Media that were once free or easily accessible — including news websites, podcasts, TV shows and games — rushed to get behind paywalls during the pandemic. This accelerating trend is carving the internet into many niche audiences, Balkanizing our collective media diets. News publisher paywalls took off in 2020 and have seen sustained gains since; users are running into paywalls across a range of media, discovering they must now pay for content that was once free. Even podcasts, traditionally the most open and freely available media via RSS feeds, are moving behind paywalls. There's no clear

Sens Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) introduced the Open App Markets Act, which would set fair, clear, and enforceable rules to protect competition and strengthen consumer protections within the app market.

Facebook's leaders know they have to demonstrate accountability to the world, but they're determined to do so on their own terms and timetable. Since the 2018 Cambridge Analytica affair, the company has moved to provide more transparency and oversight, but its limited programs often leave journalists and scholars as the de facto whistleblowers for problems on its platform. In August 2021 Facebook shut down the accounts of New York University researchers whose tools for studying political advertising on the social network, the company said, violated its rules. Facebook has become a sort of g

The Senate’s proposed infrastructure bill includes billions of dollars for broadband, but financial investment alone won’t be sufficient to keep America on top.

The European Commission aims to use its new authority to review Facebook’s proposed takeover of Kustomer, a startup specializing in customer-service platforms and chatbots.

A new policy paper from the German Marshall Fund p

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC)'s longstanding conflict-of-interest rules may unnecessarily impede its ability to attract, retain and deploy the technical expertise that it badly needs to keep up with Big Tech. To change this, the FTC needs to narrow