If Meta can convince the court that the FTC’s market definition is wrong and that TikTok is Meta’s biggest rival, then Meta’s market share drops below monopolist standards, “undercutting” the FTC’s case, Big Tech on Trial reported.
But are Facebook and Instagram substitutes for TikTok?
Although Meta paints the picture that TikTok users naturally gravitated to Instagram during the TikTok outage, it’s clear that Meta advertised heavily to move them in that direction. There was even a conspiracy theory that Meta had bought TikTok in the hours before TikTok went down, Wired reported, as users noticed Meta banners encouraging them to link their TikTok accounts to Meta platforms. However, even the reported Meta ad blitz seemingly didn’t sway that many TikTok users, as Sensor Tower data at the time apparently indicated that “Instagram and Facebook appeared to receive only a modest increase in daily active users and downloads” during the TikTok outage, Wired reported.
Perhaps a more interesting question that the court may entertain is not where TikTok users go when TikTok is down, but where Instagram or Facebook users turn if they no longer want to use those platforms. If the FTC can argue that people seeking a destination to connect with friends or family wouldn’t substitute TikTok for that purpose, their market definition might fly.
Kenneth Dintzer, a partner at Crowell & Moring and the former lead attorney in the DOJ’s winning Google search monopoly case, told Ars that the chief judge in the case, James Boasberg, made clear at summary judgment that acknowledging Meta’s rivalry with TikTok “doesn’t really answer the question about friends and family.”
So even though Zuckerberg was “pretty persuasive,” his testimony on TikTok may not move the judge much. However, there was one exchange at the trial where Boasberg asked, “How much does it matter if friends are on a particular platform, if friends can share outside of it?” Zuckerberg praised this as a “good question” and “explained that it doesn’t matter much because people can fluidly share across platforms, using each one for its value as a ‘discovery engine,'” Big Tech on Trial reported.
