In its landmark antitrust case, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) alleges that Meta illegally maintains a monopoly in “personal social networking,”—something the company has always denied. As determined by the agency in its amended 2021 complaint, the only two surviving competitors left in this space were Snapchat and the company I founded: MeWe.
I used to think it was possible to compete with Facebook, but as I wrote in the Wall Street Journal in 2021, competition became impossible. With this realization, I handed MeWe off to new management in 2021, who then repurposed it into the niche Web3 arena.
The FTC, which initially filed its lawsuit in December 2020, defines Meta’s market, in particular Facebook, as “personal social networking,” where users primarily engage with their real-world connections. This is distinct from entertainment or news-focused platforms like TikTok, YouTube, or X.
People take a photo at Meta (formerly Facebook) corporate headquarters in Menlo Park, California on Nov. 9, 2022.
JOSH EDELSON/AFP via Getty Images
A key difference lies in network effects. Platforms like TikTok or YouTube can grow and provide worthwhile experiences for individuals without their social circles joining. But personal networks depend on that. If your friends, family, colleagues, schoolmates, etc. aren’t there, the platform can’t grow, and new members quickly become dormant. That creates a huge barrier to entry for upstarts in the space.
While the FTC identified Snapchat and MeWe as the only independent players left in this market, it’s remarkable the two had sidestepped the digital graveyard in Meta’s wake. After Snapchat rejected Meta’s $6 billion buyout offer in 2013, Meta didn’t simply move on. It declared war. Snap created a dossier, “Project Voldemort,” detailing how it believes Facebook and Instagram cloned Snapchat’s features and blocked Snap-related search terms. Meta even allegedly pressured influencers to remove Snapchat links from their profiles and bought a VPN app, Onavo, to spy on iPhone users and monitor Snapchat and other rivals which was later removed by Apple for violating its privacy rules.
MeWe experienced similar suppression. Under subpoena, I submitted hundreds of pages of documentation to the FTC, including numerous reports and screenshots from MeWe users showing that their Facebook posts mentioning MeWe were hidden, flagged, or removed. Potential partnerships also fell through seemingly due to the real or perceived threat of retaliation from Meta.
Judge James Boasberg, who presides over the trial, noted that the FTC presented sufficient facts to suggest Meta dominates the “friends-and-family sharing market.” He said a reasonable fact finder could conclude Meta “exploits” this customer base.
Meta rejects that framing and insists it competes with TikTok and YouTube. Mr. Zuckerberg testified that Facebook has evolved into a “discovery-entertainment space.” But this doesn’t negate Meta’s monopoly in personal social networking. To draw a parallel, Google has significant competitors in AI and cloud computing. Federal courts affirmed on April 17 and last August that it still holds illegal monopolies in both ad sales and search, respectively.
During my time at MeWe, we built a full-featured personal social network. It consistently rated over four stars out of five in Apple and Google’s app stores, while Facebook held steadfast with barely over two stars. Regardless, Facebook’s powerful network effect along with the billions of marketing dollars it spent preempted users’ dismal experiences. Seventy-nine percent of Americans use Facebook, and more than 50 percent use it “several times a day.”
Some argue that because Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp are free, antitrust law doesn’t apply. Price hikes are what led to the famous breakups of Standard Oil and AT&T. That’s outdated thinking. Today’s web economy runs on data and targeting. Slade Bond, public policy lead at Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca, says Meta’s defense relies on “antiquated precedents.”
Meta’s monopoly harms users in multiple ways. Lack of competition forces users to submit to pervasive content manipulation, invasive data mining, unprecedented privacy infractions, and a variety of mental health harms. After the Cambridge Analytica breach in 2018, Meta suffered a massive 66 percent loss in trust, and many users wanted alternatives. Yet at the time, Meta reported “no visible impact to core engagement metrics.” Users were trapped by Meta’s network effect. In fact, the subsequent $5 billion fine levied on July 24, 2019, was offset the same day by a larger increase in Meta’s market cap.
On April 15, the Wall Street Journal reportedthat Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg offered $1 billion to settle the FTC’s lawsuit, up from an initial offer of $450 million. The FTC rejected it, reportedly seeking at least $18 billion and a consent decree.
During the first day of trial, FTC lawyer Daniel Matheson pointed to an internal message from Zuckerberg in 2012 acknowledging that Meta was “buying time” by acquiring competitors before new ones could scale. Matheson called the 2012 message “a smoking gun.” Another email from Zuckerberg in 2008 reads: “It is better to buy than compete.”
Meanwhile, Meta has made attempts to befriend the Trump administration, including donating $1 million to the inauguration. Despite Zuckerberg’s political maneuverings, FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, appointed by President Donald Trump, recently stated that the FTC “certainly” believes Meta is a monopoly.
The FTC seeks to split off Instagram and WhatsApp. History shows us what can happen in such a scenario. AT&T’s breakup into “Baby Bells” in 1984 eventually led to reconsolidation.
The more lasting fix is adding data interoperability into any final judgement. For instance, the proposed bipartisan ACCESS Act would require platforms with over 100 million monthly U.S. users to let people port their data between platforms. Web inventor Tim Berners-Lee has created a working protocol for this: Solid Pods. This technology seeks to enable people to own, upload, download and relocate their social graphs, mitigating the network effect while interrupting unwanted data collection.
Interoperability wouldn’t just benefit personal social networks. Notably, Trump and his ally Elon Musk, now both owners of social media platforms, have a vested interest in dismantling Meta’s data fortress. Meta’s breakup would likely cause a user stampede to Truth Social, X, Bluesky, Mastodon, and others.
Breaking up Meta is a good start. In tandem, releasing the stranglehold of the network effect gives users control of their data and the ability to easily move themselves and their networks between sites. In this scenario, if an app you’re on does something unsavory, then your personal social graph, your contacts, content, and history, can simply migrate elsewhere. That’s a compelling way to inspire vibrant competition.
Mark Weinstein is a world-renowned tech entrepreneur, thought leader, privacy expert, and one of the inventors of social networking. He is the author of Restoring Our Sanity Online (Wiley, 2025).
The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.
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