Meta's deck from the FTC proceedings is interesting because of how simple it is. It's made for a non-tech audience focused on a single story with major movements and just a couple data points to digest at a time. Because the audience (presumably) uses Facebook, the business of Meta feels familiar. So the deck needs to inform the audience of a certain reality without losing — or angering — them altogether.

(Just as interesting is what they don't say, of course — that's strategy.)

The slides on competitive dynamics are interesting, too, and they're familiar to anyone who's done a robust comparative analysis: the obvious look-a-likes are not likely or always your actual competition. As Reed Hastings famously said, "You get a show or a movie you're really dying to watch, and you end up staying up late at night, so we actually compete with sleep."

This "everyone competes with us" tack could backfire in that it reveals just how big and broad Meta's reach is. It grows beyond the question of monopoly, approaching a powerful information network that regulators aren't comfortable with.

The deck is an admission of size without a confession of dominance: yes, they've infiltrated every digital nook and cranny, but they're not vertically extractive according to the definition of a monopoly.

[Note: This isn't a post on the case itself or its merits either way.]