August Threads 2025
Threads from ICLE scholars on trending issues for the month of August 2025.
Right after the Google Search case was filed in 2020, I wrote a snarky post about how these payments were a subsidy.
The logic was simple. Google's payment to Apple gets partially passed through to consumers.
This argument is somewhat vindicated now that we have the remedies. pic.twitter.com/dYzmuaZNtv
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) September 4, 2025
Right after the Google Search case was filed in 2020, I wrote a snarky post about how these payments were a subsidy.
The logic was simple. Google's payment to Apple gets partially passed through to consumers.
This argument is somewhat vindicated now that we have the remedies. pic.twitter.com/dYzmuaZNtv
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) September 4, 2025
The Google Search remedies decision just dropped. The court rejected breakups, payment bans, and choice screens.
But it still ordered data sharing and syndication duties.
This reasoning will shape antitrust for years. My thoughts ? https://t.co/ScFNzZ7GxA
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) September 3, 2025
NEW. Over the summer, I read all of the EU’s latest digital acts (640 pages…) so you don’t have to.
I ran an empirical study to measure how adaptive these regulations are. Here are the results: https://t.co/QBpb6mqiC0.
(And yes, I’m experimenting with very short abstracts!) pic.twitter.com/HStga30mH5— Thibault Schrepel (@ProfSchrepel) September 3, 2025
As the deadline for the European Commission’s consultation on the revision of the merger guidelines approaches, I have submitted a comment based on a new @LawEconCenter working paper titled “Do #Ecosystems Exist in EU #Competition Law?” 1/n pic.twitter.com/pc0OBgQnaG
— Giuseppe Colangelo (@GiuColangelo) August 27, 2025
Surprising that it took so long for the US to push back against regulations that are largely designed to weaken the competitive position of American firms (albeit in the name of fairness, contestability, transparency…).
So where do jurisdictions like Europe go from here? ? pic.twitter.com/nGhv0n7FeD
— Dirk Auer (@AuerDirk) August 26, 2025
On Friday, @ericfruits, @kristianstout and I filed comments on the FCC's copper retirement NPRM. We argued that the market for voice services is in the midst of "creative destruction" and the FCC should eliminate rules that slow down that transition pic.twitter.com/cW9VjEYnHb
— Ben Sperry (@RBenSperry) August 25, 2025
For an explainer on the US-EU trade deal “squabbles” over non-tariff barriers to trade (i.e. EU digital regulation) see my analysis on EUTechReg (.com) https://t.co/zPhDjO72EY pic.twitter.com/e01S1dl85a
— Miko?aj Barczentewicz (@MBarczentewicz) August 20, 2025
Simple economics is damn good at making real-world predictions.
Yet, if you only read oped columns, you’d think economics was a failure. Our models are too abstract. Our predictions are always wrong.
I push back in the @WSJopinion ? pic.twitter.com/ovY0fO6s41
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) August 19, 2025
I actually think it’s bad that a grocery store would not properly account for the opportunity cost of their building pic.twitter.com/nOXgPDBnMZ
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) August 18, 2025
NEW @LawEconCenter working paper out: “News publishers, digital platforms, and bargaining codes: debunking the free-riding myth.” pic.twitter.com/rMpmTeSHvn
— Giuseppe Colangelo (@GiuColangelo) August 17, 2025
America’s commercial space industry runs on innovation & speed—but our regulatory system is stuck in the 1980s.
Yesterday, the White House issued an EO to “streamline regulations and foster a competitive commercial space industry.” ?
— kristian stout (@kristianstout) August 14, 2025
1/ My new white paper w @AuerDirk examines whether the EU's push for digital regulation hinders its own startup ambitions. We argue there's a fundamental tension between the EU's Digital Agenda and its goal of building a thriving tech ecosystem. https://t.co/UZYQLRTSx3
— Lazar Radic (@laz_radic) August 13, 2025
Just published on @TOTMblog “Truth Cartels? The DOJ’s Misguided Leap into Viewpoint Regulation” critically assessing the @JusticeATR statement of interest (https://t.co/ychreV63be) on Children’s Health Defense v. Washington Post (https://t.co/IwMunHEIHV)
— Francisco Marcos (@pacomarcos) August 13, 2025
Learn how chips actually work!
I’d love to see the market definition where Apple has the monopoly. Smart phone chips in US bought smartphones? That’s not a market! pic.twitter.com/SuN4aALyj5
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) August 12, 2025
Planet Money had an interesting podcast tying together the BLS story with the broader questions about the role of economists and economics.
Some thoughts:https://t.co/YYEBtc0muf
— Brian Albrecht (@BrianCAlbrecht) August 5, 2025
What I should have noted is that Gus Hurwitz and Geoffrey Manne have a good and recent piece on this: "Build, Buy, or Both…." The logic is hard to escape; and another example the dead orthodoxy that emerges from slavish following of Brown Shoe. https://t.co/9mBTWUI9Cu
— Herbert hovenkamp (@Sherman1890) August 2, 2025
? #HappeningNextWeek | #CompetitionLawintheDigitalAge
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— The Dialogue (@_DialogueIndia) August 2, 2025