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comes, you decoder, I'm you. I Patel

1:35

editor in chief of the Verge and

1:37

Dakota is my show about big ideas,

1:39

other problems. Today I'm talking with Jonathan

1:41

Cantor, the Assistant Attorney General in charge

1:43

of the Antitrust division at the Department

1:46

of Justice, alongside Federal Trade Commission shared

1:48

Lena Com. Cantor is one of the

1:50

most prominent figures in the big shift

1:52

happening in competition in antitrust law in

1:54

the United States. This a fun episode.

1:56

Cantor and I taped this conversation live

1:58

onstage at the digital. That net

2:00

confidence in Charleston, South Carolina just

2:02

a few days ago. So you

2:04

hear the audience, which was a

2:06

group of fancy media company executives.

2:08

You also hear me joke about

2:10

Google a few times. Fancy media

2:12

executives are very interested in two

2:15

cases the Department of Justice has

2:17

brought against one from Monopolizing Search

2:19

and another from Monopolizing Advertising Sexy

2:21

Ass or these cases several times.

2:23

Cantor it was a very good

2:25

at not commenting on active litigation,

2:27

but those cases are evidence of

2:29

Cantor's major. Charge when it comes to

2:31

competition in tech and media between the

2:33

Ftc, India J, the nicest government has

2:35

blocked a record number of murders in

2:37

the past two years. You'll hear us

2:40

talk about the deal. j Preventing Big

2:42

Five book publisher Penguin Random House from

2:44

acquiring it's competitor, Simon Schuster. A. Case

2:46

Center says was designed to protect

2:48

authors from their payments getting lower.

2:51

Your here's really talk about that

2:53

in the concept of monotony, not

2:55

monopoly monotony. In. The same way,

2:57

a monopoly is a market with one powerful solar.

3:00

monotony, Is a market with one

3:02

powerful by. Tech. Giants in

3:04

particular can end up becoming that powerful by

3:06

it and use your tent. Or talked about

3:08

how that can really distort the market. The

3:11

Horse this is decoder. So he talks about what

3:13

the and I trust division really is and how

3:15

it's organize your here center point out that the

3:17

Interest division has fewer people in it's and it

3:20

did in Nineteen Seventy Nine. Despite some

3:22

is bigger and more complicated economy and

3:24

frankly the world has gotten. He's

3:26

also pretty confident that the new series about and

3:28

to trust. He and others are bringing up. Make.

3:31

Antitrust enforcement more accessible than it's ever been.

3:33

I also asked him how he makes decisions

3:35

and well, let's to say he's got his

3:37

hands on. us

3:40

assistant attorney general jonathan kinda to

3:42

it All

4:00

right, 30 minutes of avoiding questions about

4:02

Google. All right, let's start. So

4:06

we are going to run this on Decoder, the

4:08

podcast. There are two questions I ask everybody on

4:10

Decoder, which I think Jonathan will help us understand

4:12

a lot of the things that you are up

4:14

to right now. So the first one, you

4:17

are the Assistant Attorney General for antitrust, the Department

4:19

of Justice. How is your

4:21

division structured? How does that work? Sure.

4:23

So we are a division of over

4:25

800 people. And

4:28

we are a lot of lawyers, enforcement

4:30

lawyers, who focus on antitrust enforcement.

4:33

We have roughly 50 PhD economists. We

4:37

have data analysts, data

4:39

scientists. We have an

4:42

amazing support team, amazing group of paralegals. Some

4:44

of the smartest people that I've ever met

4:46

and never had the honor of working with

4:49

are at the antitrust division.

4:51

And so the way I

4:54

would think about our organization is

4:56

in a few different ways. First,

4:58

we have civil antitrust enforcement.

5:00

And that includes mergers.

5:03

And so if there's a big merger, we

5:05

review that merger. And then if necessary, take

5:07

action to block that in court. We

5:10

do monopolization investigations. I know that's something

5:12

that I look forward to avoiding your

5:15

questions about later. And

5:17

we talk about we investigate big

5:20

monopolies, the standard

5:23

oil, AT&T's of our era. And

5:26

then we have criminal

5:29

antitrust enforcement. And so these are

5:31

companies that engage in price fixing

5:33

and market allocation and

5:36

certain kinds of fraud. And

5:38

then we have an advocacy policy arm.

5:40

And that focuses on international. We

5:43

live in a global world economy. And

5:45

there are antitrust and competition law regimes all

5:47

over the world. And we have to coordinate

5:49

our work there. We

5:52

focus on providing technical assistance to

5:54

Congress on legislation. And

5:56

then just feeding the discourse

5:58

and dialogue around. antitrust

6:01

and making sure that competition

6:04

policy in our country is sound.

6:08

There is a lot of renewed discourse around competition

6:10

policy both in our country and around the world.

6:12

One thing you pointed out to me just a

6:14

minute ago was 800 some

6:17

people are still relatively small, right?

6:19

The amount of emphasis we're putting in antitrust

6:22

does not actually match the investment. So just

6:24

for a little bit of context,

6:27

the antitrust division today, all right, and

6:29

we've been in existence for over

6:31

100 years, we are over 200

6:34

people smaller than

6:37

we were in 1979, right? So think about

6:41

we have more than 200 people, we were more than 200

6:45

people larger in 1979. Not

6:49

only was the

6:51

economy much smaller then but the kinds of

6:54

issues that we're confronting now are

6:57

extraordinarily complex. The amount of data,

6:59

the amount of information that we

7:01

have to consume, ingest, and review in

7:03

the course of reviewing

7:05

even a merger, the merger economy

7:07

has changed. So

7:10

we, our folks are

7:12

constantly charged with

7:15

doing a lot with very little and then obviously

7:18

it puts an important emphasis

7:20

on prioritization. I assume if it's 1979

7:23

because in 1980 Ronald Reagan

7:25

was elected. That would coincide, yes. All

7:30

right, fair enough. The second

7:32

question I ask everybody on decoder and I

7:34

think is very important here to understand how

7:36

do you make decisions? You have a lot

7:38

of pretty market moving decisions to make all

7:41

the time. What's your framework

7:43

for making those choices? Yeah, so the

7:46

good news is that's kind of embedded in

7:48

our mission

7:51

and so everything that

7:53

we do starts and finishes with the facts and

7:55

the law, right? And so what does the law

7:57

say? What did Congress write and how is that?

8:00

been interpreted by courts. And

8:02

then how do we fit the facts into any given

8:04

situation? Now obviously there's

8:06

a lot more that goes into that. And

8:09

we've developed a methodology that I call

8:11

HIPPS. Tell everybody to keep their hands on

8:13

their HIPPS. It stands

8:15

for High Impact Programmatically Significant.

8:18

And so when we think about a

8:20

matter that we're investigating

8:24

and we think about our scarce resources

8:27

and how to deploy them, we

8:29

think about, OK, well, what's going to have a

8:31

big impact on society? Right? And that

8:33

could be in terms of the amount of

8:35

commerce it affects. But it

8:37

could also be about the kind

8:40

of industry. And

8:42

so news and journalism, for example,

8:44

it's the raw material of our

8:46

democracy. And the marketplace of

8:48

ideas is vital to a thriving

8:50

free society. And so that

8:53

is high impact. Similarly,

8:57

the PS stands

8:59

for Programmatically Significant. And so as a

9:01

law enforcement organization, we need to make

9:03

sure that we are bringing

9:05

cases that enable the law to

9:07

develop in a way that's healthy

9:09

and adapts to current market realities.

9:11

And so we bring

9:14

those cases that we believe are

9:16

important to establishing the kinds

9:18

of precedents that allow the antitrust law to

9:20

evolve the way it was intended to by

9:22

Congress and to make sure

9:24

that we are adapting it to market realities

9:27

and deterrence. And this is

9:29

important, which is the

9:31

best, most successful work we

9:33

can do is to keep the bad stuff from

9:35

happening in the first place, and whether that's a

9:37

merger that never sees the light of day because

9:41

of antitrust risk or a company

9:43

that doesn't engage in antitrust violation

9:45

because they've invested in compliance. That's

9:48

the win-win scenario for everyone. All

9:51

right. I want to talk about deterrence

9:53

first, and then I want to talk about Some

9:55

bad things that have already happened that you're trying

9:58

to stop. Deterrence, I think the best example. Cause

10:00

You stop the Penguin merger with

10:02

Simon and Schuster. What

10:04

were the bad things you saw coming that

10:06

you think you stop there I bought, yeah,

10:08

so that was really important matter for us?

10:12

I was a murder of book

10:14

publishers and we brought that. Case

10:17

I: a series that. Was

10:19

successful we assert and correctly that

10:21

was rooted saw in well established

10:24

legal principles but we didn't bring

10:26

the case based on a theory

10:28

that for prices were gonna go

10:30

up. We brought

10:32

the case based on the

10:34

theory that advances to professional

10:37

authors who relied on advances

10:39

in order to fund. The

10:41

development and research and writing of

10:44

their books, Will. Go Down. It

10:46

was but we and are some

10:49

wonky way called Lieberman Obscenities. And

10:52

so we were preserving the market to

10:54

make sure that people who create things

10:56

for a living. Have enough

10:58

competition to be compensated. For.

11:00

The value of their creations served. That's really

11:03

important idea that I want to stay centered

11:05

on as we talk because the idea of

11:07

it's it's the buyers who consolidating and arab

11:09

the demand will go down at a price

11:11

for demand is willing to pay will go

11:13

down and he's very relevant to rid of

11:16

his room because art buyers are traditionally been

11:18

large platforms. right? And are direct

11:20

relationship with their customers ring we're all trying to

11:22

build of now that are buyers who is from

11:24

past decade of in March platforms. Cigarette.

11:27

Yeah, I'm ready. We

11:30

need to get good grades. Will come back. Cancer

11:32

and I get into Deirdre cases against Google. Support

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15:07

listen to Compiler in your favorite

15:09

podcast my they say Compiler for

15:11

their support. We're

15:17

back with a D O J Antitrust division.

15:19

Had Jonathan Cantor stuck with the antitrust cases

15:21

against Google and the Dj in as he

15:23

sees Trek reference and Far. As

15:27

you've got to cases right now: Iraq

15:29

on the case against Google for search

15:32

monopolization, some New clothes way and decisions

15:34

in a about to go to trial

15:36

on the Ad tech case against. google.

15:39

Why? Did you choose to bring these

15:41

cases so that. It. Is I

15:43

was it was it for the same reason that

15:46

you see the demand side. Changing

15:48

dramatically different salami limousine out

15:50

to higher altitude Am as

15:52

you anticipated and previewed. I

15:54

can't talk about any ongoing

15:56

matters are pending here for

15:58

drank now and Zola. Foreign

16:01

to hog every time I say

16:03

that. but but I think it's

16:05

It's helpful to think about this

16:07

contextually. it it's public record that

16:09

we have those cases. It has

16:11

public record that we've gone to

16:13

court and filed complaints to address

16:15

these important industries. and I think

16:17

it's self evident, including to this

16:20

audiences. You know why We should

16:22

care about markets that involve the

16:24

flow of information. Markets that involve

16:26

or advertising which is so important

16:28

to monetize the kind of information.

16:30

That companies like the ones in this

16:32

room run to produce and for to

16:34

better society through the distribution for analysts

16:36

I'm one of the seems I think

16:39

we're seeing in a lot of cases

16:41

in this is not just in tech

16:43

and media but it's It's throughout the

16:45

economy are intermediaries. right? Intermediaries

16:47

who are becoming more

16:49

powerful than the products

16:52

and services or the

16:54

the entities The intermediate.

16:56

I. Think that's. A phenomenon

16:59

that. Result of a

17:01

lot of. Developments.

17:03

And technology in the last, not as

17:05

our technology and economy. Where am I

17:07

think in a used to have one

17:10

one for one transactions but I have

17:12

one one from any of platforms. You

17:14

have entities that sit in the middle

17:16

and that generate revenue from aggregation rather

17:19

than. Production. And so

17:21

that's changed market realities and I

17:23

think a lot of the. Cases.

17:26

That were bringing a lot

17:28

of a murderer, Matters that

17:31

we're pursuing and challenges that

17:33

we're bringing Not all of

17:35

them, but many of them

17:37

relate to these kinds of

17:39

these intermediary markets. And in

17:41

a lot of those markets,

17:43

the intermediary is both a

17:45

buyer and seller. And you

17:47

know, increasingly, when platforms can

17:49

exert massive amount of control

17:51

and asymmetry. An asymmetry have

17:53

power over people who supply

17:55

that. Platform it becomes you.

17:58

a real concern. I'm

18:00

and we hear some businesses a

18:02

lot that these intermediary markets An

18:05

establishment of these dominant intermediaries can

18:07

have a negative effect on their

18:09

ability to distribute, grow, and invest,

18:12

So if you don't like this pattern in

18:14

digital media, you followed him in Op's me

18:16

leaving. it's a natural order. The Internet you

18:18

might call by know the name my friend

18:21

been Thompson Closet aggregation theory that you agree

18:23

it all the demand and something of a

18:25

lot of power of your suppliers countries prices

18:27

and that comes from building a superior user

18:30

interface where a superior user experience in this

18:32

is why Apple just pays Google for search

18:34

crisis. They. Build the best source

18:37

products legislative using it as fancy data

18:39

back into this is their arguments you

18:41

will get out. You say no. This

18:43

is a promises artificially distorting the market

18:46

in some way. Is there a balancer

18:48

as it or yeah, so the balances

18:50

me. A We believe in full throated

18:52

competition, right? And that means we don't

18:55

pick winners and losers. but yes, sometimes

18:57

some one. The women, sometimes someone won't

18:59

when we want since duking it out

19:01

and competing in a very vibrant from

19:04

full throated way and. You

19:06

know that can. ah and the

19:08

Law or Congress going back to

19:10

eighty Nine, the and updated any

19:12

time since has made a judgment

19:14

that you know me, a competitive

19:17

economy is one that provides opportunities.

19:19

It's one that is consistent with the values

19:21

of a free and open democracy. and so.

19:25

Yeah, I like companies can

19:27

get big on the merits

19:29

of their own innovations, but

19:31

when companies start using contracts

19:33

and payments and start an

19:35

engaging in note building in

19:37

order to preserve their monopolies

19:39

from disruption from competition from

19:42

disintermediation, those are the kinds

19:44

of things that turn from

19:46

being competitions on the merits,

19:48

ads, and competitive conduct that

19:50

can violate the law. One

19:53

of the approaches you and Sean

19:55

Connery taken as you. In.

19:58

Charge of cops surpassing the contrary his

20:00

I was. it depends on a swamp.

20:02

Since Nineteen seventy nine, Fray was very

20:04

premise of environments. Under the by

20:07

the ministration. Less. For miss environment

20:09

more things are blocked or talons towards

20:11

Ah to enforce actions are taken. The.

20:14

I would say the record there is

20:17

spotty heart has been someone's There's been

20:19

some losses on balance to thank you

20:21

for. the depends on to a healthier

20:24

for yeah I'm really proud of of

20:26

our results. So we've when we think

20:28

about the murders that we successfully challenged

20:31

in court and there been a number

20:33

of high profile victories, including most recently

20:35

our victory in court against I gently

20:38

spirit merger the Penguin Random how Simon

20:40

Schuster of the American Airlines Shapley Transaction

20:42

When we think about the ways. Of

20:45

deals that happen in bands and either

20:47

after we fall litigation or in the

20:50

face of it including recently in the

20:52

tax base the they'll Be Sigma matter,

20:54

Abbott and you know their been a

20:57

number of matters including in the supply

20:59

chain, aerial bombing, ocean shipping I see

21:01

I'm see Maersk comes to mind, carpets,

21:04

Hakone cranes and number of other transactions.

21:06

Were in in looking down

21:08

the possibility of litigation the

21:10

company's aside not to pursue

21:12

those transactions were also hearing

21:14

that. That

21:17

enforcement of a was having

21:19

is anticipated effect of deterrence.

21:21

And so when companies are

21:24

considering. A merger of

21:26

they consider and I trust risk

21:28

as a real factor and if

21:30

a merger gonna roll up some

21:32

a an industry of mergers going

21:34

to reinforce the dom in a

21:36

position of a platform. If.

21:38

The merger is going to

21:41

enable affirms exercise monotony power

21:43

over key participants and it's

21:45

ecosystem. then more

21:48

it at the then.

21:50

We've seen any time in recent memory. companies

21:54

are choosing to either person rather

21:56

than merge or they're finding another

21:58

dance partner one that doesn't

22:00

raise those competitive concerns. And I think when we look

22:03

at the entire body of

22:05

work, at least that

22:07

I've been involved in, which is now a little

22:09

over two years, we

22:11

see trial victories, we see updated

22:14

merger guidelines, we see abandoned transactions,

22:16

we see deterrence, those

22:18

are the ingredients of success. And I'm really proud

22:20

of the work that our team has done to

22:23

achieve that level of notable success. I'll also

22:25

say this, and I think this is really

22:28

important, and it's something I think that a

22:30

lot of folks here

22:32

in the room today, and certainly listening, understand,

22:34

these issues are more accessible than they've ever

22:36

been. When I

22:38

started practicing antitrust, it was in the late 90s,

22:41

it was this wonky, technical,

22:43

technocratic, insular area that

22:46

was largely occupied by a small

22:48

group of people inside the beltway in New York,

22:51

and occasionally San Francisco. But

22:54

it was really limited, and that

22:56

was due to a vocabulary that

22:58

was exclusionary. And

23:00

I think what we've seen is over

23:03

the last number of years, more

23:06

people feel affected by monopoly

23:08

power. More people see their

23:11

lives worse off

23:13

because of concentration of power

23:15

and control. And by

23:17

people, I don't just mean people who

23:19

go and buy something at a store

23:21

or online, I mean people who work

23:24

hard for living as laborers,

23:27

people who create the creative

23:29

economy, perhaps more than any

23:31

other, has experienced firsthand the

23:34

harm and the threat of monopoly

23:36

power. And the resonance

23:38

that these issues have is

23:41

something that I've never witnessed in my

23:43

lifetime. And I think that is a

23:45

significant change that animates a lot

23:47

of the success that we're having on the field

23:50

with our matters. Yeah, I will say that when

23:52

I was, I was not a good law student,

23:54

I majored in Miller Lite. But

23:56

when I was in, well that's true, when

23:59

I was in law school. over 20 years ago, antitrust was described

24:01

to me as a math class. And

24:03

it feels like maybe not the place

24:05

it occupies anymore. So I've been to

24:07

about 20 or so

24:10

law schools and business schools over the last

24:12

year alone. It's been

24:14

eye-opening. So people often ask me, OK,

24:16

are we, is

24:18

this a transition period? Is this an inflection point?

24:21

And I say, yes, but we're just at the

24:23

beginning. And the

24:25

energy that's coming from students who

24:27

care about these issues because they

24:30

care about the problem, as

24:32

opposed to thinking about antitrust as a math class

24:34

that you can take in order to get a

24:36

high-paying job. It's

24:38

different today than it's been in many years. This

24:42

is a room full of media executives. This

24:44

industry is under a lot of pressure. There

24:46

are probably some conversations about consolidation happening

24:48

in and around this room. How

24:51

should the media industry think about consolidation? There's

24:53

a lot about the idea that maybe we

24:55

can get a leverage against a Google or

24:57

another distributor if we actually get

24:59

bigger ourselves. So every matter, again,

25:01

we start with the facts and

25:04

the law, what's happening here. I

25:06

think that we would rather

25:08

a market that's competitive. And

25:10

we think that's the best solution. When

25:13

the problem is not enough competition, the

25:16

answer is often not to create

25:18

less competition. Now, I know that's not always

25:21

that simple. But one of

25:23

the things that I've talked about a lot is why

25:25

it's important to make sure that we're enforcing the law

25:27

against monopolies so

25:30

that the only way to compete and

25:32

survive isn't to merge. We

25:34

want to promote a competition

25:36

and a law enforcement regime that creates

25:39

enough opportunity for as many companies to

25:41

compete without having to merge with their

25:43

competitors. We're talking here

25:45

a day or two after Disney,

25:48

Warner, and a handful of the other streaming

25:50

giants of sports rights announced a big tie-up.

25:53

We're going to make a new sports bundle for people. This

25:56

is an old idea that sounds very new and sounds very good. But

25:58

we're going to try it again. Does that raise

26:00

any red flags for you? As

26:04

a sports fan. In

26:08

the sport of public

26:10

speaking and podcasting, I'm

26:13

going to exercise

26:15

my all-star ability not to answer your

26:17

question. But I can drink. We

26:21

have to take a quick break. We'll be right

26:23

back to get into European antitrust enforcement and how

26:25

it differs from the approach of the FTC and

26:27

the DOJ here in the United States. Support

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28:33

We're back talking with Assistant Attorney General

28:35

Jonathan Cantor about the lessons he's learned

28:37

from European antitrust enforcement. Alright,

28:40

I'm going to try another way at this. Alright, go for

28:42

it. I can do this

28:44

all day. Do you know the code name for a decoder

28:47

is NEILI versus media training? That's what our team calls it.

28:49

And if I get too consistently a draw, we're doing a

28:51

good job. The United States, you

28:53

mentioned the Adobe-Sigma deal. Adobe

28:55

just openly blamed that on

28:57

European enforcement. Dana

28:59

Rao, Adobe's General Counsel, was actually on decoder. He

29:01

said, we evaluated it. We could not find a

29:03

way to meet the standard that Europe was trying

29:05

to impose on us. And his

29:07

description of it was, they thought Sigma could be a

29:10

big company and we could not prove that negative. That

29:13

Sigma would be better off with us. And they walked away from the deal. Europe

29:16

is kind of leading the charge here, at least

29:18

from my perspective. They are doing that enforcement. They

29:20

are setting their standards. I want to talk with

29:22

the Digital Markets Act with you for sure. Europe

29:26

has also spent a decade trying to get

29:28

people to not use Google. Like

29:30

aggressive interventions on people's computers.

29:32

They designed browser ballots on

29:35

Android phones. They ask

29:37

you if you want to use the Play Store or not. They've

29:40

mostly failed. After a decade of intense interventions,

29:42

people in Europe, as far as I can

29:44

tell, still use Google. They do not

29:46

use Bing. I know they don't use Bing, but they

29:48

definitely use Google. Does that strike

29:52

you as, okay, that's actually the wrong way to

29:54

do it? These aggressive interventions, is there a better

29:56

way? complex

30:00

questions and we have different legal regimes.

30:02

We work very well with our counterparts

30:04

in Europe, including on that matter you

30:07

mentioned regarding Adobe Figma, we issued our

30:09

press release. Our

30:11

process was not public, but

30:14

we discussed the importance of that murder,

30:17

our process as well. I think

30:20

we all work within the confines of

30:22

the tools we have and

30:24

the legal and regulatory regimes that

30:27

are binding in our country. Here

30:30

in the United

30:33

States, in the absence of

30:35

new regulation and laws, we have our

30:37

antitrust framework and that's one that says,

30:40

okay, we're not gonna prescribe outcomes, we're not

30:42

gonna pick winners and losers and we're gonna,

30:44

for the most part, disfavor telling

30:47

people how to run their businesses.

30:49

Instead, we're going to rely on

30:51

a competitive market to

30:55

fuel innovation and to give different

30:58

parts of the market the opportunity to discipline

31:00

other parts of the market. That

31:03

only works if you have a competitive

31:05

economy. And so my

31:07

job, at least, is to make

31:09

sure that we are enforcing the

31:12

law to preserve competition, to

31:14

promote it and make sure that competition

31:17

can work to generate these

31:19

benefits for folks more broadly.

31:22

Obviously, there's been discussion of

31:24

legislation in the United States, we've

31:26

weighed in, the department on some

31:29

of that, certainly in the last Congress. Europe

31:31

has its own pathway.

31:36

We are at this moment

31:38

in a regime that focuses on

31:41

enforcement and those are the tools

31:43

we have, those

31:45

are the tools we're gonna use. When

31:47

you look at some of the proposed legislations

31:50

out there, I picked the Journalism Competition Preservation

31:52

Act, JCPA. That

31:54

mirrors legislation that we've seen around the world

31:57

in Australia and other places. We're gonna allow this

31:59

group of producers. to go negotiate as

32:01

a block to get favorable terms from platforms. Do

32:04

you see that as a useful tool

32:06

that would actually enable the kind of

32:08

competition you're talking about? Or do you

32:10

see that as a prescription or a

32:12

tax? So ultimately, again, decisions about legislation

32:14

are made by Congress. We

32:17

provide technical assistance to Congress when they consider

32:19

these kinds of legislation.

32:22

I will say that I think what

32:25

we're talking about here, and

32:27

this is not specific to the legislation, but

32:30

I think it's symptomatic of the

32:34

issue, are asymmetries

32:36

of power. And

32:38

so when a company

32:40

or intermediaries have so much power

32:42

that they can extract prices

32:45

or terms that are

32:48

unfavorable to a wide range of

32:51

a market, that is often

32:53

viewed as a market failure. And

32:57

how you deal with a market failure

32:59

can be through a mixture of legislation

33:01

and regulation. And I think there are

33:03

lots of different theories, and many

33:07

college and PhD courses taught on

33:09

how to deal with that. Do you think

33:11

the journalism market is filled? I

33:14

think that journalism

33:16

is probably the most, it

33:20

is one of the most important industries in our country.

33:23

It is not just vital to an informed

33:26

society. It's vital to

33:28

a democratic free

33:30

society. And so if monopolization

33:36

and harm to

33:38

competition is harming

33:41

journalism, if it means

33:43

that companies can't

33:45

invest in original

33:48

journalism, in the kind

33:50

of reporting and

33:53

infrastructure that is

33:55

necessary, not just on a

33:57

national level, but on a local level, to.

34:00

keep our country free of corruption, to make

34:02

sure that our political

34:04

discourse is well informed, to

34:07

make sure that people can

34:09

learn about exciting new things, to make sure

34:11

that we can vote in

34:13

an informed way. It's

34:16

hard to imagine something that's

34:18

more important or critical to the

34:20

fabric of our nation. And

34:22

so, you know, going back to my

34:25

hands on hips, if something is

34:28

affecting in a meaningful, deep

34:31

way the

34:33

journalism industry in our country,

34:35

yeah, that's really important. One

34:46

of the tools that is available in Europe now is

34:48

something called the Digital Markets Act. It

34:50

is, again, a very aggressive intervention into

34:53

the market. It classifies certain companies

34:55

as gatekeepers, particularly Apple is a gatekeeper for

34:57

the App Store and other parts of the

34:59

platform. Because you have to open up, you

35:01

have to allow these other sources

35:04

of competition to arrive.

35:07

You're looking at it as an outsider, understand that we

35:09

don't have that here. But Apple is doing something that

35:12

I've heard described as malicious compliance. They're

35:14

saying, we're going to comply with the DMA

35:16

technically, but actually it's so hard to take

35:19

advantage of the openness that's being imposed on

35:21

our platform that you're better off just sticking

35:23

with us. When you look at that from

35:25

your perspective, you say, OK, the

35:27

DMA is the right start, but it has more to

35:29

go, or this is the wrong choice. So,

35:34

again, it's hard to sit here on this side of

35:36

the Atlantic and... No,

35:39

Americans criticizing Europeans is firmly international

35:41

tradition, sir. So

35:46

I'll talk about it from my perspective, which

35:48

is the

35:50

DMA is a fact. It

35:53

exists in Europe. And

35:56

we are watching with great interest as

35:58

it... it comes into

36:01

effect. And we're

36:03

watching with great interest to see how companies

36:08

comply or not comply with the DMA.

36:10

And how they do that teaches us a lot.

36:12

It teaches us a lot about our

36:15

own remedies. It can teach us a lot about what's

36:17

possible, what's not possible. It

36:20

can teach us a lot about what

36:22

companies can do to make life

36:24

difficult for would-be competitors

36:27

or competitive disruptions. These

36:30

are all facts. And

36:32

we gather those facts, and then we use

36:34

that to reach an informed conclusion based

36:36

on our laws in the United States. In

36:39

this early period, what do you think you've learned so far about

36:41

DMA? We're watching

36:43

with great interest. Well done. All

36:47

right. We're going to have a few questions

36:49

from the audience if you're listening to this on Decoder.

36:52

We're going to cut this off now because the audience

36:54

is off the record. So thank you very much, Jonathan.

36:56

Thank you very much. I'd

37:01

like to thank Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Cantor for

37:03

taking the time to join me on stage at

37:05

the DCN conference. I'd like to thank the DCN

37:07

conference for having us. I'd also like

37:09

to thank you for listening to Decoder. I hope you

37:11

enjoyed it. In case you missed our announcement last week,

37:14

Decoder is now publishing twice weekly. Our

37:16

classic interviews with CEOs, politicians, and other

37:18

troublemakers, like this episode, are now on

37:20

Monday. And on Thursdays, we'll bring you

37:22

shorter episodes of some big topics in

37:24

the news with the Verge reporters, experts,

37:26

and other friends of the show. If

37:29

you have big ideas on what we should cover or who we

37:31

should talk to on the show, we'd love your

37:33

feedback. You can email us at decoderattheverge.com. We really

37:35

do read all the emails. Or you can hit

37:37

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37:52

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