Submission statement For years, First Amendment debates over social media (highlighted by Moody v. NetChoice) have been trapped in a false binary: platforms are either neutral conduits like telecom networks or expressive editors like newspapers. But recent factual findings in FTC v. Meta suggest this framework no longer reflects reality. Social media platforms have shifted away from facilitating user-to-user communication (“the social graph”) toward algorithmically curated feeds dominated by “unconnected content.” These systems are designed not to transmit speech or express viewpoints, but to maximize user engagement and, ultimately, advertising revenue. This shift undermines both traditional analogies. Platforms are no longer neutral pipes, as they actively shape what users see through constant algorithmic intervention. Yet treating these systems as editorial actors stretches First Amendment doctrine too far, because engagement algorithms operate with indifference to meaning. They optimize for behavioral response, not expression.
If competition between platforms is already intense and converging on increasingly extractive models, can antitrust law meaningfully address the democratic harms of social media? Or, if we reconceptualize algorithmic curation as a business practice rather than an editorial judgment, does this open the door for the state to assert a substantial interest in regulating these systems—not to control content, but to curb the logic of attention fracking itself?
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Submission statement: For years, First Amendment debates over social media (highlighted by Moody v. NetChoice) have been trapped in a false binary: platforms are either neutral conduits like telecom networks or expressive editors like newspapers. But recent factual findings in FTC v. Meta suggest this framework no longer reflects reality. Social media platforms have shifted away from facilitating user-to-user communication (“the social graph”) toward algorithmically curated feeds dominated by “unconnected content.” These systems are designed not to transmit speech or express viewpoints, but to maximize user engagement and, ultimately, advertising revenue. This shift undermines both traditional analogies. Platforms are no longer neutral pipes, as they actively shape what users see through constant algorithmic intervention. Yet treating these systems as editorial actors stretches First Amendment doctrine too far, because engagement algorithms operate with indifference to meaning. They optimize for behavioral response, not expression.
If competition between platforms is already intense and converging on increasingly extractive models, can antitrust law meaningfully address the democratic harms of social media? Or, if we reconceptualize algorithmic curation as a business practice rather than an editorial judgment, does this open the door for the state to assert a substantial interest in regulating these systems—not to control content, but to curb the logic of attention fracking itself?
It’s really simple: tax the advertising revenue into oblivion.