>Meta’s counter-argument is, in a sense, that social media per se doesn’t exist now in the way that it did in the twenty-tens, and that what the company’s platforms are now known for—the digital consumption of all kinds of content—has become so widespread that no single company or platform can be said to monopolize it.

Sure, and as long as people are making things Ford can't monopolize the auto industry. As long as people talk to each other Bell can't monopolize telephones.

This thing where people just generalize the conversation into meaninglessness is so frustrating. Everyone knows what social media is and does until it's time to do something about it then all of a sudden like a Roman salute no one actually has any idea what this is and really telephones are also social media but also social media doesn't exist anymore at all and also some social media is an existential threat to democracy and human rights but not the one that I own which, again, doesn't exist but still somehow makes me enough money that I can put the president on layaway.

I generally trend away from authoritarianism but I can see the appeal in just saying "Jesus Christ shut up we all know what's actually going on here" and just doing something