1 Last week Bob Ferguson the State’s attorney general for Washington launched an anti-trust probe into Google and Facebook . Among... 1 Last week Bob Ferguson the State’s attorney general for Washington launched an anti-trust probe into Google and Facebook. Amongst the many allegations, he claimed that the Duopoly had not only formed an unfair monopoly to squeeze publishers and “squash competition”, but also that Google and Facebook had gone one step further by, “actively seeking to harm consumers.” How and why? I’ll explain why below but to put it succinctly – it is in their best interest to do so. Once complete they will have succeeded in creating a platform-based internet, keeping you in their walled garden and removing your freedom of choice. You will see whatever they want you to see. Adios free will. This is tearing at the fabric of our society. They create filter bubbles, fuel hate, and narrow our worldview. They are invading our privacy. Have you ever talked about something and then seen an ad for it? Yes, they’re listening in on every device. You see, when you harm publishers, you also harm the end user, and that’s you. You are collateral damage in the biggest landgrab in the history of modern society. At the same time the government launched their probe, the top publishers in the country had gathered for an emergency summit in New York. Advertising dollars from 2015-2018 were slowly declining. 2019 trends were showing an alarming trend with programmatic revenues in freefall industry-wide. Ad revenue across publishing was down over 50%??? There’s gotta be an explanation for this? 2 Here’s the sticky-fingered culprit. Facebook has decided to sweep the leg on the entire industry, it’s actually happening now. But why now? The reason why is shockingly simple. Google and Facebook are ad-supported businesses. They want to get you on their pages and keep you there at all costs. This puts them at odds with the publishing community, much of which is ad supported. Google. Facebook, and Amazon control 70% of all online ad dollars spent. The rest of the publishing world fights for scraps of the other 30%. But Google and Facebook got together last year and colluded with each other, asking a simple, shocking question, a question that prompted the anti-trust probe: “What if we took it all?” And these clowns actually agreed they should fuckin’ do it. Holy smokes. 3 The endgame is underway. Last Thursday, Rooster Teeth, a company I admire and have tremendous respect for laid off 50 people. To avoid the same fate publishers have absolutely littered their website with ads; Pop-ups, Auto-sound ads, the kitchen sink, to stay afloat. We haven’t followed suit. Frankly I’d rather die. Fewer publishers, and the ones left must worship a new god. Sound familiar? 4 By taking it all, the Duopoly actually wins twice. Not only do they kill publishers and take their money, what’s left of the publishers who hang on will have no choice but to attach their skeleton crew to Facebook and Google for life support. Facebook will actually have the balls to play savior by creating, say, a ‘preferred publisher program’, anointing a handful of publishers as partners who will get traffic from FB and just enough ad revenue to survive. Then Facebook’s algorithm will only show you articles from those publishers that their algorithm thinks you want to see. 5 GIF BUT – I am giving you an option to support us directly and cut out the vampire squids. How will this work? Simple, for the price of a beer ($4.99) we’re going to give you a ton of bang for you buck and a chance to win big prizes every month. 6 7 … especially if you’re Joshua Horne who just beat cancer for the second time, his letter and coin are already in the mail. And one lucky Chiver will open up a card to find something rare and very special. 8 This is the first look at the official BFM Solid Gold Coin. It is literally worth its weight in Gold ($1,500) and it will also get you entrance to theCHIVE HQ for life. The only people who own a BFM Gold are Bill (he uses it for magic tricks), theCHIVE Box winner, and possibly you. I don’t even have one of these fuckers. Pro Tip: Read the membership page to give yourself a leg up to win the solid gold coin. 9 So the war beings. The bad guys have an endless war chest, political lobbyists, and intend on making a whole industry bend the knee. But they don’t have the hearts and minds of the people. The “Techlash” has begun and phrase s like ‘feed fatigue’ has entered our parlance as the nation wakes up to the the negative effects of social media, both physical and mental. Recently, Wordpress’ parent company Automattic bought Tumblr from Yahoo. When Automatic’s CEO Matt Mullenweg was asked why he responded, “We have to believe in a world of distributed media and a free and open internet because the opposite is the absolute dominance of the platforms, and that cannot happen.” 10 I’ve known this was coming for a while and you have to take a stand sometime, that time is now. If it works, others will follow and begin taking the power back from the Duopoly. Believe me when I tell you that something far greater than theCHIVE is at stake here. And I have no oblem being the first to step up on behalf of an industry I love. For all that we aren’t, for all our flaws, I believe in theCHIVE and our community more than anything i’ve ever believed in my life. I have no wife, no kids, this is my life’s work. I’ll likely pay for all this too, the last time I spoke up against Google they tanked our SEO overnight, this actually happened. Our overlords do not like voices of dissent, especially mine. Bullies scare easily. I believe the world will be free to discover their favorite internet destinations rather than having it dictated to them. I choose freedom over autocracy.