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submitted 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) by ModerateImprovement@sh.itjust.works to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[-] todd_bonzalez@lemm.ee 188 points 3 months ago

You can sue people for choosing not to do business with you?

Musk is such a fucking baby. He has no basis for this. He made major changes to the site, including a complete rebrand, and advertisers left. That's the fucking free market, and he's gonna sue?

[-] RedditWanderer@lemmy.world 88 points 3 months ago

Even funnier, he literally told advertisers to go fuck themselves lol. Now he goes whining back to Mommy for new rules for his little kingdom.

[-] ZoopZeZoop@lemmy.world 43 points 3 months ago

He can sue, but he won't win in any sane court.

[-] solomon42069@lemmy.world 53 points 3 months ago

No sane court? So it has a real chance of being decided by The Supreme Court...

[-] halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world 25 points 3 months ago

They'd never even hear it. To give this lawsuit any credibility, they'd have to effectively say that businesses spending/donating money is not free speech. Which would effectively be the opposite of Citizens United.

[-] eestileib@sh.itjust.works 29 points 3 months ago

You think they give a shit about consistency?

[-] solomon42069@lemmy.world 20 points 3 months ago

All that matters is the sponsorship tier - will you be flying the judge out to a vacation? Buying their mother a house? The outcome is solely dependent on your investment in the court. Justice.

[-] jaybone@lemmy.world 9 points 3 months ago

Maybe they’ll say billionaires can sue as long as it’s an official act.

[-] Empricorn@feddit.nl 119 points 3 months ago

You can sue your... customers, basically for choosing not to do business with you!?

Even if he wins a one-time payment (no way), how could this do anything but make everyone not want to advertise on Twitter??

[-] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 49 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I can't wrap my head around the ridiculousness of it. Or grasp why some US political figures are lapping it up.

Imagine McDonald's suing you because you didn't buy enough big macs this quarter. It's crazy. You're not automatically entitled to having customers.

[-] trk@aussie.zone 25 points 3 months ago

Please drink verification can

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[-] nonailsleft@lemm.ee 25 points 3 months ago

You don't understand. Bad publicity is good publicity.

Or maybe, in this particular case... No publicity.

No publicity is good bad publicity like... Well yeah you might have a point there

[-] bender223@lemmy.today 9 points 3 months ago

Elon is the dumbest genius 🤦‍♂️

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[-] magnetosphere@fedia.io 90 points 3 months ago

This is hilarious.

Should every company, regardless of whether they’ve advertised on Twitter before, be federally mandated to spend a certain percentage of their advertising budget on Musk’s little shitshow?

What, exactly, is the solution he has in mind?

[-] irotsoma@lemmy.world 35 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Advertising communism apparently. 🤣

[-] Plopp@lemmy.world 10 points 3 months ago

Well it would go well together with the corporate socialism...

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[-] eee@lemm.ee 23 points 3 months ago

More government intervention in markets, because that's what Republicans stand f- oh wait, er....

[-] Altomes@lemm.ee 77 points 3 months ago

One of the most poignant comments I've seen on this is it's a ploy to draw attention from his PAC and other negative media

[-] pikmeir@lemmy.world 16 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

While I think it will have that effect, Musk isn't smart enough to have thought about it that deeply.

[-] AstralPath@lemmy.ca 6 points 3 months ago

Don't underestimate him. He's shown he's a spoiled brat, but he's not shown that he's incapable of elaborate and spiteful plots to get his way.

A smart decision in his eyes might be a dumb one in ours but that doesn't mean he's actually stupid.

Writing him off as an idiot is a one way ticket to being blindsided while you're distracted by something else.

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[-] NutWrench@lemmy.world 69 points 3 months ago

You literally told your advertisers to go fark themselves, Elmo. Several times. This is what consequences look like.

[-] Voroxpete@sh.itjust.works 30 points 3 months ago

Oh God, it only just occurred to me that that will be used as evidence.

[-] dinckelman@lemmy.world 21 points 3 months ago

Just because he filed a lawsuit, it doesn't mean it won't immediately be thrown out of court.

No one has any obligation to work with him

[-] laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone 14 points 3 months ago

I really hope it's tossed out with prejudice

[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 15 points 3 months ago

Nah.

Drag it out. Then order him to pay legal fees.

[-] laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

I find this to also be acceptable

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[-] Telorand@reddthat.com 67 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

ETA: He really is a 13yo in a 53yo body.

[-] empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com 57 points 3 months ago

You can't sue people for... making normal business decisions? You'd think Musk would understand that if he was a real businessman, LOL RIGHT he's not.

[-] hddsx@lemmy.ca 48 points 3 months ago

Just like you exercised your free speech to give Trump's PAC a gratuity of $45 million, advertisers exercised their free speech by not spending it on twitter.

Aren't you a free speech absolutist? Why are you trying to force advertisers to exercise their free speech on your platform?

[-] laurelraven@lemmy.blahaj.zone 31 points 3 months ago

Because he's only a free speech absolutist for himself and for people who agree with him

[-] hddsx@lemmy.ca 14 points 3 months ago

Yeah, he doesn't care about free speech. He just wants to be able to say whatever he wants without consequences because he knows he's an asswipe

[-] Noodle07@lemmy.world 6 points 3 months ago

It's actually fee speech, common misconception

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[-] Darkassassin07@lemmy.ca 46 points 3 months ago

I hope exhibit A of the defences evidence is Elon telling them all to go fuck themselves.

[-] Avatar_of_Self@lemmy.world 42 points 3 months ago

A House Republican lead committee said that the boycott is illegal but also said they don't know if there's really a law against it.

Republicans: Corporations should have freedom of expression (Citizens United)!

Also Republicans: Corporations shouldn't be able to choose what platforms to run ads on!

[-] IllNess@infosec.pub 20 points 3 months ago

I can sue X for not advertising on the my Instagram page then? Lol.

[-] AllNewTypeFace@leminal.space 39 points 3 months ago

Who does he think he is, Israel?

[-] whoisearth@lemmy.ca 25 points 3 months ago

Takes one apartheid asshole to recognize another eh? Lol

[-] DxK@lemmy.world 34 points 3 months ago

Elon Musk: Your honor these mean jerks won’t pay to advertise in my nazi bar and it hurts my feels.

[-] SlopppyEngineer@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago

Musk being shocked they don't like his Apartheid Ad Network.

[-] Bahnd@lemmy.world 24 points 3 months ago

My head-cannon from the lawyers going something like this.

"Thank you Mr. Musk for the lawsuit, we had a lot of fun reading it. Especially the parts you drew (I liked the blue dinosauar). Before we begin, we would like to let you know the legal fees for this case are coming directly from the portion of the advertising budget we allocated to the website formerly known as Twitter"

Probably more entertaining than the actual cases.

[-] Vanth@reddthat.com 22 points 3 months ago

I had to skim quite a few down the search results to find an article that described what it meant by suing for "illegal boycott" in more detail.

https://variety.com/2024/digital/news/elon-musk-x-sues-advertisers-garm-boycott-1236097110/

X’s lawsuit alleged that the advertisers’ “boycott” violated Section 1 the U.S.’s Sherman Act antitrust law, which broadly prohibits agreements among distinct actors that unreasonably restrain trade, “by withholding purchases of digital advertising from Twitter.”

“The conduct of Defendants and their co-conspirators alleged herein is per se illegal, or, in the alternative, illegal under the Rule of Reason or ‘quick look’ analytical framework,” the X lawsuit said. “There are no procompetitive effects of the group boycott, which was not reasonably related to, or reasonably necessary for, any procompetitive objectives of the GARM Brand Safety Standards.”

The “unlawful conduct” alleged by X is the subject of “an active investigation” by the House of Representatives’ Committee on the Judiciary, the lawsuit said. The committee’s interim report issued on July 10 concluded that, “The extent to which GARM has organized its trade association and coordinates actions that rob consumers of choices is likely illegal under the antitrust laws and threatens fundamental American freedoms. The information uncovered to date of WFA and GARM’s collusive conduct to demonetize disfavored content is alarming.”

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[-] 2pt_perversion@lemmy.world 14 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

He's trying to claim that companies colluded to stop advertising on X and that violates antitrust laws.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Group_boycott

But it's strange because this refusal to advertise on twitter doesn't really harm competition in anyway. Concerted refusal to deal is supposed to be like when 3 big bad companies want to hurt a smaller competitive company so they get together and boycott any suppliers that deal with this competitor or force them to get a worse deal.

The companies GARM (Global Alliance for Responsible Media) represents are big enough (90% of advertising $) but they aren't really competitors to twitter. If say facebook and tiktok got together and told GARM they wouldn't run any of their ads unless they stopped working with twitter that would be much more in the spirit of the law.

But Twitter might still have a tiny bit of a case if they can prove they met GARM's standards but were still excluded anyway. I doubt that's enough for any major payouts though unless the judge is crazy. And honestly I think it's still dumb because even if GARM settles it just tells advertisers "Okay you can advertise on twitter if you want they meet our standards"...but are advertisers really going to want to advertise on the site that just sued them?

Also I don't even think GARM prohibits members from advertising with companies it doesn't recommend and just offers suggestions, which makes this case even more insane if that's true. In that situation it's like the health inspector gives a restaurant a "D" and the restaurant sues customers for not eating there anymore.

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[-] cupcakezealot@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 3 months ago

he's gonna sue twitter users for using adblockers on the site isn't he?

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[-] AgentGrimstone@lemmy.world 11 points 3 months ago
[-] DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 23 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Conservatives are hypocrites and morons.

But, hey, if he wants to argue that money isn't expression and corporations don't have freedom of speech I won't try to stop him accidentally overturning Citizens United.

Even if he wins, that still wouldn't even work, the fucking lemon, you can't force people to buy your products.

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[-] raspberriesareyummy@lemmy.world 7 points 3 months ago

what a pathetic weird dumbass

[-] billwashere@lemmy.world 6 points 3 months ago

Elon: Moooom, make the advertisers pay me

Mom: Well maybe quit being a little shit and being a whiny little spoiled bastard, hmmm?

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this post was submitted on 06 Aug 2024
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