Platformonomics TGIF is a weekly roll-up of links, comments on those links, and perhaps a little too much tugging on my favorite threads.
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So much for last week’s hope we could ignore antitrust and the EU. My apologies.
Mostly we’re gearing up for the end-of-the-month’s CAPEX reports (what some people call “earnings”).
My Writing
I join the circus around the Federal Reserve and explore the esoteric intersection of AI and monetary policy.
News
They Don’t Have the Money: Who Could Possibly Have Guessed?
The Ohio Carpenters’ Pension Plan, which was among bondholders that bought bonds issued in September, claims that Oracle didn’t tell investors that it needed to raise a “significant amount of additional debt” to finance its artificial intelligence infrastructure, according to a lawsuit filed in a New York state court Wednesday.
Several weeks after issuing the notes, Bloomberg reported that banks were also providing a $38 billion debt offering to help fund data centers in Texas and Wisconsin tied to Oracle. As a result of the additional debt, Oracle’s bonds began to trade with yields and spreads similar to lower-rated issuers as concerns about Oracle’s credit risk grew.
“The offering documents were false and misleading and omitted to state that, at the time of the offering, Oracle was organizing to raise that additional debt, which would ultimately bring the creditworthiness of these bonds into question,” according to the lawsuit.
Previous:
Oracle Disappoints: Q2 FY26, Oracle’s Remaining CAPEX Obligation: Q2 FY26, Oracle Still Can’t Build Data Centers: Q2 FY26, Oracle: Not Even a REIT?, They Still Don’t Have the Margins: Oracle Edition, They Don’t Have the Margins, They Don’t Have the Money, They Don’t Have the Money: Oracle and Tik Tok, Why Can’t Oracle Afford Data Centers?
Antitrust Incoherence: The Elon Doctrine?
In these protean times for antitrust, fractional CEO and legal theorist Elon Musk is throwing his (entirely self-serving) doctrinal hat in the ring. With the entire meaning of antitrust up for grabs, perhaps we focus the field on helping Elon overcome his lack of distribution?
Elon’s demonstrated a strong interest to add the job of antitrust enforcer to his portfolio of things to tweet about. He’s thought about how other people’s distribution could help him. He’s practiced at nuisance lawsuits generally and in this specific domain. And he’s on the frontier of legal theory with his ideas requiring customers to do business with him.
Previous:
Elon’s Enterprise AI Ambitions, Antitrust Incoherence: Elon Musk Edition, Fractional CEO Adds to Responsibilities, Company Killed By Its Customers, Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Grok Enterprise Value Proposition Really Coming into Focus, Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: xAI MechaHitler Edition, Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Where to Even Start?, Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Chapter 150, Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Grok API Edition, Do Not Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Chapter 147, Do Not Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Chapter 148, Do Not Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Chapter 149, What is Elon’s Tesla Strategy?
Antitrust Incoherence: Hipster Antitrust’s Epitaph
As part of Meta’s AI Mulligan, the company is pulling the plug on Supernatural, a VR fitness app it acquired when (at least Marc Zuckerberg believed) VR was the next big thing.
Stopping Meta’s Supernatural acquisition was the keystone Hipster Antitrust enforcement action and a demonstration the Hipsters could see far into the future:
The most extreme example of acquisition animosity (and Meta malice) was the FTC’s attempt to stop Meta buying Within, a small virtual reality fitness company. The FTC went to the mat over this minor acquisition, with Khan overruling staff (which is becoming a habit) and employing a relatively novel set of arguments because if this deal was not stopped, “Meta would be one step closer to its ultimate goal of owning the entire Metaverse” (I was only barely able to resist putting that in all caps). They lost. It seemed more vendetta than antitrust:
M.G. Siegler wrote a great piece after Roomba’s demise at the hands of Hipster Antitrust (with help from their buddies at the EU):
So here I am today left wondering why we’re not seeing a Lina Khan victory lap, like the one she took when Figma went public after she successfully torpedoed their sale to Adobe. Also, I’m not seeing a Tim Wu op-ed as we often do around these matters. Others who were quick to rage against the living room machines being owned by Amazon were bathing in hypocrisy today.
The same questions are worth asking as Supernatural joins Roomba on Hipster antitrust’s epitaph as examples of both Type 1 and Type 2 antitrust errors.
Previous:
Antitrust Coherence: A Death Blow for Hipster Antitrust?, A New Antitrust Doctrine, Antitrust Incoherence: China and the US Policy Becoming Indistinguishable, Antitrust Incoherence: Elon Musk Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: The Google Ruling, Antitrust Incoherence: Entertaining If Nothing Else, From Hipster Antitrust to Grifter Antitrust, Antitrust Incoherence: Hipster Antitrust Incoherence, Antitrust Incoherence: Don’t Make Me Complain to the Authorities About a Deal I Signed but Want to Renegotiate, Pedal to the Meta: Hipster Antitrust’s Day in Court, Antitrust Incoherence: iRobot Elegy Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: Existential Amazon Questions Edition, Antitrust Incoherence:Dodging DOGE Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: The Emerging Trump Doctrine?, Antitrust Incoherence: The Consistently Incoherent Lina Khan, Antitrust Incoherence: New Administration, Continuity of Incoherence, Antitrust Incoherence: Google Breakup Rumors, Antitrust Incoherence: Breaking Up Google #monopolist, Antitrust Incoherence: Google Verdict,Antitrust Incoherence: Competitive Harassment Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: Don’t Forget Microsoft, Antitrust Incoherence: Isn’t Market Division Illegal?, Antitrust Incoherence: Roomba Aftermath Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: Apple Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: Spotify Edition, Antitrust Incoherence: Roomba Edition, The Incoherence Doctrine: The FTC Strikes Again, The DOJ Play at Home Game
The Data Center Boogeyman Boogie Builds
I fear the cycle of political edicts and preemptive concessions is just getting started:
Expect further politicization, as data centers are an easy target for populists of all stripes (and politicians who want to distract from their own ruinous roles in creating energy scarcity).
My only ask is that people complaining about data centers not use data centers to complain about data centers.
Previous:
The Pain in New England Stems Mainly from the Insane, The Pain in Maine Stems Mainly from the Insane, Utility Computing has Finally Arrived, The Data Center Boogeyman Still Cometh, The Data Center Boogeyman Cometh, Big Bad Bankruptcy Bill Blame, Cloud Power Up, Introducing the Platformonomics Cloud Reactor Tracker
Europe: the Non Player Continent
The Non Player Continent is catching on.
Previous:
The Cookie Continent Capitulates?, GDPR Deathwatch? Or More Empty Words?, EU Insanity: Peak EU AI Regulation?, Existential Corner: EU Agrees It Faces ‘Existential Crisis’, EU and What Army?, EU Insanity: Thierry’s Termination Tizzy, EU Insanity: Experts Agree, EU Insanity: EU Goes Too Far, Even for EU, Move Fast and Regulate Things: Welcome to the Morning After, Move Fast and Regulate Things (You Don’t Understand), When “Move Fast and Regulate Things” Breaks Down, AI Regulation: Move Fast and Regulate Things, EU Insanity: Regulating Blue Checks, EU Tweets While Ukraine Burns, EU Insanity: AI Regulatory Suicide, EU Insanity: Mistral Edition, The EU Will Continue to Fiddle While Rome Burns, EU Insanity: AI Energy Suicide, EU Insanity: AI Energy Suicide (Part Deux), The European Union is STILL an Advanced Persistent Threat, BREAKING: European Union Designated an Advanced Persistent Threat
Quick Hits
Here we relegate 1.) punchlines you can write yourself 2.) topics I’ve beaten to death and/or 3.) things I’m uncharacteristically succinct about.
- Never Take a Dependency on Elon Musk: Indonesian and Malaysian Edition
- Data Centers vs. In-N-Out Burger: The Definitive Water Consumption Analysis
- Telco Misadventures: Verizon seals approval for $20bn Frontier acquisition (a special past and future edition)
- Going Nuclear: Meta Unveils Sweeping Nuclear-Power Plan to Fuel Its AI Ambitions
- EU Sanity? Italy’s privacy watchdog, scourge of US big tech, hit by corruption probe
- Bronny Won’t Boost Warner Brothers Bid
- Bronny’s Bid Blocked to See Netflix’s Homework