The future of the Internet will be determined in a building in Washington, DC – and for six weeks, I saw it standing.
In most parts of this spring, the e -Barrett Pretty in the city of Washington, DC was echoing with lawyers, reporters, and interested spectators, from the richest men of Silicon Valley to federal workers and federal workers for their elimination. In the central and tall, dark halls, a wide -ranging courtroom with a breeze, where issues related to government agencies often go down, and this means that it is hosting two extremely fruitful tech cases in the country, while President Donald Trump’s unprecedented complaint against Donald Trump.
In mid -May and late May, James James Bosburg and Amit Mehta oversees, respectively FTC vs Meta And US vs. GoogleA long -run anti -trusting couple tries to separate the two titans in the silicon valley. During the same period, several DC judges-including Bosburg-had a complete document of Trump’s first 100-day cases, in which the administration’s massive migrants were trying to portray large-scale, security clearance from law firms, and thousands of federalism. On the first day of the Google trial, a mark with a humorous Eru directed visitors to their selected anti -trust case. It directed a high level hearing on Trump’s order against Trump’s law firm Jenner and Block soon. When FTC lawyers were calling witnesses against the meta in a room court, a nearby room was hosting arguments on whether Trump could fired two commissioners of the agency.
My colleague gathered around the feed waiting for Google’s witnesses, just by stepping into the box to the defendant who jumped from a jail
For reporters, weeks of permanent case-jaggling was an exercise. During Google and Meta’s overlap, I will reach long security lines that sometimes enter a small park, which is adjacent to a court house, which awaits a media room that streams a video for reporters and avoided electronics -free courts. I occasionally had no such room, and in a small fugitive of reporters, I would bring some flights of spiral stairs to the courtroom, writing hand -written notes from the back row. One day, my colleague gathered around the feed waiting for Google’s witness, just looking at the defendant who was just a prison defendant in the box-in a short moment before the reporters realized that Mehta was taking immediate break for a criminal hearing, he wondered which high profile was the high profile.
The executives, by themselves, were very high. One day in a witness box, Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, saw Instagram’s success. A week later, former colleague and co -founder of Instagram Kevin Sistom was sitting there that he was declared an honorable boss. Google CEO Sunder Pachai will soon testify to a couple of floors, followed by Google’s biggest rivals, including Microsoft and executives in Open. All of them, the stake was more. Judge Boseburg has been entrusted with the responsibility of deciding whether Meta has made an illegal monopoly by gagaling Instagram and WhatsApp, while Judge Mehta will decide whether Google will have to abolish her chrome browser or syndicate its search data.
For the judges, the gontel looked no less than tired. The US District Court Chief Judge in DC, Boseberg, was assigned to the Meta case long before Trump took power, but after the inauguration, he became one of the most busy judges in the United States – discussing the plans to monitor the plans to discuss the use of the Administration’s alien Anemies about the use of a stranger to discuss the use of a stranger. A sign of dialogue about. When I concluded a day of the Meta Trial at 5pm, a fresh crop of reporters arrived to consider the Bosnburg’s alien enemy Act, which Trump was using to deport Venezuela’s immigrants in El Salvador. Outside the courtroom, Boseberg attacked Trump – which called him “radical left crazy” and “anxiety and anger” and demanded his motion.
In the meta trial, Bosburg was also shown-sometimes at the site of anger. He rarely mentioned the rest of his documents beyond his flow schedule. His intervention was surprising, which indicates a deep understanding of the matter. But he often sits in his hand with his head, occasionally encouraging lawyers to move, especially the painful line. He used lunch breaks at the meta trial to file one of the most stringent legal decisions of the early Trump administration, and accused the administration of “deliberately ignoring” the El Salvador for his temporary “prevention” to prevent him from being exposed to exile flights.
By the end of the Meta trial at the end of May, Bosburg felt relief as the last day wrapped up. He told the lawyer, “I will be happy to think about it now and when the first short talk.”
In 1998, the E -Barrett Prettyman Court House played a host for another Tech Dev fight for his life: Microsoft. US vs. Microsoft It was a historic monopoly case that had decided that the company had illegally dominated the PC operating system according to Intel so that its monopoly could endanger, including NetScap -up and upcoming web browsers. But in the context of the matter and consequently the settlement, regulators have taken a handful of handy methods for the next generation of tech companies. By 2020, when cases were filed against Meta and Google, it would take two decades to return to the government.
Over the past five years, the search and social networking scenario has changed dramatically, with the rise of Ticotok and Generative AI. But in the same way, there is a zeist around the tech. Since the Silicon Valley is politically dynamic, the target of the implementation of more aggressive distrust has gained bilateral support.
At the same time, there is a growing fear of foreign competitiveness, especially from Tekotok, which was published in the same court house last year to discuss the ban on the country (delayed). The company found himself back as a witness during a meta trial, where lawyers contested an executive of the ticket with statements during a failed 2024 fight.
The testimony of these weeks of the court helped to illuminate countless decisions that the tech world as we know
Inside the courthouse, it was easy to forget about everything in Washington – unless it was. I was removed from hacking in the Federal Work Force from the daily hostility of the Elon Musk’s Department of Government (DOGE), but cases about its crafts-including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The fourth day of the Meta trial and a few days before the start of Google, during the break, I got one New York Times Telling me that Virginia Judge Levini Brinkma told me, leaving me back from the bathroom, delivering a verdict against Google in the DOJ’s separate Aid Tech Anti -Trust case. I returned to the media room and already found many of my colleagues writing my stories from other shops in the hallway. SureWe made a decision, which we expected Month Will fall now.
The decisions of Google and Meta Trials this spring will likely take months to come, and may not be seen for years. But the testimony of these weeks of the court helped to illuminate countless decisions that the tech world as we know. During the early 2010’s, Facebook executives expressed concern that Google WhatsApp could buy and bund it with Android, making it a mobile message. With the context of the Google Trial, that fear looks ancient – the company eliminated its search engine in the same way by installing Android phone makers in the same way.
It is still possible to see the form of giants so far. Judge Mehta should be ordered to sell Google to Chrome, many witnesses said they would be happy to buy it, including Yahoo, anxiety and an open AI. The historic anti -trust trial of the Department of Justice against Microsoft has been given a wide range of opening of the tech industry for modern players like Google, and after a quarter century, it is hoped that something can happen for new companies today. Nevertheless, it is possible that in another decade or two decades, we will return to the same courtroom, hearing the government argues that they have closed the doors again.
