In a display of bureaucratic masochism that would make even the most seasoned D.C. lifer wince, the Federal Trade Commission has officially appealed its loss in the antitrust case against Meta. It’s a move that carries the same desperate energy as a jilted lover standing in the rain, clutching a bouquet of subpoenas, begging for one more chance to prove that the internet’s most prominent data-harvesting lizard is actually a bad influence. The agency is ostensibly aiming to reverse a ‘setback’ in the government’s supposed campaign to rein in the power of the biggest tech companies. But let’s be honest: calling this a ‘campaign’ is like calling a toddler’s tantrum a ‘tactical military operation.’ It’s a performative gesture designed to make us believe that the rule of law still matters in a world where your refrigerator is probably spying on you for ad revenue.

On one side of this legal circus, we have the FTC, led by the intellectually earnest but strategically hamstrung Lina Khan. They represent the ivory tower’s dream of a fair market—a quaint, 20th-century notion that feels as relevant today as a telegraph operator at a TikTok convention. The FTC’s tragedy is its belief that the legal system, a dusty cathedral of ancient precedents and men who think 'The Cloud' involves precipitation, can actually dismantle a digital empire built on the very human addictions of vanity and outrage. They lost their case because the judiciary, in its infinite, fossilized wisdom, demanded 'proof' of 'consumer harm.' Apparently, the systematic dismantling of human social cohesion and the psychological manipulation of half the planet doesn't quite fit the specific, narrow definition of ‘price gouging’ required by judges who still use AOL addresses.

Then we have Meta. The company formerly known as Facebook—a rebrand that fooled precisely zero people and merely served to give the marketing ghouls something to do—is the ultimate beneficiary of this bureaucratic flailing. To call Meta a monopoly is almost a compliment; it’s an ecosystem. It’s a digital panopticon where we are all both the prisoners and the volunteer guards, perpetually refreshing our feeds for a hit of dopamine that will never come. The irony of an antitrust suit against Meta is that the company didn’t just steal the market; it manufactured the addicts who demand its existence. Zuckerberg doesn't need to fight this appeal with logic; he just needs to wait for the government to bore itself to death with its own procedural incompetence.

The Right-wing pundits will, of course, scream about 'big government overreach,' ignoring the fact that their entire political identity is currently being fed to them through the very algorithms they claim to despise. They want 'free markets' until those markets start censoring their favorite conspiracy theorists, at which point they want the government to step in—but only to protect their specific flavor of nonsense. Meanwhile, the Left-wing cheerleaders will frame this appeal as a heroic stand for democracy, conveniently forgetting that they spent the last decade using these same platforms to engage in performative activism that accomplished nothing but increasing Meta's engagement metrics. Both sides are fundamentally invested in the platforms they pretend to hate, making this entire legal battle a shadow play for a public that has already traded its soul for a high-speed connection.

This appeal is not about justice, nor is it about the 'economy.' It is a ghost dance. It is a ritual performed by a government that knows it has lost control, trying to summon the old gods of regulation to save it from a monster it helped create. The 'setback' the FTC suffered wasn't a glitch in the system; it *is* the system. The laws were written to protect capital, and Meta is capital in its most efficient, distilled, and terrifying form. To think that a few more months of legal filings will change the trajectory of our digital feudalism is the height of naivety. We are watching two dinosaurs fight in a tar pit, oblivious to the fact that the asteroid of total digital integration has already hit the atmosphere.

In the end, the FTC will likely lose again, or perhaps win a pyrrhic victory that involves a fine Meta can pay with the pocket change found in Zuckerberg’s hoodies. The 'campaign' will continue, the lawyers will continue to bill four-figure hourly rates, and the rest of us will continue to scroll through the wreckage of our attention spans, wondering why everything feels so hollow. It’s not just a loss for the government; it’s a confirmation of our collective irrelevance. The only thing reined in by this process is our hope that anyone in Washington, or Silicon Valley, actually has the slightest clue what they’re doing.