THANKS, JUDGE BORK:

On Monday, a district judge threw out antitrust complaints that the FTC and 48 state attorneys general brought against Facebook. U.S. District Judge James Boasberg, in an opinion laced with withering sarcasm, didn't just dismiss the FTC's complaint on a technicality or ruling of law -- he undercut the cornerstone of the argument by ruling the FTC did not prove Facebook had a monopoly or market power.

"The FTC's Complaint says almost nothing concrete on the key question of how much power Facebook actually had, and still has, in a properly defined antitrust product market," the filing reads. "It is almost as if the agency expects the Court to simply nod to the conventional wisdom that Facebook is a monopolist."

Indeed.

On Wednesday, the tech industry saw five companies debut on public stock markets. One of them, Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi, is worth nearly $70 billion. Two others, Taboola and Integral Ad Science, compete in the online advertising industry -- one of the markets that has supposedly been ruined by Alphabet (in particular) and Facebook.

More generally, this year has seen the hottest IPO market in years, and investors continue to pile into start-ups at a record pace -- Q1 saw more than $64 billion in venture funding, a record.

This does not look like a deserted wasteland of stifled innovation and broken dreams.

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