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“Beware of the scummy monopoly campaign to vilify competition law.”
Pretend Politics
The CEO of Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, is sounding off on his fellow tech executives for falling in line behind Donald Trump.
“After years of pretending to be Democrats,” Epic CEO Tim Sweeney posted on X-formerly-Twitter, “Big Tech leaders are now pretending to be Republicans, in hopes of currying favor with the new administration.”
Though he didn’t name names, the comments came after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a series of sweeping changes to content moderation and workplace culture at Facebook, Instagram, and Threads that seemed like a bald-faced attempt to appeal to Trump’s right-wing sensibilities.
Sweeney’s angry missive also occurred after a bunch of major tech companies, including Google and Apple — whose CEO, Tim Cook, has a personal relationship with the former and forthcoming commander-in-chief — pledged millions to Trump’s inauguration fund in apparent hopes of landing on the president-elect’s “nice” list after he’s inaugurated.
Notably, all three of the aforementioned companies are facing government antitrust lawsuits — and Epic actually took Google to court over similar claims. Cozying up to Trump could, in other words, looks a lot like a bid to sway regulation in their favor.
“Beware of the scummy monopoly campaign to vilify competition law as they rip off consumers and crush competitors,” Sweeney warned.
No Angel
Sweeney may be standing up to bullies now, but his management style has made him the target of criticism in the past.
Back in 2023, the North Carolina-based gaming studio conducted a series of layoffs resulting in more than 800 staffers, or 16 percent of its workforce, being terminated. The company also divested in Bandcamp and spun off its kid-oriented studio, SuperAwesome, which according to IGN added another 250 jobs to the chopping block.
Months later, Sweeney then boasted during a conference that Epic was back in the black after making those massive job cuts.
“I’m happy to tell you now that the company is financially sound,” he told audiences at Unreal Fest in February 2024, “and that Fortnite and the Epic Games Store have hit new records in concurrency and success.”
Layoffs and CEO back-patting are obviously par for the course in the tech game. If the guy who bragged about his company’s solvency in aftermath of such major cullings is outraged, though, you know it’s bad.
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