Welcome back to Forests Over Trees, your tech strategy newsletter. It’s time to zoom-out, connect dots, and (try to) predict the future.

Here’s today’s plan:

• Tech News Takes — digestible analysis and commentary

• Tool of the Week — tools you’ll find useful

• F/T Shoutouts — sharing other cool stuff we’ve found

ALSO

Thanks to everyone who filled out the survey so far!

If you haven’t taken it yet but have 30 seconds right now…

… then please do!

Digg is Back!

Plus: Trump vs CISA; Meta vs FTC

⚡ Tech News Takes ⚡

The FTC is Finally Taking Meta to Court

• What’s up: Meta bought Instagram in 2012 and WhatsApp in 2014. In 2020, the FTC sued them on anti-trust grounds. This week, the case is finally headed to court. The FTC is arguing that Meta buying competitors 1/ gave it a monopoly in advertising and 2/ robbed users of better social media apps. If Meta loses, they might be ordered to spin-off those companies.

• So what: Three thoughts here. First, I know legal proceedings take time, but 10+ years later is an incredibly “late call”! Second, I’m sure the FTC will try to provide the judge context relevant to the time of the acquisition, but it’s harder to argue passionately about a lack of social media competition these days (YouTube, X, TikTok, etc…). Third, the Trump administration seems willing to play ball with the tech execs (ex. Apple getting tariff exclusions, Nvidia avoiding export restrictions, all the dropped crypto suits)… so I’ll be very surprised if they end up breaking up Meta.

Trump vs Krebs

• What’s up: President Trump ordered an investigation into Chris Krebs, the former head of the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). Krebs had rejected Trump’s claims of election fraud when he lost the 2020 election. On top of ordering the investigation, the administration also revoked security clearance for Krebs and SentinelOne, where he’s part of the c-suite.

• So what: It’s 100% within the executive’s authority to grant/revoke security clearances, but there’s still an issue here. By singling-out political opponents (especially those that served, seemed to follow the law, and then re-entered the private sector)… Trump is setting a bad precedent. We’ll be safer and more secure if we avoid treating clearances and security protocols as political footballs.

🛠️ Tool of the Week 🛠️

Hire an AI BDR & Get Qualified Meetings On Autopilot

Outbound requires hours of manual work.

Hire Ava who automates your entire outbound demand generation process, including:

• Intent-Driven Lead Discovery Across Dozens of Sources

• High Quality Emails with Human-Level Personalization

• Follow-Up Management

• Email Deliverability Management

Hire Ava to slash costs & boost productivity.

🌲 F/T Shoutouts 🌲

• Caveday — This is a pretty cool startup I found this week. They do live focus sessions to help remote/solo workers get after it. And they offer a 2-week trial. (note: not an ad… just cool)

• Checkbox Olympics — if you need a random, mindless game, this absolutely checks the box. Pun intended.

• AI-Agents, but explained well! — awesome YouTube video covering some of the basics of AI, AI workflows, and AI agents. Helpful to break down the jargon and see examples.

The forest is growing.
Feel free to share this post.

If you have feedback…

If you want to advertise to our 14,000+ smart, curious readers,
reply to this email or send me a note.