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The most relevant example would be the break up of NBC / ABC [1] in the early days of broadcasting. They were simply split into two companies that do exactly the same thing, but were now natural competitors

We could do the same with Facebook. Force them to segregate out different demographics (maybe by continent)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBC_Red_Network

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So I could no longer be Facebook friends with my friends on different continents?

No, they would be forced to allow friendships to span company-wall boundaries.

So we split Facebook into multiple companies which must of necessity coordinate all their activities with each other?

Are e-mail providers "multiple companies which must of necessity coordinate all their activities with each other"? Sure, but when you put it that way it sounds nefarious. The underlying idea here, if I understand it correctly, is to force Facebook into defining protocols for what they do - something closer to e-mail than the current Facebook model.

Sounds like a little creative reimagining of PubSub (hell, even RSS) would make this more than possible.

Works pretty well for the global phone system, doesn't it?

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