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Yea there's alot of emotional bickering that comes up when a company says "we won't do business with X". >In other words, Google has a private sanctions regime against smaller countries. With this stupid statement, my company must have a private sanctions regime agaisnt half the world
Perhaps I am not understanding the implications, but is Google supposed to be forced to make its phones available in Turkey?
And yes, if Google is breaking US and international anti-trust laws, “forcing” people to do things is generally the remedy of last resort.
If Google kept selling the phones without resolving the issue then they would be subject to fines. How is complying with local laws a Dangerous Foreign Policy act?
Perhaps I am not understanding the implications, but is Google supposed to be forced to make its phones available in Turkey?
> is Google supposed to be forced to make its phones available in Turkey Well yes, because free trade, globalization, equality and other buzzwords. /s The reality is that historical big companies have always sparred with nation-states. Usually the EIC, but occasionally other firms. They went roughly 50/50. "Won" in China. Lost in America. OPEC said "no oil for you" and it worked. And no one invaded or otherwise compe…
This is like world history as told by Dreamworks.
The article was masterfully framed to make us feel outraged by Google’s exercise of its right to chose where it does business. When Google pulls out of a country, it loses a lot, and so does the country. This is a strong incentive for both parties to be reasonable. Forcing Google to obey every government in the world doesn’t seem fair; many countries have unreasonable or evil laws.
OTOH: forcing every country in the world to obey google is no better.
Google also operate in USA. USA has more people in prison than Turkey has. Recently journalist Max Blumenthal was jailed on false charges.
> Google also operate in USA. They're based there, in case you didn't notice. > USA has more people in prison than Turkey has. And is substantially larger, and tends to not lock up everybody that might be against dear leader. For now. > Recently journalist Max Blumenthal was jailed on false charges. Definitely not a very good moment in the history of the USA but there are plenty of worse examples and besides the case…
> And is substantially larger, and tends to not lock up everybody that might be against dear leader. For now.
Just for the record, the incarceration rate is much higher in USA than in Turkey.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/uk/06/prisons/html/nn2... lists 737 vs. 97 per 100k population (though I can't find a date there), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarcera... says 655 vs. 288.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/300986/incarceration-rat... has data from 2019 and says 655 vs. 318. Still more than twice as high in the USA than in Turkey.
Perhaps I am not understanding the implications, but is Google supposed to be forced to make its phones available in Turkey?
The answer is most likely that profit > laws, so they did what they could get away with as long as they could. In my opinion those fines should be backdated to the day the EU found them in violation and they decided to limit the resulting changes to a single region.
Perhaps I am not understanding the implications, but is Google supposed to be forced to make its phones available in Turkey?
Google is perfectly capable of untying their search from Android via a software update, because that’s the remedy they already developed and use in Russia. Turkey is asking them to turn on the same capability. Google is saying they could but that they won’t, because Turkey isn’t a big enough country to make them. And yes, if Google is breaking US and international anti-trust laws, “forcing” people to do things is gen…
> Google said it was willing to ‘work with’ Turkey, but as a partner and not as a corporation working within a sovereign nation. It simply said it doesn’t like Turkey’s law, and so it will stop providing Android phones for an entire country. In other words, Google has a private sanctions regime against smaller countries. The fact that Google even has the leverage to blackout an entire country like this--and that it's…
> -and that it's legally allowed to do so--is the best reason I've seen so far to break up Big Tech. Of course it is legal.. Nobody can tell a company who they HAVE to sell their product to.. But you want to break it up and what then exactly.. ? > Both Android and Chrome need to be spun out--at this point they are basically public utilities No, they're not.. And they're not a fundamental right either.
Of course the state can do that.
I’ve just read the Reuters story that is linked. The Turkish government said that they were not legally permitted to sell phones with the current contract; so Google stopped selling an illegal product until they could resolve the issue. If Google kept selling the phones without resolving the issue then they would be subject to fines. How is complying with local laws a Dangerous Foreign Policy act?