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Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

wsj.com

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Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#61

Post by nostrademons »

iateanapple wrote: post #36
akersten wrote: post #23

I will continue to believe that this is another tentacle of William Barr's political harassment of Google and tech in general until he leads the same crusade against other 'monopolies' of the same degree like Comcast, Apple, Boeing, Amazon, United Airlines, etc.

Are any of those companies (except Amazon) even in the same league in terms of negative impact as big tech?

Boeing's 737 Max debacle killed two plane-fuls of people. It's pretty hard to argue that either Amazon or Google has had negative effects on that magnitude.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#62

Post by tyre »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #33
akersten wrote: post #23

I will continue to believe that this is another tentacle of William Barr's political harassment of Google and tech in general until he leads the same crusade against other 'monopolies' of the same degree like Comcast, Apple, Boeing, Amazon, United Airlines, etc.

Even if it is, it could set a precedent that makes it easier for a future, less corrupt administration. I don't know if the good necessarily outweighs the bad, but maybe it does.

This.

Precedent is tricky. Democrats removing the filibuster for judges came back to haunt them.

There was a recent (last few weeks) SCOTUS decision that came out with numerous opinions by different coalitions. You could tell that they were all maneuvering around this idea of precedent.

Liberal justices who ended up on either side (majority or minority) were couching their votes as upholding a prior precedent, even when they definitely weren't.

Conservative justices ended up on either side of the case while subtly arguing that overturning precedent, or at least modifying it, was okay and normal.

Both are presumed to be setting up for the next challenge to Roe vs. Wade.

EDIT: mistakenly put that the democrats removed filibuster for SCOTUS judges, that was for other nominations

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#63

Post by JumpCrisscross »

maxwell wrote: post #22
pb7 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Break them up into what?

"Facebook could be forced to get rid of Instagram and WhatsApp, Amazon might divest Zappos and Whole Foods, Google may lose YouTube, and Apple could part with its App Store." https://www.cnet.com/news/momentum-grows-to-break-up-big-tec...

> Amazon might divest Zappos and Whole Foods

Amazon Freight, AWS and marketplace, if one wishes to keep going.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#64

Post by subroutine »

Do DOJ rules only apply to Google's operations in the US?

Could DOJ also do this to overseas-based companies that operates in the U.S.?

Say you break up Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc., and people begin to adopt the platforms like say, Baidu, TikTok, Alibaba, etc. which grow to 90%+ market dominance. Can DOJ bring antitrust lawsuits against Alibaba?

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#65

Post by GoodJokes »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #33
akersten wrote: post #23

I will continue to believe that this is another tentacle of William Barr's political harassment of Google and tech in general until he leads the same crusade against other 'monopolies' of the same degree like Comcast, Apple, Boeing, Amazon, United Airlines, etc.

Even if it is, it could set a precedent that makes it easier for a future, less corrupt administration. I don't know if the good necessarily outweighs the bad, but maybe it does.

Ah yes, the all powerful precedent! It has shown its strength lately don't you think.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#66

Post by subsubzero »

akersten wrote: post #23

I will continue to believe that this is another tentacle of William Barr's political harassment of Google and tech in general until he leads the same crusade against other 'monopolies' of the same degree like Comcast, Apple, Boeing, Amazon, United Airlines, etc.

Not saying google isn't a monopoly, it classically is, same with facebook. But I wonder if Goog wasn't a majority "blue" company would he aggressively go after them. The problem is there are so many oligarchy's controlling industries. Chips, well its a two or three company game(intel, amd, ARM). Lets look at airlines, well its united, delta, american etc. Communications(cell phones), ATT, Verizon, Sprint/Tmobile. America is increasingly becoming a land of large companies controlling industries where the consumer almost always loses, think higher prices due to less competition. I point out google/facebook as they are the only companies in their space (search, social media) that control more than 75% of the space by themselves.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#67

Post by xoxoy »

mrkramer wrote: post #54
pge wrote: post #20

This is interesting because it seems like the DOJ's definition of monopoly is changing, which I think is a good thing. Since the late 80s (roughly), antitrust litigation has only been brought on the basis of a monopoly's negative impact on consumer prices (i.e. does the existence of a monopoly cause the consumer to have to pay higher prices?). That ignores monopolies that impair the ability of smaller companies to en…

Google's dominant market position was achieved through market competition not through impairing the ability of smaller companies to enter markets. Even in Google Chrome you can pick DuckDuckGo and Ecosia as your default search engine. Most of Chrome users probably never heard of those two search engines. For example would YouTube be successful as it is today if it wasn't Google's resources and knowledge to skyrocket…

Does it matter how a monopoly came to be a monopoly?

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#68

Post by megiddo »

glenstein wrote: post #16

I don't have a problem with this. But I wonder why there isn't similar willpower to pursue, say, telecoms, banks, Monsanto, Luxxotica, Disney, and the like. Why is it just big tech?

Telecoms usually pay for their monopoly privileges.

This is just a shakedown.

The same way Microsoft was deemed a "monopoly" and what? Unbundled explorer? Is anyone seriously worried about their monopoly now? There's always a new kid on the block.

The DOJ is too slow to be effective at targeting tech monopolies. They should just quit before they look like a bunch of johnny-come-lately blowhards.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#69

Post by cromwellian »

nojito wrote: post #46
foxtr0t wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't settlement far more likely than losing all the way through appeals? And in what way is it straightforward? Does it not require a new interpretation of antitrust law? Google isn't using monopoly power to increase prices for consumers.

>Google isn't using monopoly power to increase prices for consumers. This is whole reason for the criminal trial. If they can prove Google stifled competition in the advertising business, it is going to be a cut and dry case.

Facebook and Google only account for 50% of all digital ad spending online, so clearly there are lots competition, it's just fragmented.

Re: Justice Department, states likely to bring antitrust lawsuits against Google

#70

Post by ryanwaggoner »

tyre wrote: post #62
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if it is, it could set a precedent that makes it easier for a future, less corrupt administration. I don't know if the good necessarily outweighs the bad, but maybe it does.

This. Precedent is tricky. Democrats removing the filibuster for judges came back to haunt them. There was a recent (last few weeks) SCOTUS decision that came out with numerous opinions by different coalitions. You could tell that they were all maneuvering around this idea of precedent. Liberal justices who ended up on either side (majority or minority) were couching their votes as upholding a prior precedent, even w…

Precedent is tricky. Democrats removing the filibuster for SCOTUS judges came back to haunt them.

Did it though? Legal precedent is different (for now) from political precedent, and I think the Republicans have proven they’re happy to steamroll through almost anything they can to seat a Justice. They would have instantly dropped the filibuster if it hadn’t already been done.

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