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The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

rankscience.com

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Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#251

Post by pb7 »

zo1 wrote: post #222
pb7 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's really not. You're asking for a seafood restaurant and are given directions to various seafood restaurants. You are not shown directions to one (a link) and when you show up there, it's another (link was fake).

To follow the GP's point ITO this being a protection racket: You "pay to be at the top" of that list of seafood restaurants. Let's not pretend like google aims to find you the "best" answer to your search question.

No contest, just don't see how this is unique to Google. When you go to a store and you look at an aisle at eye level, do you see the objectively best products or the ones that paid the most to be there? Before you get to that aisle, do you see the best product on the endcap? Do you grab that item regardless or only if it's what you're looking for anyway?

It's okay to have a problem with advertising -- I think it's pretty healthy to do so -- but this is a societal problem and not one with any single player.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#252

Post by scarface74 »

CPLX wrote: post #243
scarface74 wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And look at IEs market share until 2008.... https://www.jitbit.com/news/3304-browser-market-shares-1993-...

I mean, I get what you're saying, but I don't think it's that controversial to point out that facing serious consequences from the US DOJ put a serious check on the actions of Microsoft and held them back from employing their embrace, extend, extinguish model on the web.

How so? Out of three of the areas where they were investigated - there is only one where they are not still dominant. They lost browser market share because Google was the most popular web destination.

MS lost the mobile market - but outside of Apple, “winning the mobile market” was a Pyrrhic victory for Google [1]. Apple won by selling hardware not by licensing.

But they are the second largest cloud provider and are making far more than Google is making on mobile. Microsoft also don’t have to pay the competition a reported $8 billion a year because their competitor has the most valuable customers.

They also successfully pushed their way into the console market. MS is still the 3rd most valuable company in the US. Down from #1 in 2002.

[1] https://www.theverge.com/2016/1/21/10810834/android-generate...

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#253

Post by foobarian »

Rapzid wrote: post #191
foobarian wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, yes, this government right: https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/gps.html

With about 70% of their revenue from the US Government in 2018? Those defense companies might as well be an extension of the government with the added "benefit" that it allows individuals to get wealthy off them. Edit: Further to that and the comment pointing out where GPS was researched and developed, the Air Force still operates GPS block III and contracted these services out to Lockheed. So yeah, ultimately any su…

That's kind of the point though; would this whole arrangement work any better if it was all directly under the DoD hierarchy? Vs. private contractors like this? I was not intending to be snarky in the original comment. I've lived in a system where a lot more of the economy was under the government in the org chart and it was not magically better than the American system.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#254

Post by JAlexoid »

MadSudaca wrote: post #174
shadowgovt wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is 100% nothing stopping the Federal government from offering a full-faith-and-credit-backed "America electronic transaction system" for electronic transactions, with those fees handled by taxes. But much as there's nothing stopping the Federal government from greatly simplifying the burden and toil of tax season by issuing 90% of Americans a pre-filled-out "This is what you owe; sign this and return it or disp…

I actually like this aspect of the USA. Most parts of the world, specially more socialistic-leaning countries, would have politicians eager to expand their powers and size of the state so that they have control over a bigger cut of the pie. Of course, this is supposedly for the good of the people. It seems to me that more people is socialistic-minded in the USA these days, to me that looks like a indicator of the dec…

[flagged]

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#255

Post by shakna »

scarface74 wrote: post #209
shakna wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every device that I can think of allows you to choose a default search engine. Users, overwhelming, do not change defaults. Period. Unless there is a step where they are shown a range of options and select one, this is not an active choice for them.

So we need the government to come in because people don’t know what’s best for them?

Alternatively, the government can be useful to ensure people know what options are available to them.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#256

Post by v7p1Qbt1im »

glitchc wrote: post #52

This seems excessive. Instead of regulating search, which would have a net effect of entrenching Google as the only de-facto search engine, it is better to let competition take its course. A better technology can always up-end Google's business model (it's more fragile than people think). Let the open market perform its function. After all, it was only 2000 when people thought MS and RIM were too big and needed to be…

Mentioning MS in that way doesn’t help your argument. They are doing better than ever before. Who cares about desktop space (which they still have an enormous market share of btw) when you have Azure. I would argue the antitrust settlement actually helped them.

Everyone is basically ignoring them in current “tech-lash” discussions. They got away with a slap on the wrist 20 years ago and are just slightly more careful.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#257

Post by JAlexoid »

tuna-piano wrote: post #161
tempsy wrote: post #18

I would argue Visa and Mastercard and payment processing at large as the top priority by far. It's crazy that we've given up control as a society of the only mechanisms for electronic payments in an increasingly cashless world to unregulated private entities who continue to jack up fees as often as they can get away with. Makes everything 3-5% more expensive. Ridiculous.

I don't think this analysis is correct. While it's true many merchants pay 1-3% in processing fees, many of the costs involved are real. Building the network, fraud, rewards to consumers, etc. Visa's net income is roughly $11 billion a year[1], and they process roughly $11 trillion a year[2]. So their take is ~.1%, not 3-5%. Note that this ignores that banks may make money off these transactions as well. May be bette…

You seem to think that Visa is a bigger thing, than it actually is.

That 3% is the total cost to the merchant. Visa is just a payments network. It is not the payment processor(the company that the card terminals connect to). They are not the issuer - the banks that charge as well.

Visa facilitates integration between different payment processors and issuers, they don't even handle fraud or low level stuff.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#258

Post by martin_drapeau »

When a country regulates Google, they raise borders. Google, like any other global internet compnay, is across borders. I would hate to be blocked form accessing US Google when I live in Canada. Putting up barriers on the Internet is contrary to an open Web.

It does exist for content. For example Netflix content in Canada is different than in the US. You just can't do that for web pages.

In addition, nothing prevents Google from moving outside of the USA. Assuming the US wants to break them up, Google could just turn around and say "I'm moving to another country". The loss of jobs, intellectual property, etc would be too big. The government would back down. In the end the consumer decides which search engine to use. Today, that's Google.

This leads me to this question. What do you do when FAANGs become larger than some countries? Apple revenues for example are larger than the GDP of some countries. Facebook has 2B users. More than any other country. It then only makes sense to regulate them at a international level. Not possible today. Maybe in 100 years. Until then, FAANG will continue growing and gobbing up companies and industries.

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#259

Post by scarface74 »

dumbfoundded wrote: post #245
scarface74 wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did that work out? 20 years later MS still has the same share of PC operating systems and approximately the same share of the office productivity space.

It seems to have worked well. I doubt you're using Internet Explorer to respond to me. The antitrust case was about bundling Internet Explorer with Windows. It was called the Browser Wars and related to preventing Netscape from competing. The result is pretty obvious. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor... .

It was also about operating systems and productivity software.

Now instead of having an operating system vendor with 80% market share now we have an ad vendor. Win????

Meet the new boss....

Re: The case for why Google should be regulated as a public utility

#260

Post by three_seagrass »

tetrometal wrote: post #40

The last thing I want is for government to become even more involved with managing what information I receive or how I receive it. We need less of that, not more. Also, please use competitors such as DuckDuckGo. It's not hard, and they're not bad. It's unconscionable to me that we would resort to government force before taking the obvious step of just not interacting with Google.

Obligatory FYI: DuckDuckGo is pretty much Bing search. If you're trying to support newer competitors in the search engine space, try Qwant or YaCy.
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