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Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

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Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#81

Post by chris_f »

return1 wrote: post #21
ricardo81 wrote: post #12

The UK recently evaluated the online ad market and found that Google and Facebook commanded 70% of all online ad spend in the country [0]. Their large pool of advertisers also helps them command a higher return per search compared to other platforms, allowing them to outbid its peers to become the default search choice on devices, e.g. Apple products. Their lack of privacy sensitive policy also helps their ad targeti…

The only way to have competition is if FB started a search engine or if google bought instagram

FB may already be backing their way into search:

https://www.engadget.com/facebook-test-adds-wikipedia-search...

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#82

Post by paulryanrogers »

doukdouk wrote: post #70
throwaway_kufu wrote: post #66

What so many people fail to realize about these issues vis-a-vis Google, it’s not so much the issues of Google having a monopoly or not on the ad market...in either case google is a dominant market incumbent that uses its position (in this case web traffic, data and online ad platform) to unfairly compete and stifle competition. Google has often used data acquired through their market position to start subsidiaries t…

Words get abused a lot, and for some of them, they do not have a clear-cut, universally agreed upon meaning. "Monopoly" is one of such words (others candidate include: freedom, democracy, justice). When random person X complains about, say, Google having a monopoly, there are two possibilities: - Person X means something along "Google has a dominant market position and abuses its power", slightly abusing the meaning…

Meaning isn't dictated by a language academy and may change over time. Debating about the precise differences between monopoly and monopsony serves more to distract from the core issue: abuse of their market position.

If the allegations are true then I can't see a solution that does not involve breaking Google up. The incentives to cheat are likely just undeniable over a time scale of years.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#83

Post by dustingetz »

doukdouk wrote: post #70
throwaway_kufu wrote: post #66

What so many people fail to realize about these issues vis-a-vis Google, it’s not so much the issues of Google having a monopoly or not on the ad market...in either case google is a dominant market incumbent that uses its position (in this case web traffic, data and online ad platform) to unfairly compete and stifle competition. Google has often used data acquired through their market position to start subsidiaries t…

Words get abused a lot, and for some of them, they do not have a clear-cut, universally agreed upon meaning. "Monopoly" is one of such words (others candidate include: freedom, democracy, justice). When random person X complains about, say, Google having a monopoly, there are two possibilities: - Person X means something along "Google has a dominant market position and abuses its power", slightly abusing the meaning…

Duopoly?

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#84

Post by paulryanrogers »

indigochill wrote: post #55
philipov wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fb is also a problem, so relying on them isn't going to solve anything. A cartel or oligopoly is not a better situation than a monopoly. For there to be a healthy market, it needs to be possible for small business to compete. If that's not possible in a market, then it needs to be regulated like a public utility.

> If that's not possible in a market, then it needs to be regulated like a public utility. What I don't understand here is does this not just hand Google the monopoly but now with government protection? Because they're already in place, so who's gonna offer this public utility? We see similar situations with, e.g. cellular carriers in the states, where wherever you live, you only get not-even-a-handful of choices. An…

Regulation like a utility doesn't mean their has to be only one gatekeeper. It could just more rules once one becomes so dominant they are a defacto gatekeeper.

Doubtful this would be done in the same way everywhere. Though big markets like the EU or US may regulate at the federal/union level to ease the burden on interstate commerce.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#85

Post by elliekelly »

KorematsuFred wrote: post #32
ricardo81 wrote: post #12

The UK recently evaluated the online ad market and found that Google and Facebook commanded 70% of all online ad spend in the country [0]. Their large pool of advertisers also helps them command a higher return per search compared to other platforms, allowing them to outbid its peers to become the default search choice on devices, e.g. Apple products. Their lack of privacy sensitive policy also helps their ad targeti…

Every company is a monopoly based on how you define the market. Why should we focus only on online ads ? Why not look at the entire ad spend and then see what % is controlled by Google ? By some logic the coffee shop in my block has a monopoly on coffee if their market is the block. They are irrelevant if you look at the entire city.

Even in that extreme hypothetical I’m not sure it would be considered a monopoly - is there a convenience store on the block? A grocery store? A bakery? The market for “coffee on a given block” isn’t limited to coffee shops.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#86

Post by xibalba »

doukdouk wrote: post #70
throwaway_kufu wrote: post #66

What so many people fail to realize about these issues vis-a-vis Google, it’s not so much the issues of Google having a monopoly or not on the ad market...in either case google is a dominant market incumbent that uses its position (in this case web traffic, data and online ad platform) to unfairly compete and stifle competition. Google has often used data acquired through their market position to start subsidiaries t…

Words get abused a lot, and for some of them, they do not have a clear-cut, universally agreed upon meaning. "Monopoly" is one of such words (others candidate include: freedom, democracy, justice). When random person X complains about, say, Google having a monopoly, there are two possibilities: - Person X means something along "Google has a dominant market position and abuses its power", slightly abusing the meaning…

You may be over-indexing on a prescriptive lexicon:

https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/descriptive-vs...

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#87

Post by doukdouk »

dustingetz wrote: post #83
doukdouk wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Words get abused a lot, and for some of them, they do not have a clear-cut, universally agreed upon meaning. "Monopoly" is one of such words (others candidate include: freedom, democracy, justice). When random person X complains about, say, Google having a monopoly, there are two possibilities: - Person X means something along "Google has a dominant market position and abuses its power", slightly abusing the meaning…

Duopoly?

Again, mindless arguing what exact word fit or does not fit the situation detracts from the real issues.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#88

Post by justaguyhere »

amelius wrote: post #61
eqtn wrote: post #52

make targeted advertising opt in. Make the opt in scary like how android enables the installation of apk's from unknown sources.

Just ban targeted advertising, but allow websites that ask the user to tell about themselves in order to get tailored product recommendations.

Or educate users to pay for quality and make quality websites/products so we don't have to depend on advertising. This would be insanely difficult to pull off, but it is at least worth a try.

The incumbents have trained users to expect everything on the internet for free. People think they pay $75 (or whatever their internet connection costs) and that should cover everything - news, search, email...

How many people even pay for super important stuff like email? No wonder ads are everywhere, like bad smell.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#89

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

doukdouk wrote: post #70
throwaway_kufu wrote: post #66

What so many people fail to realize about these issues vis-a-vis Google, it’s not so much the issues of Google having a monopoly or not on the ad market...in either case google is a dominant market incumbent that uses its position (in this case web traffic, data and online ad platform) to unfairly compete and stifle competition. Google has often used data acquired through their market position to start subsidiaries t…

Words get abused a lot, and for some of them, they do not have a clear-cut, universally agreed upon meaning. "Monopoly" is one of such words (others candidate include: freedom, democracy, justice). When random person X complains about, say, Google having a monopoly, there are two possibilities: - Person X means something along "Google has a dominant market position and abuses its power", slightly abusing the meaning…

I think the argument that Facebook and Google compete in the ad space is tenuous at best. Just ask a digital marketer: almost all of them consider FB and Google to have separate purposes and markets.

So fine, Google doesn't have a monopoly on online ads, but they do have a monopoly on search ads.

Re: Google says it doesn't monopolize digital ad market – senators don't buy it

#90

Post by nl »

The headline doesn't quite convey what the argument seems to be: Google is involved in nearly every step in the chain between advertisers seeking to place their ads and the publishers selling space on their websites. Hawley pointed to findings from the United Kingdom's antitrust regulator showing that Google has dominant positions in various parts of the ad technology market, ranging from 40% to more than 90%.

There could be some merit in that argument.

But the way it is usually made ("Google (or Google+FB) monopolizes the digital ad market") seems easy to refute: just look at the demand for TikTok, and Snapchat is pulling in over $500M (revenue) a quarter and back to robust growth after some missteps a year or two ago.

And Twitch ads & sponsorships are huge.

Even the UK investigation found Google+FB only controlled 70% of the market (which I believe is less than the major newspaper publishers controlled in the newspaper heyday)

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