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United States vs. Google

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Re: United States vs. Google

#51

I think Google is the best search engine. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with them being the best search engine, top online ad platform and a developer of the top mobile OS, top video streaming service, top internet browser, top mapping/navigation service, among other things, at the SAME time. Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening onli…

1) best search engine

2) top online ad platform

3) top mobile OS

4) top video streaming service

5) top internet browser

6) top mapping/navigation service

Okay, you listed 6. What should the law say is the new limit for how many they should be able to have?

Re: United States vs. Google

#52

Most interesting part IMO is at the end (emphasis mine): > That, though, is why it is a mistake to read the report as some sort of technocratic document... it is exceptionally difficult to make the case that any of these companies are causing consumer harm, which is the de facto standard for antitrust in the United States. Indeed, what makes Google’s contention that “The competition is only a click away” so infuriati…

In the HN context in particular, it's important to observe that the underlying legal philosophy of monopoly differs in European and US law.

It's not just that the laws are different; it's the goals of the laws. The European laws (in general) attempt to stave off competitor harm. They're historically sourced to guild protections and seek to create a situation in which companies can compete. Small players in the market are seen as inherently a good thing, regardless of whether that actually makes a better market for consumers (which it is not guaranteed to; laws protecting the existence of small book stores keep prices of books artificially high in a world of extremely inexpensive data copying and book fabrication. French book buyers are essentially paying a hidden tax to have corner book shops exist, whether or not they care if corner book shops exist).

The US lacked a similar guild history and, instead, historically experienced the threat of government overreach privileging the existence of incumbent companies over new players. The US therefore has laws crafted to protect against the major threat the US historically experienced: one company making life miserable for consumers (i.e. the Rockefeller threat, or going back further, the British East India Company threat). Neither US law nor US monopoloy philosophy traditionally care whether small-time market players can compete at all ("why should it," runs the argument, "maybe Starbucks is ubiquitous because their coffee is actually better. What's the value to the consumer of propping up bad coffee?").

It feels like 90% of arguments on HN on the topic are unaware of that philosophy gap.

Re: United States vs. Google

#53

Correct me if I am wrong, but is there anything stopping anyone from starting a new (better) search engine, and promoting it like crazy? Maybe even pay users a portion of the ads revenue for using the new search engine? I understand there are economies of scale here, but if a few investors got together what's to stop them from achieving this?

> is there anything stopping anyone from starting a new (better) search engine Nothing, but that's always been the case, with every monopoly. There was nothing stopping anybody from running telephone lines and competing with AT&T in the 80's except for AT&T's massive incumbency head-start.

You chose the perfect example to disprove your own point. Other companies could not run phone lines. There are plenty of hard monopolies, and they’re very different from soft, virtuous cycle monopolies.

Re: United States vs. Google

#54
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm one of the types that doesn't care much if a company has/hasn't reached the legal definition of a monopoly. This is because by the time anything reaches that point, the damage has already been done to the market. It doesn't take a time traveller to tell you what is going to happen once it reaches a particular point. I appreciate both perspectives, but openly take my position.

> It doesn't take a time traveller to tell you what is going to happen once it reaches a particular point. Just like it didn’t take a time traveler to know that Kodak, Microsoft, and Sears would grow to be unstoppable?

Microsoft was the subject of an antitrust proceeding, and is currently the largest US company by market capitalization. Kodak (film photography) and Sears (mail order catalogs) failed because the markets they had dominated effectively ceased to exist, not because anybody unseated them in those markets.

Re: United States vs. Google

#55

I think Google is the best search engine. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with them being the best search engine, top online ad platform and a developer of the top mobile OS, top video streaming service, top internet browser, top mapping/navigation service, among other things, at the SAME time. Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening onli…

1) best search engine 2) top online ad platform 3) top mobile OS 4) top video streaming service 5) top internet browser 6) top mapping/navigation service Okay, you listed 6. What should the law say is the new limit for how many they should be able to have?

Lets say 1.

Re: United States vs. Google

#56

I think Google is the best search engine. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with them being the best search engine, top online ad platform and a developer of the top mobile OS, top video streaming service, top internet browser, top mapping/navigation service, among other things, at the SAME time. Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening onli…

1) best search engine 2) top online ad platform 3) top mobile OS 4) top video streaming service 5) top internet browser 6) top mapping/navigation service Okay, you listed 6. What should the law say is the new limit for how many they should be able to have?

one seems about right

Re: United States vs. Google

#57

I think Google is the best search engine. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with them being the best search engine, top online ad platform and a developer of the top mobile OS, top video streaming service, top internet browser, top mapping/navigation service, among other things, at the SAME time. Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening onli…

1) best search engine 2) top online ad platform 3) top mobile OS 4) top video streaming service 5) top internet browser 6) top mapping/navigation service Okay, you listed 6. What should the law say is the new limit for how many they should be able to have?

It's not the number that OP is arguing, its this:

> Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening online. This gives them ability to control big part of collective human consciousness, across languages and borders.

Re: United States vs. Google

#58
post #4

Correct me if I am wrong, but is there anything stopping anyone from starting a new (better) search engine, and promoting it like crazy? Maybe even pay users a portion of the ads revenue for using the new search engine? I understand there are economies of scale here, but if a few investors got together what's to stop them from achieving this?

The reason Google is because of their AI. And the reason their AI is good is because of the massive amount of data they collect by violating privacy. No other company can start right now. Their search engine is years of efforts of collecting every user's data in Chrome for determining 'freshness', page rank and other related stuff.

The ideal outcome of this lawsuit is Google being forced to open up their vast amounts of data obtained by being the 90+% market monopoly. Only then can other search engines even begin to compete.

Re: United States vs. Google

#59

I think Google is the best search engine. I don't have a problem with that. I do have a problem with them being the best search engine, top online ad platform and a developer of the top mobile OS, top video streaming service, top internet browser, top mapping/navigation service, among other things, at the SAME time. Their assets give them undue and unsupervised influence over a very big chunk of what's happening onli…

1) best search engine 2) top online ad platform 3) top mobile OS 4) top video streaming service 5) top internet browser 6) top mapping/navigation service Okay, you listed 6. What should the law say is the new limit for how many they should be able to have?

They all feed off each other and that's a problem. When iOS was taking off, Google was legit worried about their search dominance being threatened. That's why they paid Apple top dollars to replace Bing as the default search engine on iOS. Same reason why they bought Android to make sure Apple doesn't get to dictate terms. Also the reason why they built Chrome. All of this made sure they have the most eyeballs and the data to train their search models better and better and better. If you look at history of Standard Oil, you'll see a similar pattern. Antitrust regulations were invented when people saw how this perfectly logical combination of actions could accumulate so much power.

Re: United States vs. Google

#60

Most interesting part IMO is at the end (emphasis mine): > That, though, is why it is a mistake to read the report as some sort of technocratic document... it is exceptionally difficult to make the case that any of these companies are causing consumer harm, which is the de facto standard for antitrust in the United States. Indeed, what makes Google’s contention that “The competition is only a click away” so infuriati…

The harm is pretty trivially demonstrated in the privileged search rankings Google gives its own products. This drives down competition in these other verticals and leaves consumers with winners that won because they are Google's products, not because they are the best. I also really dislike the use of the word "hatred" here, which is a loaded word deployed when a writer wants to make those they are arguing against s…

Does Google give a boost to its own products in the search rankings?
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