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Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

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Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#281

Post by ClumsyPilot »

tengbretson wrote: post #64
gumby wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...their monopoly, which is why Google should be broken up. Not denying their monopoly position, but how could Google meaningfully be broken up? It's really just a single business (advertising) with a gaggle of loss leaders adding up to less than 20% of revenue. Even pushing advertising down to 80% took a huge amount of effort. It's not like Standard Oil which was a vertically integrated trust of several points in…

Maybe we shouldn't be letting this gaggle of loss leaders distort the market in their respective verticals.

Exactly, this should be absolutely obvious.

If an oil compnay gave away cars for free and became a car monopolist, people would be up in arms, vut Google's BS is somehow acceptable

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#282

Post by leafmeal »

wyager wrote: post #205
leafmeal wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least with government we have the powers of oversight and political organizing. It seems like a better bet then a corporation who's accountable to a bottom line, or owners.

I trust "political organizing" (codeword for astroturfing and cathedral control) less than I trust Google's profit interests.

I'm confused, do you not believe there is "political organizing" outside of the guise of astroturfing? And even when political organizing is just astroturfing, isn't the motivator just the same as Google's profit interest?

Whether you believe it or not, you have a lot more power to influence government (locally at least) than you do to affect what Google does. That was my only point.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#283

Post by bilbo0s »

ketzo wrote: post #81
jeffbee wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Name even one way in which Google resembles a public utility. When I build a house, do I have to pay $25k to get my Google pipes hooked up? Seriously where are the parallels?

It's a service with which essentially every person living in present-day America needs to interact on a day-to-day basis. And yes, they need to. I think it is hugely disingenuous to pretend otherwise. We can talk all day about how DuckDuckGo and ProtonMail exist. But for a huge, huge majority of people, Google simply is the internet.

The material point is that an ISP is what you need to get to Google. You don't need Google to get to the ISP.

You need electricity to get television, you don't need television to get electricity. You need electricity to get the internet, you don't need the internet to get electricity. Now whether or not television or internet are more useful than electricity is an entirely separate question. But which of the three is the baseline utility is a bit obvious.

But again, the intended purpose is probably not to make Google a utility, it's to score political points. So none of these arguments are really relevant to the calculus that a politician would work through before taking an action like this. This is still a brilliant action from a political perspective because it will undoubtedly win incumbents some votes.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#284

Post by [deleted] »

buran77 wrote: post #74
jolmg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Google isn't the only provider of email addresses. In contrast, water utilities typically hold monopoly over their region. EDIT: Many people are replying with some variant that the problem is that Google can block the email account that people have tied to their financial and government services. But the same is true of any other email provider. If Google is somehow turned into a public utility, how does that sol…

No, but Google holds monopoly over that email address that you've been using and passing around for years, and all the data associated to it. Losing access to it can prove to be a major issue. Of course this is nowhere near as critical as water, food, or shelter. But in the modern world losing access to your long time email address, like a phone number, will cause some pain. I see no reason not to put such a responsi…

[deleted]

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#285

Post by idiotsecant »

Arch-TK wrote: post #242
supernova87a wrote: post #212

A big problem with software and people who write software (often) is that software doesn't like all the ways that human beings misbehave, change their minds, don't have immutable states, and don't fit into the categories you build for them. So any system that has a duty to serve everyone eventually ends up with an operational component that has almost as much human interaction and problem solving required as the soft…

There are plenty of rational reasons for not wanting a smart meter. Don't let the irrational people detract from the fact that there are many real problems with smart meters. Especially lots of privacy issues. In the UK, I report my own meter readings and the electrical company probably only really ever goes out once every few years when tenancies change. So I actually don't see what money it saves them asides from t…

What sort of horrible privacy issues do you suppose your smart meter has? You already tell your utility how much power you use.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#286

Post by supernova87a »

Arch-TK wrote: post #242
supernova87a wrote: post #212

A big problem with software and people who write software (often) is that software doesn't like all the ways that human beings misbehave, change their minds, don't have immutable states, and don't fit into the categories you build for them. So any system that has a duty to serve everyone eventually ends up with an operational component that has almost as much human interaction and problem solving required as the soft…

There are plenty of rational reasons for not wanting a smart meter. Don't let the irrational people detract from the fact that there are many real problems with smart meters. Especially lots of privacy issues. In the UK, I report my own meter readings and the electrical company probably only really ever goes out once every few years when tenancies change. So I actually don't see what money it saves them asides from t…

There's not that many things about the smart meter that are much worse than the vulnerabilities of the plain old spinning disk meter. There were many problems with old meters too. And the benefits far outweigh those issues. Smart meters are not being hacked left and right.

And your privacy concerns are just a matter of granularity of time. You report your usage monthly -- that is also private information. Smart meters just do it on a finer timescale. Not a fundamental difference.

Anyway, back to the main topic.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#287

Post by justbored123 »

pcmoney wrote: post #117
adrr wrote: post #95

But I have multiple choices for email, search, video hosting and browsers. I don’t have any choice for water, electricity, sewer, on any other public utility. I am sure there are a bunch of people on here that don’t use any Google products and are using DuckDuckGo, Firefox, ProtonMail, Vimeo. There are many choices.

You have multiple choices for water, dig a well, buy it from the local grocery store. Same for sewage because self composting toilets exist. Also electricity isn't a utility just use a stationary bike as a generator or buy solar panels... Just because you have multiple choices doesn't mean something is/isn't a utility. Its pretty arbitrary. They also aren't talking about Google products (most of which are completely…

That is a terrible argument. "Go sh*t in a chemical toiled" is not a reasonable alternative, the cost alone is ludicrous. Just have the decency and maturity to admit when you are wrong instead of arguing that you should "go dig a well" in the middle of the city. This is why we can't have reasonable conversations anymore.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#288

Post by easrng »

caslon wrote: post #157
ccity88 wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except it's actually not that easy. Most of the web uses google analytics, so its unavoidable when you visit a website. Most of the web's emails are routed through google; I remember reading a post about a guy who set up his own SMTP server and everything, but then realised that everyone he was contacting was using gmail anyway (can't find the post). Every time you see an add that's served by google, that means that…

"Most of the web uses google analytics, so its unavoidable when you visit a website." I actually mentioned that. Just shim GA connections; this happens with most ad-blocking software, and I believe happens in Firefox's "strict" mode by default. It's really trivial. "Most of the web's emails are routed through google; I remember reading a post about a guy who set up his own SMTP server and everything, but then realise…

RE: YouTube alternatives there's also PeerTube which also can use p2p delivery.

Can confirm that Android works great without Google Play Services, I don't have it. Most Play Store apps break but most of my apps are from F-Droid anyway.

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#289

Post by ClumsyPilot »

bananabreakfast wrote: post #77
ericmay wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even just divesting YouTube would be a start.

YouTube is hardly profitable. They would barely be able to afford their own infrastructure under their current revenue. They would immediately be acquired by a competitor or declare bankruptcy.

Thats exactly the point

Re: Ohio sues Google, seeks to declare the internet company a public utility

#290

Post by supernova87a »

dcow wrote: post #247
supernova87a wrote: post #212

A big problem with software and people who write software (often) is that software doesn't like all the ways that human beings misbehave, change their minds, don't have immutable states, and don't fit into the categories you build for them. So any system that has a duty to serve everyone eventually ends up with an operational component that has almost as much human interaction and problem solving required as the soft…

I don't think your argument supports the second conclusion in your penultimate sentence. Seems like a big leap. Power and water “just work” and the utility companies can’t abuse people. As an “end user” I don't get crappier power or worse water because my neighbor is spooked out by smart meters. I highly doubt the savings would be passed on to me anyway. I would 1000 times over rather live in a world where internet u…

Then isn't this an argument that tech companies are not utilities because the things they supply don't "just work" and have no nuance to them?

Electricity and water "just work" because you deliver it, you're done. You have no obligations aside from not failing to deliver it, and not exploiting your monopoly market.

Tech companies are not utilities because they're not just something you buy like a commodity and have a right to not have complex terms of usage?

You want the best of both worlds. Maybe that's not possible.

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