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Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

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Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#301

Post by int_19h »

judge2020 wrote: post #245
stale2002 wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> like smartphones or phones in total, Apple just does not have a monopoly. A monopoly is not needed for anti-competitive behavior to be illegal. All that is needed is significant market power. Apple has 50% of the smartphone market. Which is around where courts have stated that anti-trust laws start to apply. 50% of a highly concentrated market is not a slam dunk anti-trust case, by any means, but it is within the r…

> A monopoly is not needed for anti-competitive behavior to be illegal. All that is needed is significant market power. Have any references where someone was sued for antitrust while having <50% marketshare (of course, using the market determined by the court at the time)? If what you say is true, is the cutoff for antitrust action just "when media outlets report on it long enough to actually be put in sight of regul…

There were cases like that in the pre-Bork era (i.e. when the courts interpreted the law as people who originally wrote it actually intended). Here's one example:

https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/370/294/

"In 1955, the date of this merger, Brown was the fourth largest manufacturer in the shoe industry, with sales of approximately 26 million pairs of shoes and assets of over $72,000,000 while Kinney had sales of about 8 million pairs of shoes and assets of about $18,000,000."

And even more relevant:

"Another important factor to consider is the trend toward concentration in the industry. It is true, of course, that the statute prohibits a given merger only if the effect of that merger may be substantially to lessen competition. But the very wording of § 7 requires a prognosis of the probable future effect of the merger.

The existence of a trend toward vertical integration, which the District Court found, is well substantiated by the record. Moreover, the court found a tendency of the acquiring manufacturers to become increasingly important sources of supply for their acquired outlets. The necessary corollary of these trends is the foreclosure of independent manufacturers from markets otherwise open to them. And because these trends are not the product of accident, but are rather the result of deliberate policies of Brown and other leading shoe manufacturers, account must be taken of these facts in order to predict the probable future consequences of this merger. It is against this background of continuing concentration that the present merger must be viewed."

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#302

Post by int_19h »

fingerlocks wrote: post #171
fooey wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the parent post says, Firefox on iOS isn't really Firefox. It doesn't run Gecko, it's barely more than a skin on top of Safari. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox_for_iOS https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#2.5... > 2.5.6 Apps that browse the web must use the appropriate WebKit framework and WebKit Javascript.

How much does this really matter to the typical user? I’m not using Firefox because it’s JS and rendering engine are significantly better than webkit. Can’t really tell the difference honestly. I’m still getting all the other features of Firefox that actually distinguish it from it’s competitors. The so-called skin is more like the guts from a user value perspective.

Safari lags behind on many web standards. On other platforms, when that happens (e.g. IE), competitors provide alternatives that can do better.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#303

Post by int_19h »

GeekyBear wrote: post #142
Jasper_ wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In 2001, Microsoft "constituted unlawful monopolization" under Antitrust Act for bundling a web browser with their operating system. You're forgetting how that ended. Remember, the DOJ threw the book at Microsoft. It was an intensely publicized trial, with pretty much all the country hating Microsoft and Bill Gates. Waffling over the word "ask", the infamous "knife the baby" email, the Halloween documents and Embra…

This kind of glosses over the fact that they were found guilty of anticompetitive behavior in the EU. They got a massive fine and were and forced to do things like open up the client server protocol used between Windows Domain Controllers and Windows Clients. They came pretty close to being forced to open up the Office document formats, but the EU backed down from that one.

The Office formats were forced open anyway. Note the dates:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/openspecs/office_file_forma...

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#304

Post by mcdevilkiller »

solarkraft wrote: post #223
bushbaba wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s likely the payoff is also to prevent apple from building its own search engine to compete. As googles payoff is so lucrative

There have been reports and speculation that they’re doing just that. Of course it’s worth it for the negotiation threat alone, but Apple also really doesn’t seem to like depending on Google. I personally can’t see them switching any time soon, as DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible and I’m not sure they can do much better without collecting more data.

DDG is so much better than Google for me.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#305

Post by int_19h »

Dracophoenix wrote: post #52
agloeregrets wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The law sees it as they have been paid and blackmailed to see it. There was a report yesterday that showed Apple's lawyers threatening to pull out funding of a minority education school if the state considered any sort of App store laws.

Wouldn't that be Apple's prerogative? There's no reason to do business in a state that's hostile to your interests or pursuits. That's not blackmail anymore than the attempted Hollywood boycott over Georgia's abortion laws a few years ago. There are plenty of well-documented violations of integrity to accuse Apple of, but using its philanthropic investments as a leverage isn't one of them.

"Leverage" doesn't go along with "philantropic".

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#306

Post by afiori »

solarkraft wrote: post #223
bushbaba wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s likely the payoff is also to prevent apple from building its own search engine to compete. As googles payoff is so lucrative

There have been reports and speculation that they’re doing just that. Of course it’s worth it for the negotiation threat alone, but Apple also really doesn’t seem to like depending on Google. I personally can’t see them switching any time soon, as DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible and I’m not sure they can do much better without collecting more data.

my experience (sample size < 5) is that people that use Google with an adblocker have a very nice experience and don't have an adblocker have a miserable experience.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#307

Post by xyzzyz »

Renaud wrote: post #288
solarkraft wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There have been reports and speculation that they’re doing just that. Of course it’s worth it for the negotiation threat alone, but Apple also really doesn’t seem to like depending on Google. I personally can’t see them switching any time soon, as DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible and I’m not sure they can do much better without collecting more data.

>DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible I would like someone to make some objective research on that. My experience is the reverse, so I strongly suspect our reticence is just one of changing our habit more than an real thing. I switched to DDG years ago and it took a few weeks to wean out the tendency to compare searches, usually brought on by the fear of missing out something. I very ra…

There is not much interesting stuff on the internet these days outside closed FB etc, so search is just not as important as it used to be.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#308

Post by Godel_unicode »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #162
Sargos wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An example I find interesting and easy to explain is Pool Together which is a no-loss lottery where you can buy $10 in lottery tickets for a chance at a $3,000 weekly prize but if you don't win your tickets still work for the next round and even 10 rounds from now you can withdraw your full $10. It works by putting everyone's money in the same account which earns ~6% interest savings account and the winner actually g…

6% interest paid by who?

It's a Ponzi scheme, which depends on more people buying in.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#309

Post by irrational »

solarkraft wrote: post #223
bushbaba wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s likely the payoff is also to prevent apple from building its own search engine to compete. As googles payoff is so lucrative

There have been reports and speculation that they’re doing just that. Of course it’s worth it for the negotiation threat alone, but Apple also really doesn’t seem to like depending on Google. I personally can’t see them switching any time soon, as DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible and I’m not sure they can do much better without collecting more data.

I’ve been using DuckDuckGo as my default search engine on all devices for years. I’ve never had a problem finding what I’m looking for and have never felt the need to use a different search engine to get different results. YMMV.

Re: Google’s ‘Project Hug’ paid out huge sums to keep game devs in the Play Store

#310

Post by irrational »

xyzzyz wrote: post #307
Renaud wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>DuckDuckGo’s search results are something between worse to terrible I would like someone to make some objective research on that. My experience is the reverse, so I strongly suspect our reticence is just one of changing our habit more than an real thing. I switched to DDG years ago and it took a few weeks to wean out the tendency to compare searches, usually brought on by the fear of missing out something. I very ra…

There is not much interesting stuff on the internet these days outside closed FB etc, so search is just not as important as it used to be.

I don’t use Facebook at all and I’ve never had any problem finding interesting stuff on the Internet (quite the opposite - there is too much stuff and not enough time). What interesting stuff is only available on Facebook?
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