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Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

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Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#211

Post by mthoms »

1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote: post #64
robin_reala wrote: post #7

249. The speed benefits Google marketed were also at least partly a result of Google’s throttling. Google throttles the load time of non-AMP ads by giving them artificial one-second delays in order to give Google AMP a “nice comparative boost.” Throttling non-AMP ads slows down header bidding, which Google then uses to denigrate header bidding for being too slow. “Header Bidding can often increase latency of web page…

In case anyone reading is unaware Google already inserts artificial delay into page loading times, to allow for header bidding. Online advertising proponents would argue this delay is below human perception. But the perceptibility of the wait should be for users, not Google, to decide; it is artifical and undisclosed delay, for the benefit of advertising. If users were told about it and could avoid it, no doubt they…

Is this delay on the HTML page being served? Or on the associated (ad-loading) scripts?

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#212

Post by throwawaysea »

paulluuk wrote: post #27
throwaway4good wrote: post #18

Given that Google is critical for US intelligence supremacy and technological dominance, I am curious what the US chooses to do with it. Surely from a free market perspective and for long term growth, it needs to be broken into pieces in such a manner that would destroy its monopoly power.

But would it still be a "free market" if governments just go around splitting up companies once they get (too) big? Not defending the idea of a free market here, I'm leaning pretty far past socialist myself, but I know that the US in general cares deeply about free market philosophy.

I think a “free market” has to retain some degree of competition and choice. Companies above a certain size (of capitalization) or with natural anti-competitive elements (like network effects) or with ownership of multiple sides of a market or with massive patent war cheats all impede competition. They move the free market away from a competition driven incentive to something more stagnant that can discourage entrepreneurial competitive innovation.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#213

Post by RNCTX »

acomar wrote: post #205
billylindeman wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always blows my mind seeing the things people who work at google/fb are willing to "walk out" / "protest" over, and then these insidious things they're willing to just sit back and let happen. When I moved to the bay area working at FB/Google was something I held in high regard and was a career goal of mine. Now I get hit up by recruiters from them often... and I don't message them back. It hurts thinking about ho…

> It always blows my mind seeing the things people who work at google/fb are willing to "walk out" / "protest" over, and then these insidious things they're willing to just sit back and let happen. symbolic action is always easy. but you're asking them to strike (refuse to work) in response to unethical demands, without the collective backing of their peers, in an industry that views union activity with - at best - s…

Bullshit.

How many minimum wage employees does Google have in the Bay Area? We’re talking about a class of six figure employees here.

Like he said, you’re a storm trooper, just own it.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#214

Post by rytcio »

deadbunny wrote: post #160
dessant wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're also pushing for the adoption of Signed HTTP Exchanges, with several Google employees defending the spec here on HN, comparing it to be merely like HTTPS in terms of publishers giving up control over their content. It's clear that Chrome must be separated from Google and Alphabet, nothing else will stop them from trying to colonize the web.

> It's clear that Chrome must be separated from Google and Alphabet, nothing else will stop them from trying to colonize the web. Or advocate for open alternatives, use Firefox, and make sure any site you build (or you build at work) work perfectly in non Chrome browsers.

The real problem is that Google/Chrome basically run the internet. If Google decides to change some internet standard, Firefox and web developers all follow suite like lemmings. It's like Google has become the authoritative leader in web without any sort of process or watchdog. Aside from getting people off of Chrome, the other need is to get people to stop following Google's leadership on all things web.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#215

Post by dragonwriter »

throwawaysea wrote: post #212
paulluuk wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But would it still be a "free market" if governments just go around splitting up companies once they get (too) big? Not defending the idea of a free market here, I'm leaning pretty far past socialist myself, but I know that the US in general cares deeply about free market philosophy.

I think a “free market” has to retain some degree of competition and choice. Companies above a certain size (of capitalization) or with natural anti-competitive elements (like network effects) or with ownership of multiple sides of a market or with massive patent war cheats all impede competition. They move the free market away from a competition driven incentive to something more stagnant that can discourage entrepr…

> I think a “free market” has to retain some degree of competition and choice.

An ideal market is both competitive and free, but the former is not a component of (and is often, outside of abstract ideals, in tension with) the latter.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#216

Post by magicalist »

amelius wrote: post #132
robin_reala wrote: post #7

249. The speed benefits Google marketed were also at least partly a result of Google’s throttling. Google throttles the load time of non-AMP ads by giving them artificial one-second delays in order to give Google AMP a “nice comparative boost.” Throttling non-AMP ads slows down header bidding, which Google then uses to denigrate header bidding for being too slow. “Header Bidding can often increase latency of web page…

> Google throttles the load time of non-AMP ads by giving them artificial one-second delays in order to give Google AMP a “nice comparative boost.” That's it. Webmasters should give all visitors with a Chrome user agent a loading penalty of 1 second and a popup saying that the website runs faster on Firefox. I said it before on HN, but the idea was condemned, and I partially agreed, but now it seems (at least to me)…

> Webmasters should give all visitors with a Chrome user agent a loading penalty of 1 second and a popup saying that the website runs faster on Firefox

it's for ads:

> Google throttles the load time of non-AMP ads by giving them artificial one-second delays

so would need to limit the +1 second for ads to be equivalent, but you could just run "ads" for ad blockers instead :)

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#217

Post by einpoklum »

triska wrote: post #25

What a read. Almost every single paragraph in the document leaves me speechless. For example, quoting from the document: "Google likes to claim that it will “never sell your personal information to anyone,” with Google CEO Sundar Pichai deceptively claiming that such a policy is “unequivocal.” But Google leverages intimate user data and personal information to broker billions of daily online ad impressions between pu…

> In Orwellian terms, it’s a beautiful thing for Google, the destruction of words like “sell” and “personal.”"

Disagree with the claim here. Certainly, Google is utilizing your personal information against you, but:

1. That's certainly not selling your personal info.

2. To make this argument, US states must concede that active commercial advertising has an aspect of harm and manipulation. I doubt any of them are actually willing to go ahead and adopt that position consistently.

Having said that... when we read Google's claim that

> it will “never sell your personal information to anyone”

let's also not forget that it's quite willing to give it for free to the US government, in bulk and forever.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#218

Post by Jensson »

tga_d wrote: post #196
Jensson wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Newcorp and the other media's anti google campaign has worked flawlessly. Even techies boarded the train and now think Google is worse than Microsoft or Apple. At worst Google is as bad as Microsoft or Apple if all the things the articles accuse them of is true. I don't work for Google nor own Google stocks, but among the things I am afraid of Google using its position to capture a bit too much of the ad-market is am…

Secretly colluding in backroom deals to intentionally hamstring privacy protections seems pretty unambiguously... bad? Can you explain how anything Microsoft or Apple has done has worse implications for society?

Both Microsoft and Apple happily collaborates with CCP, that is a big one that Google still doesn't do. Then both Microsoft and Apple often performs huge patent litigations for nonsense patents they spam, Google doesn't. Both Apple and Microsoft uses their industry dominance to push their own products and push others products out of the market, Google does that as well but before it seemed they didn't do it at the same rates, but this lawsuit would put Google at roughly the same level of Microsoft and Apple.

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#219

Post by radlad »

rytcio wrote: post #214
deadbunny wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's clear that Chrome must be separated from Google and Alphabet, nothing else will stop them from trying to colonize the web. Or advocate for open alternatives, use Firefox, and make sure any site you build (or you build at work) work perfectly in non Chrome browsers.

The real problem is that Google/Chrome basically run the internet. If Google decides to change some internet standard, Firefox and web developers all follow suite like lemmings. It's like Google has become the authoritative leader in web without any sort of process or watchdog. Aside from getting people off of Chrome, the other need is to get people to stop following Google's leadership on all things web.

> If Google decides to change some internet standard, Firefox and web developers all follow suite like lemmings.

This works because they have such a large market share. It's a chicken/egg problem. Switching to Firefox is the best most of us can do to achieve the goal of "getting people to stop following Google's leadership on all things web."

Re: Google digital advertising antitrust litigation [pdf]

#220

Post by magicalist »

ricketycricket wrote: post #168
magicalist wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are being awfully credulous of two sentence fragments quoted in an editorial paragraph. Much of this could certainly be true but my bullshit meter is going off on the level of narrative they're reconstructing in all the non-quoted portions. I dislike AMP because the UX is bad and Google strong armed it in the news carousel anyways instead of focusing on performance for all sites, but this would be a lot more c…

> People are being awfully credulous of two sentence fragments quoted in an editorial paragraph. Much of this could certainly be true but my bullshit meter is going off on the level of narrative they're reconstructing in all the non-quoted portions. This is not an editorial document, it’s a legal complaint by the Attorneys General of 17 U.S. states and commonwealths demanding a jury trial (among other things). The al…

> This is not an editorial document, it’s a legal complaint by the Attorneys General

It's definitely both, they know their audience is not limited to the court. Performative filings by attorneys general happen all the time, and being able to set the narrative and put the other party on the defensive is absolutely part of this process, for good or bad.

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