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Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

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Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#61

Post by maccard »

worrycue wrote: post #47
rplnt wrote: post #25

Google might have pretended to stood for something, but they have been an evil corporation since they have been a corporation. That's what corporations do by design. One relevant example is that they've been doing the "only for ie5+" with their services for 10+ years now. They killed most of their browser competition not by having a good product, but by having or buying up good services that they used to force chrome…

That’s not how I remembered it. Chrome really was a good browser and I would argue is still a good browser (for now). IE got displaced by Firefox’s predecessors because MS got caught napping - they disbanded the IE team thinking they have won. Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster. Firefox fell behind often enough that Chrome managed to take almost all of its market…

> Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster.

I disagree - if that was the case then people would be switching back to Firefox now. Firefox got outcompeted by chrome by Google adding a "works better in chrome" button to their home pages.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#64

Post by Cthulhu_ »

Animats wrote: post #17

It's time to start lobbying hard for an antitrust breakup of Google. This DRM plan, as abuse of a monopoly position, provides more political coverage for a forced breakup. It's pretty clear how to break up Alphabet, because it grew mostly by acquisition. - Google - search, ads on search pages and nothing more. - DoubleClick - third party ads on other sites. - Analytics - services to web sites. - Cloud - the money-los…

Nit: Google Cloud has been profitable this year: https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/25/google-cloud-turns-profit-...

It's actually perfectly fine to lose money; you have to invest before you can start making a profit, and services like Google Cloud can be money printers once they're established.

But all the cloud providers are competing hard, pumping money into 3rd parties / partners that will then sell it and set it up at companies. I was at one company (a famous flower exchange in the Netherlands) that was in the process of moving all their workloads - hundreds of services, from people's office suites to high volume exchanges - to AWS, and I'm confident that the one guy, the new manager of the IT department, has Connections with Amazon to help sell AWS to companies like this. Because once they're in, it'll cost millions and years to move out again; I don't think many companies will do a sideways step often and move from e.g. AWS to GCP.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#65

Post by hutzlibu »

Joeri wrote: post #54
hutzlibu wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Chrome - browsers" And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web. Seperate that and there will be no more chrome as there is no other source of income. (Except maybe a little bit from ChromeOS). Otherwise I get it, it is mostly politics to threaten google to reach this.: "It's quite likely to make Google dump this proposal,…

Money for developing chrome is not an issue. Google search could pay chrome to be the primary search engine just like they pay mozilla. Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…

"Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…"

Microsoft surely will continue to develope edge. That is my main issue with this thing, because they surely would like to be the one with the dominating browser again and if google has to drop chromium, Microsoft will just overtake it.

Antitrust and breakup is not a simple thing to do right.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#66

Post by ImHereToVote »

The elephant in the room is the increase of interest rates. The free lunch of cheap money is over. Now corps have to make money by squeezing every rock for the last bit of water.

My advice to everyone is to watch out, and be carefull. Look over the license changes over the incoming days to see how you might potentially be squeezed.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#67

Post by kortilla »

pyrale wrote: post #36
DoingIsLearning wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I fully agree with a breakup but arguably other than Search, DoubleClick, and Youtube, none of the others are solvent without ad money. On thing I feel we are still missing is for FSF, Wiki, Archive.org, etc. to effectively gather enough cash to start lobbying in politics and in industry much in the same way Meta and Alphabet do. Politicians/legislators are ridiculously cheap to lobby in the grand scheme of things.

> none of the others are solvent without ad money. This is a consequence of Google's structuring. If the pricing is unrealistic after a split, it's also currently an example of price dumping preventing competitors from emerging.

That’s not “price dumping”. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dumping_(pricing_policy)

If you don’t charge a normal price for something anywhere, then it’s just a loss leader (costco hot dogs).

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#68

Post by worrycue »

maccard wrote: post #61
worrycue wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not how I remembered it. Chrome really was a good browser and I would argue is still a good browser (for now). IE got displaced by Firefox’s predecessors because MS got caught napping - they disbanded the IE team thinking they have won. Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster. Firefox fell behind often enough that Chrome managed to take almost all of its market…

> Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster. I disagree - if that was the case then people would be switching back to Firefox now. Firefox got outcompeted by chrome by Google adding a "works better in chrome" button to their home pages.

Some people do. I switched back and forth. But most people are “low frequency” switchers. Chrome is ahead often enough that most people stick with them.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#69

Post by hutzlibu »

Andrew_nenakhov wrote: post #51
hutzlibu wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Chrome - browsers" And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web. Seperate that and there will be no more chrome as there is no other source of income. (Except maybe a little bit from ChromeOS). Otherwise I get it, it is mostly politics to threaten google to reach this.: "It's quite likely to make Google dump this proposal,…

Well maybe from search engines, who'd pay to be the default search option? So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla.

"So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla."

Yeah, with tracking and ads from the browser enabled by default and by now allmost non existent marketshare. The money from ad companies does not come with no strings attached.

(But I still use Firefox btw.)

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