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DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

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Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#251

Post by hilbert42 »

liopleurodon wrote: post #219
hilbert42 wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Who would possibly buy Chrome?" This is illustrates the extent and magnitude of the problem to fix the internet. That regulators failed to give enough oversight of the internet and to regulate its monopolistic players several decades ago when these problems first became obvious has meant that they are now almost insurmountable. Ideally, Google would be forced to divest itself of Chrome and that Chrome would become a…

may as well just discontinue it then and let Chromium take its place

Yeah, but if Google were forced to divest Chrome then parts of its proprietary code would have to be open-sourced and integrated into Chromium to minimize disruption to users. Alternatively, Google would have to make its services more interoperable.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#253

Post by sidibe »

throwawaythekey wrote: post #145
dnissley wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The revenue and profitability of "the Chrome Company" is going to be far less than Google, since Google's rising tide is what lifted that particular boat. How would the Chrome Company deal with this? Would they do closed source development going forward, no more free lunch for other browsers or shells using Chrome as an engine? How much of a hit does this mean for employees salaries? They are currently making Google…

Firefox makes hundred of millions of dollars in revenue per year. If you assume the same revenue per user and apply it to Chrome's market size (about 30x that of firefox) then you have a top 20(?) tech company in revenue terms. They will have more money than they know what to do with. But yes, going closed source does seem more likely.

Isn't firefox mostly making its money from Google? They'll be struggling too if Google gets out of the browser business and no longer feels the pressure to sustain them

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#254

Post by BadHumans »

phyzix5761 wrote: post #193
jmpetroske wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can look up details of the lawsuit, but the idea is that Google paying Apple to be the default search engine prevents other search engines from competing with Google search. The default search selection has been shown to be quite important. Anti-trust law is built around the idea of maintaining competition - “monopolies” aren’t inherently illegal.

Every company does this though. They pay to be the exclusive or official XYZ of some company or event. For example, Bud Light being the official drink of the NFL. Or Coca-Cola being the exclusive drink that can be sold at the Olympics and many other sporting venues.

Bud Light has a 9.7% market share.

Chrome has a 67% market share. You also missed the entire point of defaults being important.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#255

Post by BadHumans »

4b11b4 wrote: post #160

This doesn't seem helpful... Yet, Microsoft owning Chrome feels better. They are less incentivized to bake in features related to advertising.

Is this sarcasm? Because Windows 11 has a ton of ads and more ads/telemetry are getting added with every update.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#256

Post by philistine »

charliebwrites wrote: post #60

Plot Twist: Google sells Chrome, then immediately forks Chromium and starts a new “completely unrelated” browser with all the same features called “Magnesium”

With those rulings come conditions. Corporations under a judgement under monopoly practices can't do anything they want wily-nily. AT&T, for example, was forbidden from selling computers in 1956.

https://economics.yale.edu/sites/default/files/how_antitrust...

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#257

Post by wmf »

andrewflnr wrote: post #210
kittikitti wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chrome makes enormous sums of money through ads. Also, these companies pay fortunes for default settings like search engines and other backroom deals. Someone could buy Chrome and ask Microsoft for 30% of Bing's search revenue to be the default search engine and Microsoft would agree.

Google makes money from ads by having control of Chrome. I don't see how that would continue if it's spun out. I'm not aware of any ads in Chrome itself (but I've been using FF for years, so what do I know). And Chrome controlling the default search engine is exactly why they want it spun out from Google, so if the result was simply that it makes money by defaulting to a different search engine, that would be an absu…

Imagine if Google isn't allowed to pay Chrome Inc for traffic acquisition so Chrome changes the default search engine to Bing and now Bing is a monopoly because 90% of browsers default to Bing.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#258

Post by hilbert42 »

st3fan wrote: post #225
legitster wrote: post #153

I'm all for competition and increasing consumer choices, but the government is really not making a case that this is supposed to help consumers. The only reason I still use Chrome is because I already use other Google products and they integrate well together. There are many other better options out there otherwise, and they are all free. Breaking out Chrome from Google will not in any way benefit me as a consumer. >…

> The only reason I still use Chrome is because I already use other Google products and they integrate well together. And that is exactly why Chrome should be broken up/out. It is unfair competition. And you say there are many other well working options out there but that is simply not true. Googles web applications work best on Chrome and often break on non Chrome browsers. Mostly because of changes to those web app…

"And that is exactly why Chrome should be broken up/out."

Exactly, we saw this with MS's IE 2—3 decades ago. That governments didn't learn from this and let it repeat with Chrome is so damn annoying.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#259

Post by animex »

legitster wrote: post #153

I'm all for competition and increasing consumer choices, but the government is really not making a case that this is supposed to help consumers. The only reason I still use Chrome is because I already use other Google products and they integrate well together. There are many other better options out there otherwise, and they are all free. Breaking out Chrome from Google will not in any way benefit me as a consumer. >…

By that same logic, Safari is the #1 browser on mobile in the US and should also be spun off.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#260

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

elashri wrote: post #202
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #157

Again, no idea how Google's supposed monopoly of web browsers is worse for the consumer than Apple's actual monopoly on iPhone browsers (they're all Safari under the hood) and on App stores.

The DOJ is after monopoly in search space (and how Google is using chrome position to strengthen the search monopoly) not the browser space itself (Which is another monopoly but to less extend). People don't look into one product and DOJ are not naive to fall into this trap.

Then pass a law that says all browsers must give a choice of search engine.

I'm not sure your right though.

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