Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

bloomberg.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

461–470 of 1001 posts

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#461

Post by hehehheh »

hilbert42 wrote: post #205
curiouscat321 wrote: post #5

Who would possibly buy Chrome? Letting any of the large tech companies purchase it (the only possible buyers) would just give someone else monopolistic power. Chrome can’t exist as a standalone business without being even more consumer hostile.

"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…

An internet tax could pay for it.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#462

Post by elAhmo »

SpEd3Y wrote: post #417

Arguably out of the big 4 (Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon) Google gave the most back to humanity: Android, Chromium, Kubernetes, Google Office suite, the Go programming language, Tensor Flow, Alpha Fold (and Google DeepMind), donating to Linux, etc. All these are things everyone has access to precisely because Google is such a big player and can afford to lose money on innovation that fails. What did Microsoft and…

Giving back doesn't mean you should be allowed to be a monopoly. Other companies you listed are or have been targeted by DOJ as well.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#463

Post by radicalbyte »

SpEd3Y wrote: post #417

Arguably out of the big 4 (Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon) Google gave the most back to humanity: Android, Chromium, Kubernetes, Google Office suite, the Go programming language, Tensor Flow, Alpha Fold (and Google DeepMind), donating to Linux, etc. All these are things everyone has access to precisely because Google is such a big player and can afford to lose money on innovation that fails. What did Microsoft and…

I agree regards Google (just beware I'm a massive Google fanboy) but I think that Microsoft do deserve at least a little bit of credit.

Microsoft gave us (counting only OSS and things they effectively gave away):

1. Microsoft Basic, the first language of a large number of developers in the 35+ age group. This was effectively given away which is part of why it was so popular (it was a small, fixed-price fee instead of the per-unit licensing)

2. TypeScript

3. C# and the CLR

4. Visual Studio Code

5. Since 2010 they've made large contributions to Open Source.

Commercially they've also been strong competition to enterprise players like Oracle and IBM and of course have done a huge amount for gaming.

Apple are narcissists, they're all take take take. They do, however, provide very strong competition which pushes other players to improve.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#464

Post by SpEd3Y »

felixarba wrote: post #432
SpEd3Y wrote: post #417

Arguably out of the big 4 (Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon) Google gave the most back to humanity: Android, Chromium, Kubernetes, Google Office suite, the Go programming language, Tensor Flow, Alpha Fold (and Google DeepMind), donating to Linux, etc. All these are things everyone has access to precisely because Google is such a big player and can afford to lose money on innovation that fails. What did Microsoft and…

I know it's not comparable to Google, but Microsoft did significantly invest in open source, they also open sourced .NET, made TypeScript, VS Code

Fair. These are good examples of open source that Microsoft did! I love all 3 of those.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#466

Post by sofixa »

Certhas wrote: post #394
matwood wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Splitting off Chrome doesn't make any sense as a stand alone business. Anyone who could buy Chrome would immediately cause other anti-trust issues. This solution for Google is probably bad for consumers. What the DoJ should be pursuing is having Google divest YouTube. Now we're talking real change.

Firefox is massively profitable. Why couldn't Chrome be? Goggle would compete with other search engines for being the default search. So this would have knock on effects on search as well.

Firefox is profitable thanks to Google's money, and Google are probably so generous with them to ensure they have some competition. In the EU, OSes and browsers have to ask the user which browser and search engine they want to use, and an independent Chrome might be forced to follow the same logic. Then Google would have little incentive to splash as much money.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#467

Post by pitkali »

sebstefan wrote: post #458
SpEd3Y wrote: post #417

Arguably out of the big 4 (Google, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon) Google gave the most back to humanity: Android, Chromium, Kubernetes, Google Office suite, the Go programming language, Tensor Flow, Alpha Fold (and Google DeepMind), donating to Linux, etc. All these are things everyone has access to precisely because Google is such a big player and can afford to lose money on innovation that fails. What did Microsoft and…

It tickled me how much power they have over the web. Do web standards even matter when Chromium's implementation is all that matters for 90% of users? I never got over that one either: https://www.tomshardware.com/news/youtube-responds-to-delaye...

Yeah, that kind of sucks. I liked a sibling suggestion that splitting off YouTube would make more sense because at least it could be a self-sustaining product.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#468

Post by tirant »

typeofhuman wrote: post #281
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. >…

This would be like if Tesla made the roads and the roads could recharge batteries but only to Tesla vehicles and you as a Tesla owner saying this is not anti-competitive.

Even as a non Tesla owner I would say that’s not anti competitive if every other OEM is also able to make their own roads, which is exactly the case with Chrome.

There’s multiple browsers, and people might choose Chrome because it has a better ecosystem around it. That means it’s a better product for those people.

Re: DOJ will push Google to sell off Chrome

#469

Post by afh1 »

wesselbindt wrote: post #306

I'm very surprised by the number of people in this thread who don't seem to understand that monopolies are _very_ bad for consumers.

There is no monopoly.

There are a lot of other browsers.

A lot of people use them.

Most people use one of them.

They chose to do it. If you ask them, they think it's good.

But no.

There is a monopoly.

It is bad for you.

Only we the State can save you from it.

A lie repeated a thousand times becomes truth.

Post reply on HN