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EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

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Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#61

Post by nolok »

maccard wrote: post #55
nolok wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's malicious compliance with the intent of having the users misunderstand what's happening (that you don't have to do that but do it on purpose, and instead blame the law protecting them). And eh, it works for the cookie banner so why change the strategy ? The comment you're answering to prove it still works. As long as people can't be bothered to think and inform themselves for a second about it, they won't stop.…

Well no, the cookie banner is a well intentioned but flawed and poorly designed law. Any law that is that technically specific but relies on people without an understanding of how it works is doomed to repeat the same fate. The eu should have seen prop 65 and not sleepwalked back into it.

1. The EU works on intent of the law rather than specific wording and precedence.

2. The law is a very simple "if you want to do it, you have to make sure they know", intended to force information without creating excessive administrative / legal / tech burden, please inform me about what other way you would present it that would reach the goal without being subject to malicious compliance ?

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#62

Post by aabhay »

vrganj wrote: post #58
qq66 wrote: post #5

The EU has found a clever way to charge US tech companies for market access without triggering a WTO violation.

Look, US tech services can either follow our laws our they can get the fuck out of our market. The way people treat them breaking our laws as their god given right and then frame our fine as anything but their own fault is starting to really annoy me. Respect our sovereignty, follow our laws. Or don't, but then don't be surprised that breaking the law is punished. Maybe things are different in the US, maybe corporate…

While there is “law”, how much agency does an average European individual have in shaping those laws? This is a multi national body for which you can’t vote for its leader. You can’t vote on any of its resolutions or referendums.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#63

Post by watwut »

maccard wrote: post #55
nolok wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's malicious compliance with the intent of having the users misunderstand what's happening (that you don't have to do that but do it on purpose, and instead blame the law protecting them). And eh, it works for the cookie banner so why change the strategy ? The comment you're answering to prove it still works. As long as people can't be bothered to think and inform themselves for a second about it, they won't stop.…

Well no, the cookie banner is a well intentioned but flawed and poorly designed law. Any law that is that technically specific but relies on people without an understanding of how it works is doomed to repeat the same fate. The eu should have seen prop 65 and not sleepwalked back into it.

Then again, the very same people complain about GDPR not being technically super specific.

At some point we have to accept the pattern. People with ideological objections against any limits at all will try to frame any regulation as stupid, regardless of what is in it.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#64

Post by YetAnotherNick »

anonymous_user9 wrote: post #2

For reference, that's 0.25% of Alphabet's revenue last year.

That reference doesn't matter. The reference that matters is profit due to presence in Europe market. If it is lower than fines per year, it makes sense to pull out of the market.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#65

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

arka2147483647 wrote: post #14
plufz wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Im sure you are right, but I’m not sure what you mean. I can search for an address fine in search and I get an embedded map that I can click to open Google Maps. How does it work in the US?

Does not work for me. Presumably there is some popup you have to accept somewhere for it to work.

If you click on the address result (the button in the map), it will normally work.

Mostly tested on Firefox on Mac in the EU.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#66

Post by vrganj »

aabhay wrote: post #62
vrganj wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look, US tech services can either follow our laws our they can get the fuck out of our market. The way people treat them breaking our laws as their god given right and then frame our fine as anything but their own fault is starting to really annoy me. Respect our sovereignty, follow our laws. Or don't, but then don't be surprised that breaking the law is punished. Maybe things are different in the US, maybe corporate…

While there is “law”, how much agency does an average European individual have in shaping those laws? This is a multi national body for which you can’t vote for its leader. You can’t vote on any of its resolutions or referendums.

For the Council, it is literally just a grouping of our democratically elected heads of state. Those we can of course vote for according to our countries own democratic systems.

For the Commission, our democratically elected national governments each send a representative, so those are as elected as any minister in government is.

For Parliament, the EU demos elects directly.

Not sure where the issue is? It all seems more democratic to me than, say, the Electoral College.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#67

Post by poloniculmov »

esterna wrote: post #37
phiresky wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU told them they can not by default prefer their own maps product when linking from their search product, they have to allow the user to choose. They could have simply added a selector when a user first clicks on the maps preview in the search result, and then remembered it on device or across that user's account. But of course, then the user could choose a competitor's product and Google would have to honor it.…

I wonder if the EU will someday figure out a patch for this "Deteriorate everyone's user experience in a way that is technically compliant and blame the EU" behavioural exploit...

I'm blaming Google for this, but most people just don't know why it happens. Probably they'll end up mandating that Google must show a notice with the reason and it will be implemented in the worst possible way.

All of these hissy fits Google and Apple are throwing are just making me wanting to use them less and less and I'm doing my best to explain how tech companies are doing malicious compliance to others.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#68

Post by ukoki »

esterna wrote: post #37
phiresky wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EU told them they can not by default prefer their own maps product when linking from their search product, they have to allow the user to choose. They could have simply added a selector when a user first clicks on the maps preview in the search result, and then remembered it on device or across that user's account. But of course, then the user could choose a competitor's product and Google would have to honor it.…

I wonder if the EU will someday figure out a patch for this "Deteriorate everyone's user experience in a way that is technically compliant and blame the EU" behavioural exploit...

The solution is to mandate that websites are built for browsers/devices as much as they are for humans. That way you never see a cookie banner because you've set up your device to never accept marketing cookies; A Google Maps link clicks through to Google Maps because you told your browser Google Maps was your preferred online mapping tool.

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#69

Post by nolok »

mrtksn wrote: post #60
f6v wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if Google hadn't gained a monopoly status Google Maps wouldn’t have been in its current sorry state What's up with Google Maps? It's great for me.

On mobile its navigation is terrible, takes you into strange routes that might be technically faster but are hard to drive at or sometimes non-existent. Sometimes tries to be smart, makes everything worse. i.e. suggest a route that it says its 5 min faster and shows no traffic and you find out that there's no traffic because of a road closure further ahead. The UI when driving is not as good as the competition. I onl…

It was a not specified but clearly meant part of his question that it's asking in the context of "... that could be tied to decoupling".

Eg this has nothing to do and thus can't be hand-wavy blamed on for things like "On mobile its navigation is terrible, takes you into strange routes that might be technically faster but are hard to drive at or sometimes non-existent. Sometimes tries to be smart, makes everything worse. i.e. suggest a route that it says its 5 min faster and shows no traffic and you find out that there's no traffic because of a road closure further ahead. The UI when driving is not as good as the competition. I only use it because it has superior business listings with decent reviews and photos."

Re: EU Fines Google $1.02B for Favoring Its Own Services

#70

Post by patrickmcnamara »

phiresky wrote: post #21
plantain wrote: post #10

It drives me insane when in Europe the link between Google Search and Google Maps is broken and I often have to copy paste an address between the two. Thanks EU, what if I like Google's integrations?

The EU told them they can not by default prefer their own maps product when linking from their search product, they have to allow the user to choose. They could have simply added a selector when a user first clicks on the maps preview in the search result, and then remembered it on device or across that user's account. But of course, then the user could choose a competitor's product and Google would have to honor it.…

They could also just have their maps and others show in the results as normal.
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