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Google's response to the European Commission fine

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Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#111

Post by jimmywanger »

staltz wrote: post #80
andrepd wrote: post #14

> (...) connecting our users with thousands of advertisers, large and small, in ways that are useful for both . We truly live in the age of spinning, of euphemisms, where words lose all their meaning. All-pervasive advertising, the most insidious technique of consumer capitalism, is now an idealistic connecting of people (why, rather than fining us indeed they should be thanking thanking us for that, they seem to say…

This kind of rhetoric is coming often from tech giants, travestying words and claiming the exact opposite of what they do in practice. There is an interesting parallel to make here with the Soviet Union: they used to set up puppet states which were nominally sovereign, independent, "people's republic", etc, while in practice were obviously just colonies. I guess extremely powerful institutions founded on abusive prac…

> This kind of rhetoric is coming often from tech giants, travestying words and claiming the exact opposite of what they do in practice.

You have provided exactly zero (0) examples of this happening - just accusations. You accuse "tech giants" (whatever that means) of being abusive and deliberately confusing the common person, then you bring up Google's AI infrastructure as an "institution" dressed up in good causes.

When you have examples or really anything besides a huge bias and wild accusations, please contribute to the conversation. Your comment adds exactly nothing except for letting all of us know you don't like large tech companies.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#112

Post by 8draco8 »

VMG wrote: post #73
rini17 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> tech companies prefer to operate outside Any examples please?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_informatio... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_Internet_compa... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_software_c...

I'm not economist but I suspect that such concentration of tech companies in US is due to the fact that it was their home market from where they started. I think that the question was more along the lines: Is there any example of a company that started in EU and moved they main operations to US?

Most companies that are on those lists have also strong EU presence.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#113

Post by rf15 »

HenryBemis wrote: post #57
andrepd wrote: post #14

> (...) connecting our users with thousands of advertisers, large and small, in ways that are useful for both . We truly live in the age of spinning, of euphemisms, where words lose all their meaning. All-pervasive advertising, the most insidious technique of consumer capitalism, is now an idealistic connecting of people (why, rather than fining us indeed they should be thanking thanking us for that, they seem to say…

Although Google has done plenty for Technology and Humanity, when it comes to ads-marketing-tracking they are simply ruthless. Perhaps that penalty will make Google reconsider their stance on respecting everyone (and not just the ones who give them billions). Next horror story to come to your monitors over the next 5 years is monetising on the below: I search for "Item A". One week later I purchase "Item A". 2 days l…

> reconsider

They will not reconsider unless it hurts them more than when they don't act this ruthless. Therefore: needs a heavier fine still :D Crime and exploiting monopolies must not pay.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#114

Post by callumlocke »

It's true that these integrations are convenient for users, but it's also true that they harm market competition.

Google's press release seems to avoid addressing the latter point. The closest they come is pointing out that Amazon also has a monopoly advantage, which doesn't seem like a strong argument.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#116

Post by mirekrusin »

perseusprime11 wrote: post #60
matthewmacleod wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a valid complaint. Fining companies for breaking competition law is totally legitimate.

Sometimes when you go to google search, it will prompt you to download the their app, download chrome, use their native weather, news, etc. It is part of how they iterate on their core search product. If they decide to show Google shopping, isn't that their product decision?

If you're not a monopoly, you can do whatever you want.

Things change when you are a monopoly - ie. you have more than 50% of market share (maybe it's more than 50%, I don't know EU threshold) - then special rules apply - in general you can't use your monopoly position to control other markets.

Prompting to download Chrome may be against EU law. They could give a list of modern browsers if detected an old one for example. I actually don't understand why are they not forced to change it just like Microsoft was few years back?

This law is in power to avoid single company gaining total control.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#117

Post by dazc »

mcintyre1994 wrote: post #29
teekert wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How so? If something is advertising it is clearly labeled and green at the top, right? Or is there more going on?

My impression has always been that comparison sites have affiliate deals for everything they link you to. They're certainly not transparent about that (I'm sure it's in small print somewhere), but I assume it must be the case.

They're not doing it for charity, that's for sure. Not forgetting also one of the biggest affiliate networks in Europe has connections with a media company that has been very active on the lobbying front.

I'm not a fan of the shopping ads but I don't think anyone is mistaking these for anything other than what they - which is paid ads. Comparison sites, oth, in general don't do a good job of disclosure or even comparing prices.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#118

Post by pweissbrod »

callumlocke wrote: post #114

It's true that these integrations are convenient for users, but it's also true that they harm market competition. Google's press release seems to avoid addressing the latter point. The closest they come is pointing out that Amazon also has a monopoly advantage, which doesn't seem like a strong argument.

If youve been in this business long enough you could see how this comment around "convenient integrations" could be applied to Microsoft/IE on the start menu 20 years' back.

Seems to be a thin line between "convenient integrations" and big players reducing choice/competition. I realize I'm not the average consumer but I'll clamor for choice/competition every single time.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#119

Post by IshKebab »

ko27 wrote: post #19
rndmio wrote: post #12

The response from google fails to really address the point from the EU Commission, that they used their monopoly position in search to drive business through their product price comparison service. The utility of the service and the "value of those kinds of fast and easy connections" are immaterial to the reasoning behind the fine.

They are really twisting the commissions ruling to enact sympathy. "The commission said it did not object to the design of Google's generic search algorithms or to demotions as such, nor to the way that Google displays or organises its search results pages: "It objects to the fact that Google has leveraged its market dominance in general internet search into a separate market, comparison shopping."

So we can expect a similar decision against Apple bundling their own apps in iOS, or Microsoft promoting OneCloud in Windows, or Amazon not selling Google Chrome & heavily promoting their Firestick, or Bing doing exactly the same thing as Google (the only difference I see is the placement)?

I think it would be better if Google made it clearer that the shopping search was all adverts, but otherwise this seems idiotic. Every large tech company leverages its dominance in one area to compete in a different market.

Re: Google's response to the European Commission fine

#120

Post by fixermark »

geodel wrote: post #87
pulse7 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"patterns are harder to refute" -> there is also a pattern, how big US tech companies avoid tax payments in EU, it even has a name ("double irish sandwich")

So either EU is grossly incompetent to stop such thing at EU members level or they just think acting against individual companies will generate more fireworks and public support.

It's more that the EU doesn't have the political will to do what is perceived as the common good here.

Ireland has a selfish interest in attracting tech companies, and the rest of the EU can't bring enough political leverage against them to change the legal structures that make Ireland preferable for headquartering.

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