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Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

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Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#141

Post by perlgeek »

endisneigh wrote: post #119

It’s not clear to me what the EU, specifically, wants Google to do here from the article. Any insight?

Pay a fine, first of all :-)

Wikipedia has more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antitrust_cases_against_Google...

> In October 2018 Google revamped how it would distribute its Google Play Store with Android in the future: Charging a licensing fee for the store, without requiring installation of Google apps, but making it free to pre-install the Google apps if they want.

> Furthermore, Google's hardware partners will be allowed to market devices in the EU that run rival versions of Android or other operating systems.

> In March 2019 Google announced that it will give European users of Android phones an option of which browser and search engine they want on their phone at the time of purchase to further comply with the EU's decision.

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#142

Post by namdnay »

fatboy wrote: post #106
Normille wrote: post #70

Cool. The EU does have its [many!] faults. But they have a pretty good track record when it comes to consumer rights and consumer choice. Next up I'd like to see them do the same for the plethora of incompatible cordless power-tool systems out there as they did with insisting all mobile phones standardise on a USB connector.

I think that's a bit trickier. If Makita or whoever was forced to change their batteries, anyone with a big catalogue of their tools would be pretty miffed. Also, I've mentioned this on hn before, there is already the Cordless Alliance, which does exactly this. Sadly, there's only a couple of useful-in-a-mainstream-sense brands in there: Mafell and Metabo. The rest are very niche.

I would be wary of this "cordless alliance", the dynamics are closer to that of a kingdom than an alliance... it's basically lots of small(er) german tool manufacturers using Metabo batteries instead of developing their own. Which is great, but not really the same thing as an alliance of equals agreeing to align existing systems

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#143

Post by everforward »

BiteCode_dev wrote: post #92
darkwater wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But this would hit on workers who might be really innocent/unaware, depending on their roles. If you go this way, then just jail current/past executives, it would be more fair.

On the short run, yes. But on the long run, that would be more effective. Once the customers and workers have been burned once, they will be very hesitant to give their trust to the company again. Companies would then have to get their things in order quickly, and win back the trust. A very effective deterrent. Imagine Google being out of the EU market for 3 months. How many youtubers would try and publish their vide…

Google exiting the market for 3 months would have enormous economic impact, in a bad way. They're too integrated into the economy to "just" close them out of the economy for 3 months.

The world could tolerate YouTube being gone for a while.

What about Android though? Is the entire world supposed to replace their phone while Play Services are down, and Android isn't getting security updates?

What about GCP? How many businesses are also going to be shut down when GCP suddenly stops working? They might migrate, but that's not something you can do overnight.

What about Gmail? Email communications would be shattered for a while, since so many people will need a new email provider and will have to distribute that out. God forbid anyone forgot their password and can't reset it because Gmail doesn't work.

What about G Suite? Do all these other businesses just suddenly lose access to their documents? That would royally screw a lot of businesses.

You can't "just" shut down Google without a whole host of second-order effects.

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#144

Post by wara23arish »

layer8 wrote: post #138
endisneigh wrote: post #119

It’s not clear to me what the EU, specifically, wants Google to do here from the article. Any insight?

For example, not require that Chrome be preinstalled as the default browser on Android devices, and not require that a bundle of Google apps be preinstalled if any of them is preinstalled.

there is no way to delete safari from iphones

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#145

Post by RNAlfons »

Normille wrote: post #87
imiric wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I may be able to choose from different manufacturers on the Android side, but on the software side there are just two options. What do you mean by "just two options"? The AOSP ecosystem has a healthy range of ROMs to choose from on many devices. The process of installing alternative firmware may not be for everyone, but the choice is there, which is pretty much nonexistent for iOS devices.

>The AOSP ecosystem has a healthy range of ROMs to choose from on many devices. But it's not true choice is it? It's just the same old same old with a different skin on top. Much the same as the similarly claimed 'choice' in Linux distros pretty much boils down to the same old same old collection of apps running on the same old same old collection of desktop environments. But with eleventy billion superficial skins l…

> But it's not true choice is it?

Compared to what?

Apple?

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#146

Post by origin_path »

Normille wrote: post #70

Cool. The EU does have its [many!] faults. But they have a pretty good track record when it comes to consumer rights and consumer choice. Next up I'd like to see them do the same for the plethora of incompatible cordless power-tool systems out there as they did with insisting all mobile phones standardise on a USB connector.

"consumer choice ... insisting all mobile phones standardise"

Although it's not the most important thing in the world, forcing standardization through law is the opposite of giving consumers choices.

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#147

Post by layer8 »

wara23arish wrote: post #144
layer8 wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For example, not require that Chrome be preinstalled as the default browser on Android devices, and not require that a bundle of Google apps be preinstalled if any of them is preinstalled.

there is no way to delete safari from iphones

That’s Apple’s choice as the manufacturer of the device, while Google enforces conditions on Android device manufacturers. Apple would have the same problem if they would allow other companies to build iOS devices but force Safari to be the preinstalled as the default browser AND derive ad income from the use of Safari.

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#148

Post by Fiahil »

tester756 wrote: post #124
p-e-w wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is essentially nothing. Imagine an individual, caught committing an illegal act of this magnitude for the third time , being fined 1.45% of their annual pre-tax salary, with no other consequences. Speeding tickets are costlier than this in many jurisdictions.

>Which is essentially nothing. Holy shit. Is it some sign of being on HN too much? Sure, 1.45% is small, because % is shitty at representing the real value at this point at the end of the day it's fucking $4 000 000 000 It's year salary of 2200 well paid engineers That's industry-changing level of possibilities

closer to 8000 engineers, if you want to spend 500k/eng in salary alone (pre tax)

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#149

Post by Normille »

tmoravec wrote: post #93
Normille wrote: post #70

Cool. The EU does have its [many!] faults. But they have a pretty good track record when it comes to consumer rights and consumer choice. Next up I'd like to see them do the same for the plethora of incompatible cordless power-tool systems out there as they did with insisting all mobile phones standardise on a USB connector.

> pretty good track record when it comes to consumer rights Are you sure EU has "pretty good track record" with these fines of Google, FB, et al.? If anything, I'd say the EU puts a mild theatre every now and then, and gives the US giants a free pass otherwise.

  >Are you sure EU has "pretty good track record" with these fines of Google, FB, et al.?
I wasn't specifically referring to the Google [and other] anti-trust measures. I was thinking of things along the lines of abolishing roaming charges for mobile phone use, the right to open a bank account in any EU country, the right to work and reside in any EU country, the introduction of the Euro [which I know a lot of people are ambivalent about, but it did get rid of currency conversion charges]. All of which I consider to be 'consumer friendly' actions.

I'm also a European. But unfortunately resident in UK. So all those benefits and more are now lost to me. Still. At least we showed Johnny Foreigner who's boss, eh?

Re: Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B

#150

Post by SiempreViernes »

endisneigh wrote: post #119

It’s not clear to me what the EU, specifically, wants Google to do here from the article. Any insight?

It looks like it's about forcing manufacturers to ship with chrome and the google search widget, so like the old Microsoft forcing IE upon everyone case.
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