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EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

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Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#151

Post by Timon3 »

nonethewiser wrote: post #129
Gareth321 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EMEA is Google's second largest market, and it's not even close for competition. There is no way Google would be willing to cut revenue by $90 billion annually. It would be corporate suicide. The single greatest loss event of investor capital in history. They'll comply, just like Apple will comply with the DMA. They have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. Unlike the U.S., E.U lawmakers can't be bought.

But how much is it from the ad business that the EU is breaking up in this hypothetical?

Why does that matter?

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#152

Post by piva00 »

spacebanana7 wrote: post #103
flexie wrote: post #2

Before anyone makes the argument that the EU should have no jurisdiction over an American entity, please remember that Google sells its services in Europe. It's well within the jurisdiction of the EU to regulate how anyone does business here. Google Ireland alone had a 50B euro turnover. The breaking up of monopolies used to be in the toolbox of American antitrust policies, back when America enforced antitrust legisl…

There are real questions about how much authority the EU has over an American entity. Can the EU only regulate activities in the EU or does it have global jurisdiction? On one hand, if Google simply restructured, spun off or sold its EU ad business the competitive landscape wouldn't change that much. I'm not sure whether a new European competitor could ever become a peer to Google if it could only compete in the EU m…

> Alternatively, the EU having global jurisdiction would have even bigger issue. With that precedent, could Japan or Australia regulate European businesses?

That's already what the USA does to global companies operating inside the US. That's exactly how Cuba has been under a blockade from the US, for example...

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#153

Post by myrmidon »

Fyrezerk wrote: post #10

These rulings for a company of Google's stature/importance are always funny to me. How quickly would public opinion change if Google decided to just shut off their service in the EU for a day? Monopolistic breakups that serve the public's best interest are one thing. But how many people actually care that Google might represent a monopoly? Does it actually affect people negatively if the result is a positive online u…

> How quickly would public opinion change if Google decided to just shut off their service in the EU for a day?

Reframed: If you disrupt customers to avoid complying with local law, customers will perceive YOU to be the problem at least as much as local regulations.

I believe this is a REALLY dangerous move with very little upside and enormous risk for the company under almost any circumstances, which is probably the reason that companies almost NEVER do this.

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#154

Post by nologic01 »

jefftk wrote: post #140
endisneigh wrote: post #99

break every company up! Each "bet" in Alphabet needs to be broken. Each business unit within Google needs to be broken. Same with Apple. Break that up to between services and hardware. Force them to open up their new silicon. Why can't other companies use the H1 or H2 chips for their headphones? why are we letting Apple have the competitive advantage? Open up the App Store and force new payment methods. Microsoft als…

I can't tell whether you're being sarcastic, fyi

its obviously sarcastic. some people have "forgotten" what healthy competition and competent regulation of markets means.

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#155

Post by tremon »

pb7 wrote: post #135
hnbad wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is it about Europe that puts it so far behind the US and Asia in innovation? The US barely produces enough illegal drugs for its own market. If all illegal drug manufacturers cut off the supply lines to the US, the illegal drug trade in the US would tank overnight. What is it about the US that puts it so far behind South American countries in innovation?

You're comparing your populace to drug addicts? Ok then. Producing (recreational) drugs isn't innovation. Drugs don't improve your daily life. Absence of them doesn't make life resemble that of the 1900s. They don't increase productivity allowing you to achieve more with your life. And most importantly, the number of people consuming recreational drugs from SA is a rounding error. Every single person in Europe consum…

They're comparing drug producers to peddlers of surveillance capitalism.

Surveillance doesn't improve your daily life. Absence of surveillance doesn't make life resemble that of the 1900s. Surveillance doesn't increase productivity. And most importantly, the number of people not subject to surveillance is a rounding error. Every single person in Europe is subject to some type of surveillance crafted by American companies, directly or indirectly.

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#156

Post by piva00 »

aurareturn wrote: post #102
jacooper wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and that's great. They don't want surveillance Capitalism.

99% of the people don't care. That's why there are 2.1 billion people on Facebook. Without surveillance capitalism, prices for services would go up or would cease to be free. The ad-driven business model is a legitimate one. I assume that you use a free service from Google/Facebook/Microsoft? So you must not care about surveillance capitalism either. At least not care enough.

> I assume that you use a free service from Google/Facebook/Microsoft? So you must not care about surveillance capitalism either. At least not care enough.

This happens exactly because there is no competition and hence antitrust is needed. I don't want to be using services from Google/Facebook/Microsoft but there's no competition and then I end up using their services even when trying to avoid it as most as possible...

If the prices for services would go up without surveillance capitalism so be it, that's the real price, I want to choose to pay for it, not be coerced into giving them my data for their "free" services. I don't have that option right now, nor anyone else, why are you against freedom of choice?

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#157

Post by permo-w »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #110
Gareth321 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

EMEA is Google's second largest market, and it's not even close for competition. There is no way Google would be willing to cut revenue by $90 billion annually. It would be corporate suicide. The single greatest loss event of investor capital in history. They'll comply, just like Apple will comply with the DMA. They have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. Unlike the U.S., E.U lawmakers can't be bought.

> Unlike the U.S., E.U lawmakers can't be bought. I'm curious if you're so naive to believe that or if you were trolling and wrote that with a straight face. Because cronies like Ursula Von Der Leyen would like to disagree with you.

if EU lawmakers could be bought in the same way US ones can, there is absolutely no way that GDPR or the DMA would have been enacted. this isn't to say that they are completely unbuyable, but look at how much the companies affected had to lose. literally tens of billions in some cases. there's evidence online that they were pumping money into any channel possible to try and stop the DMA, but they failed

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#158

Post by unmole »

Gareth321 wrote: post #82
YetAnotherNick wrote: post #22

Google will rather split up the internet by pulling out of Europe than follow this. And isn't ads the only profitable business Google has? If they sell it, there Google search, Gmail etc couldn't exist.

EMEA is Google's second largest market, and it's not even close for competition. There is no way Google would be willing to cut revenue by $90 billion annually. It would be corporate suicide. The single greatest loss event of investor capital in history. They'll comply, just like Apple will comply with the DMA. They have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. Unlike the U.S., E.U lawmakers can't be bought.

> Unlike the U.S., E.U lawmakers can't be bought.

My sides.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qatar_corruption_scandal_at_th...

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/23/world/europe/schroder-ger...

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#159

Post by api »

jfk13 wrote: post #150
aurareturn wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Now fast forward a decade. Google drop their "do no evil" motto and jack up ad prices. Online store now pays 10 times as much for their ads and have to raise prices to cover the costs. This is just not true and not how Google's ads work. Google has a bidding system. You don't have to pay their prices if your ads aren't profitable. You can pull out. You can go somewhere else. You can try other forms of marketing. Yo…

> If other companies are willing to pay more for the ads, then your product/business/marketing isn't as good as theirs Or maybe you just don't have as much venture capital to burn. Do we really want to live in a world that overwhelmingly rewards whoever is prepared to spend the most on publicity? (How's Citizens United been working out?)

Don’t worry. There’s a hack to get around paying for publicity and that’s to be an obnoxious troll. You can get rich on social media by being deliberately offensive.

Re: EU suggests breaking up Google's ad business in preliminary antitrust ruling

#160

Post by xps »

donatj wrote: post #28
flexie wrote: post #2

Before anyone makes the argument that the EU should have no jurisdiction over an American entity, please remember that Google sells its services in Europe. It's well within the jurisdiction of the EU to regulate how anyone does business here. Google Ireland alone had a 50B euro turnover. The breaking up of monopolies used to be in the toolbox of American antitrust policies, back when America enforced antitrust legisl…

> breaking up of monopolies What’s the monopoly here? There are tons of successful ad companies.

Please name one credible Google Ads competitor.
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