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European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

europa.eu

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Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#211

Post by clarry »

nothrabannosir wrote: post #24
clarry wrote: post #3

Promoting your own product above competitors' is ok unless you're big. Ok, I get it. But I don't agree with it.

Controversial way to look at this, but surprisingly close to the truth: markets exist for the people. Companies have only one purpose: to serve the people. Their profits are merely incidental. Any type of regulation (or lack thereof) can be traced back to this rule. Freedoms exist only to let companies thrive insofar as that then lets them sell goods that benefit the people. Once that stops, the freedoms stop. I'm be…

Integration of services and software could best serve the people. Promotion may do so too, especially when it comes to software that relies on network effects.

If anything, punishing a big company for its potentially big effect on markets values 1) markets above people and 2) competitors' ability to participate on the market above the people.

Banning integration or self-promotion could very well result in a worse product overall that serves people worse.

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#213

Post by devoply »

tokenizerrr wrote: post #209
devoply wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay say that this is true, then if you want any sort of decent user experience you MUST let Google track you and analyze your behavior. So many ways for Google to win. So many ways for the user to lose. I do run a bunch of stuff on my Firefox to prevent that, perhaps that's a reasonable explanation as to why. Google owns the server, Google owns the client, Google owns DNS, Google owns domains, Google even owns > 50%…

Yes that is pretty much the entire idea. If you don't let them track you, they don't have a reasonable assurance that you're a real legit non-malicious human being. So you get to fill out the actual captcha. Pretty sweet deal, yeah? 99% of the population gets an easy checkbox, and all the people who care just need to fill out some questions to prove they're not a bot. It's not like you're blocked from using the form.

99% of the population. Last time checked significant portion of the population uses various tools including ad-blockers, and other privacy tools to decrease their online foot print. So that point is wholly incorrect. You mean significant portion of the population who does not mind being tracked constantly by Google. Most likely the most unsavy masses. Not anyone that cares about their privacy.

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#214

Post by sweden »

HerraBRE wrote: post #188
sweden wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But in order to make the advertising business very profitable (this is, in order to give a reason for other businesses to use Google Ads to advertise themselves), Google needs to know all about you: who you are, where you are, what you like, what you don't like, what you like at certain times, what are your needs, etc, etc. The real value of advertising is in showing the right advertisement at the right time at the r…

It's still a means to an end. You don't pay with your data, you "pay" by interacting with ads. Consider that Google actually became super profitable well before all the detailed tracking started. You grossly underestimate the synergy of "people searching for products" and "displaying ads". Everything else is an optimization. You're describing Facebook... which is no where near as profitable as Google, in spite of muc…

You are wrong that by stating that if we don't click on ads or use adblockers we are costing money to Google.

Even if you don't use the ads or if simply ignore them, you still represent a group of interests that can be used to feed and train the machine.

Google learns through the searches you make and through the videos you watch and your behaviour will be used to improve the accuracy of ads shown to other people. That's your payment for using Google's services.

The only reason people stop interacting with ads it's because ads don't bring any real value, And any data that Google might collect brings up that value a lot.

I think you underestimate a lot of the number of people unaware of Google's presence and influence when it comes to advertisement. This number is much bigger than the number of people who install adblock on their browser.

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#216

Post by easytiger »

goodplay wrote: post #150
theBobBob wrote: post #72

The thing is, personally I prefer getting integrated results from Google's other search services when I do a Google search. I like getting Google Maps results when I search for a location, I like getting Google Flights results etc. When I do a Google search I am not just using it as a simple website search. I want it to use it to search the whole Google suite of services. If they are forced to stop doing this it will…

Anecdotal experience: I switched browsers on android because android's default browser kept opening map links in google map. Firefox mobile didn't seem to suffer from that issue. While google's tight integration lead to a positive experience for you, it lead to a very poor experience for myself or others who want to use something not google. I'm not asking for the EUC to fine google, I'm asking for choice.

> opening map links in google map

Clear down the default intent then

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#217

Post by IanCal »

mythz wrote: post #159
IanCal wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is a ridiculous figure, how can they come up with a figure more than 2x times the amount of the previous record (for Intel's egregious behavior) for deciding what content goes on their own platform, which wasn't previously known to be illegal By following the rules & regulations set out, which Google will have been fully aware of. This is explained in the link and should not have required calling it "ridiculou…

> By following the rules & regulations set out, which Google will have been fully aware of. There was no previous ruling that indicated that displaying their own relevant content on their own Search pages was illegal. It's absurd to think displaying relevant content in the context of what the User is searching for is illegal, or that they should've been investing resources in helping their competitors get more exposu…

Are you suggesting the ruling is out of line with the regulations?

Previous anti-trust rulings seem pretty similar to me. If microsoft gets into trouble for making IE a default browser or bundling windows media player, I'm really not surprised with the way this went.

> It's absurd to think displaying relevant content in the context of what the User is searching for is illegal

It's not absurd to think that using your dominance in a market to heavily push people towards your own other services is illegal.

The Commission also note that it's not just the relevance of the link, but the position that makes a big difference.

> b) Furthermore, the effects cannot just be explained by the fact that the first result is more relevant because evidence also shows that moving the first result to the third rank leads to a reduction in the number of clicks by about 50%.

Since the introduction, it massively increased click-throughs to their already available service, with a corresponding huge decrease to competitors.

Was their own service good?

> Contemporary evidence from Google shows that the company was aware that Froogle's market performance was relatively poor (one internal document from 2006 stated "Froogle simply doesn't work").

So to be clear the problem is that they had a pretty naff service, which when treated similarly to other players lost out. They then promoted it far above other results, resulting in a huge shift towards them and away from their competitors. They did not compete by making the service better, but by using their huge dominance in one market to step into another and significantly harm the other players.

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#218

Post by [deleted] »

listentojohan wrote: post #43
sguav wrote: post #14

Google's flagship product is the Google search engine, which provides search results to consumers, who pay for the service with their data. anyone else finding the plainness of that last sentence to be staggering? ...

It's pretty much spot on.

[deleted]

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#219

Post by briandear »

kuisch wrote: post #133
mythz wrote: post #100

This is a ridiculous figure, how can they come up with a figure more than 2x times the amount of the previous record (for Intel's egregious behavior) for deciding what content goes on their own platform, which wasn't previously known to be illegal? What do they want to force Google to do now, prohibit being able to advertise on their own platform? give their competitors priority placement for free? How many rival com…

As stated in the press release, the fine has been calculated on the basis of the value of Google's revenue from its comparison shopping service in the 13 EEA countries concerned, taking into account the "duration and gravity" of the infringement. What the commission is asking is simply equal treatment between rival comparison shopping services and its own.

When I visit rivalshoppingservice.com then I would expect to see that rival shopping service. When I visit google, I would expect to see google.

Are the rivals going to be required to show google results now or is this really not about choice but about crippling google or is it about extracting an easy multi-billion dollar payday?

When I go to the SNCF (French rail) website, are they showing me flight and bus options or only their train results?

Nobody is forcing anyone to visit google. It’s a website. Perhaps if the EU really cared, they’d ask themselves why Europe hasn’t produced a credible Google rival.

That settlement money ought to go directly to funding EU startups. Instead it will likely make its way into CAP agricultural subsidies. The Common Agricultural Policy is about 35% of the entire EU budget despite supporting an industry that that is just 1.6% of EU GDP. It’s clear that the EU prioritizes some industries over others and then they wring their hands when American tech becomes ubiquitous.

Re: European Commission fines Google €2.42B for abusing dominance

#220

Post by piva00 »

devoply wrote: post #183
Aaargh20318 wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Say that this is true. Google can only use its own data from its own browser to improve the web and penalizes everyone who is not using their browser. No, it also works on other browsers. I know because I exclusively use Safari and I encounter this one-click-captcha thing regularly. The thing is it only works on browsers you use regularly. It looks like they are analysing/tracking the behaviour of your browser (usi…

Okay say that this is true, then if you want any sort of decent user experience you MUST let Google track you and analyze your behavior. So many ways for Google to win. So many ways for the user to lose. I do run a bunch of stuff on my Firefox to prevent that, perhaps that's a reasonable explanation as to why. Google owns the server, Google owns the client, Google owns DNS, Google owns domains, Google even owns > 50%…

Yes, you must. Or you will encounter the normal annoying captcha like I do and I don't complain because it's my own decision to not be tracked and I know there are consequences for profiling and live with it.

You can't have your cake and eat it too, either you are for privacy and should expect the hassles this create or you want the convenience and have to pay with your privacy for it.

I don't really understand why are you pressing so much on this issue, you have choices with tradeoffs, as most things in life.

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