Google loses EU appeal and is fined a record $4B • Hacker News Board

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

#31

Post by viraptor » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:09 PM UTC

yieldcrv wrote: post #16

typon wrote: post #9

What amount would these EU fines have to be to make companies like Google and Facebook decide to exit the EU?

probably 15-20% of annual revenue its psychology, the board or ceo would react preemptively based on the idea that shareholders would react on their behalf shareholders (if they have voting power at all) would react for the same result at higher fine amounts than that

Speculation - google would want to operate in the EU even at a loss:

1. Other search engines regularly appearing in news / on screens would remind the non-EU users about alternatives.

2. Lost traffic is lost information. Google still relies on knowing your behaviour to improve targeting.

3. Giving a whole region to other search engines would build up their financial standing and they could threaten Google in other regions in the future.

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

#32

Post by p-e-w » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:11 PM UTC

> This is Google's third EU antitrust fine. Previously, the search giant was fined in a shopping case and an online advertising case.

Apparently, "three strikes and you're out" only applies to individuals, who with a repeat offense of this magnitude would have their lives destroyed by the justice system, and get locked away for a decade or more.

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

#33

Post by mdrzn » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:12 PM UTC

Yesss! EU is doing its job.

I'm very happy every time they manage to give a slap on the wrist of these monopolies

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

#34

Post by ActorNightly » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:15 PM UTC

caldarons wrote: post #2

While I am in favour of efforts like the GDPR to protect users data, I wonder if all this anti-bigtech sentiment is actually justified and where it will eventually lead to

[flagged]

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

#35

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:15 PM UTC

davidguetta wrote: post #20

RandomWorker wrote: post #13

That increases the budget of the eu parliament with 2.2% on a yearly basis if paid out in one go. [1082B for 2014-2020, 4B/1082B*6y~2.2%] A loss of 4B is a decrease of revenue by 1.5% for google. [googles revenue was 256B in 2021 4/256~1.5%]

Quoted post unavailable.

[deleted]

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

#36

Post by otikik » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:15 PM UTC

davidguetta wrote: post #20

RandomWorker wrote: post #13

That increases the budget of the eu parliament with 2.2% on a yearly basis if paid out in one go. [1082B for 2014-2020, 4B/1082B*6y~2.2%] A loss of 4B is a decrease of revenue by 1.5% for google. [googles revenue was 256B in 2021 4/256~1.5%]

Quoted post unavailable.

You mean The European Parlament, or Google?

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

#37

Post by 988747 » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:16 PM UTC

bzxcvbn wrote: post #24

RandomWorker wrote: post #13

That increases the budget of the eu parliament with 2.2% on a yearly basis if paid out in one go. [1082B for 2014-2020, 4B/1082B*6y~2.2%] A loss of 4B is a decrease of revenue by 1.5% for google. [googles revenue was 256B in 2021 4/256~1.5%]

The budget of the EU parliament? What do you mean? The budget of the parliament was about 740k€ in 2022. Did you mean the budget of the EU itself? It's about what you said (180B€ in 2022). Of course, that doesn't account for individual member States' budgets. The EU's budget is dwarfed by the aggregate of all members' budgets, and it is lower than most of the big EU countries' budgets.

Did you mean 740k EUR per person? I can't find the whole budget right now, but it costs EU parliament over 100 million just to move it back and forth between Brussels and Strasbourg (which is totally pointless and is only done so that France can feel important). They also apparently spend 1 billion per year on translators.

EDIT: I guess I offended some French people, hence the downvotes :)

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

#38

Post by nottorp » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:17 PM UTC

> Android has created more choice for everyone, not less

Did it? I can choose between an iOS phone and an Android phone.

I may be able to choose from different manufacturers on the Android side, but on the software side there are just two options.

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

#39

Post by Nasrudith » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:18 PM UTC

viraptor wrote: post #31

yieldcrv wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

probably 15-20% of annual revenue its psychology, the board or ceo would react preemptively based on the idea that shareholders would react on their behalf shareholders (if they have voting power at all) would react for the same result at higher fine amounts than that

Speculation - google would want to operate in the EU even at a loss: 1. Other search engines regularly appearing in news / on screens would remind the non-EU users about alternatives. 2. Lost traffic is lost information. Google still relies on knowing your behaviour to improve targeting. 3. Giving a whole region to other search engines would build up their financial standing and they could threaten Google in other re…

I personally doubt it, mostly because Baidu is a similiar boat and hasn't been a spreading competitor of note in that space. Not apples to apples obviously due to several reasons admittedly, but that is most country to country comparisons.

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

#40

Post by metadat » Thu, Sep 22, 2022, 2:18 PM UTC

rvz wrote: post #25

metadat wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

> What? Did GPT3 write the parent comment? No. Why do you think that is? > This is a multi-billion dollar fine, a $4.1B fine. As it should be the standard and nothing less than that. Even so, this one is a 'generous' multi-billion dollar fine that won't scare them. I am saying it needs to be much higher than that. GPT-3 cannot explain itself or its own comments, can it?

Losing 5% of Google's annual profits will absolutely scare the shit out of them.

Consider how much this harms their ability to keep reinvesting the profits into growing the business. A 5% loss is likely sufficient to get them to stop for a moment and rethink their strategy so the punishment won't recur.

> No. Why do you think that is?

Because you lament the lack of a multi-billion dollar fine when the title states that it's a $4B fine. This comes off as nonsensical and disconnected from reality, in a way that triggered "¯\_(ツ)_/¯, maybe it's GPT3".

With that said, I meant it as a joke, not a serious accusation. The likely explanation here is this comes down to the common case of human confusion.

As a tangential aside:

I can only conclude that due to the curse of knowledge, we collectively are overly paranoid about bot commenters on HN. I was just accused of being a bot just two or three days ago.

Cheers and take care.