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The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

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Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#381

Post by Mountain_Skies »

arthurofbabylon wrote: post #181
asdfman123 wrote: post #163

At this point, tech's major competitors are overseas. Never thought I'd be making this argument, but does breaking up the search monopoly help America or up and comers?

Let's not turn into game-theory bros here. Despite the nationalist, pie-dividing rhetoric the billionaires are foisting upon us, it remains favorable to grow the pie with competitive markets.

A bigger pie isn't desirable if most of the slices go to a select few. Or to use Lincoln's rising boats metaphor, a rising tide isn't great if most boats are full of holes.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#382

Post by mtillman »

kweingar wrote: post #320

Here's something I don't understand. If you want to switch your search engine for Safari on iOS, you open Settings, tap Safari, tap Search Engine, and tap your preferred search engine. Not many users do this, and the conclusion is that the default has an unfair advantage. If you want to make Chrome your desktop browser, you open the default browser, search for Chrome, click the correct result, download the installer,…

They don’t allow any search engine in safari now that apple has become an ad network. This is why there’s a weird workaround for Kagi. The search for pay deals are the priority. For those on Mac devices, Orion is excellent now imo.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#383

Post by oaththrowaway »

Ferret7446 wrote: post #376
BearOso wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google pays Firefox ~$500M/year for 2.5% market share, 65% market share should get a healthy annual payout for default search status I'm thinking 500M/year is enough to pay for a lot more developers than they currently have. Even half that should be enough to do more than they are. Where is all this money going?

It's going towards a lot of controversial things unrelated to Firefox development or any open source software development by any reasonable standard. Here's one attempt at breaking down their finances: https://lunduke.locals.com/post/4387539/firefox-money-invest...

That was fascinating. Thanks for posting that

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#385

Post by ThePowerOfDirge »

bearjaws wrote: post #325
asdfman123 wrote: post #163

At this point, tech's major competitors are overseas. Never thought I'd be making this argument, but does breaking up the search monopoly help America or up and comers?

This is the same commentary we had around the time of the ATT break up, and it all worked out fine.

It destroyed Bell Labs https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/07/realestate/severance-lumo...

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#386

Post by karmasimida »

dehrmann wrote: post #206

Who would even buy Chrome? No one's building new browsers, and MS even walked away from the browser game. Mozilla and Firefox haven't been relevant for a decade. The only buyer I can see is private equity, and that's sort of the big boy version of buying an abandoned browser plugin so it can track you and show more ads.

No one.

It will be a be new Chrome entity I guess, spun off the Google mothership. However, how does it make money is very unclear to me, like how? Selling the search bar to highest bidder, a.k.a Google still?

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#387

Post by karmasimida »

asdfman123 wrote: post #163

At this point, tech's major competitors are overseas. Never thought I'd be making this argument, but does breaking up the search monopoly help America or up and comers?

On the other hand, keeping all eggs in one basket, which is Google, in this case, is unlikely to make it more competent against oversea competition anyway.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#388

Post by sneak »

486sx33 wrote: post #366

Chrome is so user hostile and entrapping I don’t know why anyone uses it. It should absolutely be separated and spun off to live on its own and make its own profit.

So are cars and ISPs and streaming services.

It’s because people don’t have a choice.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#389

Post by sneak »

scarface_74 wrote: post #237
geor9e wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Capable is a interesting word choice. Capable means something meets a bare minimum for success. A and B are great. C is fantastic. D is arguably first class. E is capable. When making a free choice, I want the best one, so any lackluster review feels like one of those southern backhanded compliments, getting the message across without insulting it in polite company. Capable perfectly describes my feelings towards Fir…

Seeing that Safari doesn’t drain my battery on my laptop and it doesn’t send my search engine to an adtech company…

It does; Google is the default search in Safari.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#390

Post by sneak »

ivraatiems wrote: post #322

It says something about how universally despised Google and other tech giants are that two presidential administrations who are so acrimonious and diametrically opposed that they have spent much of their time destroying everything the previous one did agree on it. I genuinely can't think of anyone, of any political stripe, outside of Google and its employees and investors, who thinks Google should have the power it h…

Destroying Google’s ability to develop Chrome means that the web dies faster than it already is.

Apple would prefer everyone use native apps, they run an app store. Most companies prefer apps, you can’t modify or inspect them or easily block ads within them. Apps can trap users inside embedded browsers with app-based surveillance, like when you click profile links in Instagram or TikTok.

The world without a free high quality browser is a worse one.

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