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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

#461

Post by 3vidence »

philistine wrote: post #405
cowl wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

we will end up again with edge being dominant just because it's the default one installed by Windows. what you say is nice in theory but you already have the Microsoft backed Edge and Apple backed Safari that are not hamppered by the "need to find a support model" and "not be a loss leader" And I am not looking forward again to a world where Microsoft disctates web development because for all privacy problems peaople…

The point is simple: Google has a monopoly in search and has used its control of Chrome to maintain that monopoly. There is no monopoly in browsers, and the DOJ has evaluated that selling off Chrome will not adversely affect the browser market. If we go from Chrome having 66% market share to Edge having 66%, but in the interim the search market has seen more entrants competing fairly, wouldn't that be a benefit?

Then a year later Microsoft will be sued for anti competitive practices involving edge.

If we just keep selling the browser market to the next trillion dollar company that's not going to fix anything

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#462

Post by aoeusnth1 »

dfabulich wrote: post #360
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,…

It's a common misconception that tons of users manually install Chrome, but Google just pays PC makers to make Chrome the default browser. Chrome is the only browser with a business model that makes sense to do this. Microsoft just doesn't make enough money from Bing/Edge to pay PC makers to leave Edge as the default. Firefox makes no money at all, and makes 95% of its revenue from Google's payments to be the default…

Where on the statcounter page does it show that people are using their default browser? You're making a lot of claims about Chrome commonly being the default browser without linking to any evidence of your correction of this "common misconception" that people install chrome manually.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#463

Post by dboreham »

gscott wrote: post #431
magicalist wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a common misconception that tons of users manually install Chrome, but Google just pays PC makers to make Chrome the default browser Maybe 10 years ago, but which ones do it now? thinkpads and HP machines, at least, ship with Edge as the default. Dell or something? Windows is also _hyper_ aggressive about pushing Edge now too. Like it's nuts how hard it pushes it, to the point that it embarrasses people who do…

If you buy a cheap computer with Windows S it is very hard to get out of the S configuration and in S configuration you can't install Chrome at all or Firefox.

Not very hard in my experience. Not even hard.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#464

Post by 3vidence »

hysan wrote: post #447
nfw2 wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of these business models you refer to rely on some combination of: 1. funding from Google (Firefox) 2. engineering from Google (Chromium) 3. tech giant bundling (Safari, Edge)

I’m a bit confused by this comment. I didn’t mention any of those and didn’t callout any specific business models for browsers. Just that Chrome would need to figure out how to monetize itself like how other browsers are trying to do. Diving into the different business models that other browsers are trying is a very different conversation that needs nuance. For example, how would Brave and Orion fit into your remark?

Brave is built on chromium and thus is being subsidized by Google https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brave_(web_browser)

I think they used to have their own engine but like everyone else found it unprofitable to maintain.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#465

Post by 3vidence »

burnerthrow008 wrote: post #354
colinplamondon wrote: post #294

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. - A pure focus on web browser monetization could lead to some interesting enterprise options. Presumably there'll be a lot of attempts to leverage Chromium, and an aggressive fork at some point. - As AI proliferates, can they pull additional revenue by getting revshare from subscript…

Ok, but if Google is not allowed to pay Apple for search referrals, how exactly will it be legal for Google to pay not-Google-Chrome for search referrals? Chrome's non-iOS market share is probably larger than Safari's market share, so any monopoly considerations about Safari apply equally to Chrome.

Quick answer it won't be. Google will be barred from paying to be default.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#466

Post by dismalaf »

tester756 wrote: post #331
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,…

On Android Chrome is preinstalled and cannot be uninstalled

Which ones? Samsung internet is the default for Samsung devices (which constitute the majority of Android devices in the west) and most (all?) of the Chinese OEMs have their own browser... The only Android devices I've ever had where the default is Chrome are Pixel devices...

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#467

Post by creato »

bo1024 wrote: post #412
theptip wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we are not discussing Chromium. Google’s browser is Chrome, and that product has search exclusivity deals that have been deemed monopolistic. Google could divest the Chrome product and keep contributing to Chromium, but the value proposition is really unclear when that OSS investment doesn’t buy you billions of dollars of browser lock-in value.

Forcing Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers to move to Manifest v3, i.e. deleting the ability from the browser to have good adblockers, is incredibly valuable to Google.

I was just forced to switch from uBO to uBO lite because of this. I can't see any difference in behavior, and now the extension doesn't need unlimited permissions.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#468

Post by xp84 »

knowriju wrote: post #427
mtillman wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

But how will Google divesting Chrome solve this ?

It sounds like they’re also trying to ban Google from paying someone (like Apple) to be default so if they did, Apple might no longer be disincentivized to build their own search engine (or at least do a DuckDuckGo and stick their branding and ads on top of licensed Bing results or something). That would represent more competition. (Although it would probably kill Mozilla too)

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#469

Post by creato »

asadotzler wrote: post #278
mattlondon wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So please enlighten us, how will someone make money from the free product that is free and no one pays for because it is free? Selling user browser data obviously won't fly (and note that Google has never explicitly nor directly sold user's browsing data as far as I know, but they do have a huge ad network that utilises cookies...), so what's the plan? Put ads in the browser? "Premium" features? The only thing I can…

Why won't selling data fly? Why not sell premium features? Why not add affiliate codes to links? Why not sell ads on new tab pages? All of these are fine examples of how a not-Google Chrome could make money. They could even get paid by Microsoft or some other not-Google search for that traffic. This isn't hard unless you're trying to make it hard to convince us all we should just give up and let Google continue runni…

You're making a great case for why most people should prefer chrome to remain a google product.

Re: The DOJ still wants Google to sell off Chrome

#470

Post by creato »

realitysballs wrote: post #167
user3939382 wrote: post #134

If you look carefully at the Chromium project, it’s made up of teams that specialize in different components. The majority of the members of those teams are in turn Google employees. Presumably they have the best qualifications to be on those teams. I don’t see how a DOJ decision against Google would change any of that. Ban Google employees from participating in the project? And then who would replace them?

Think about difference between Brave and Chrome. Both Chromium browsers but Brave is much less intrusive and exploitative of user data. More Brave and less Chrome would allow average user greater privacy and less reliance on large corporations perhaps

They also do really shady things with affiliate links and their scheme to hijack ad revenue from websites.
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