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US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

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Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#671

Post by scarface_74 »

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #367

I'm not sure people understand what the consequences of taking away Google's ad revenue is. If a large enough bank goes under, it takes out not just the bank, but huge sectors of the economy, affecting many more businesses and jobs. That's why the government bailed out the banks when they failed. The same will happen when Google loses its ad revenue. Google is an ad company. By opening up all its trade secret data, i…

Or it will force Google to charge for services - a much more honest transaction.

And you’re just naming random services most of which are already paid products like Google Cloud.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#672

Post by gpt5 »

jmatthews wrote: post #661
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #367

I'm not sure people understand what the consequences of taking away Google's ad revenue is. If a large enough bank goes under, it takes out not just the bank, but huge sectors of the economy, affecting many more businesses and jobs. That's why the government bailed out the banks when they failed. The same will happen when Google loses its ad revenue. Google is an ad company. By opening up all its trade secret data, i…

You essentially outline why it should be broken up. I'm not convinced making the ad tech sector more competitive would prompt that outcome but, "It would disrupt mature products" isn't a compelling argument to allow the existence of a monopoly. Google is a monopoly, they exert monopoly power and enjoy monopoly pricing. I think the more likely outcome would be more dynamic products under smaller bannerheads.

> Google is a monopoly

This argument was stronger a couple of years ago. But search is being commoditized at such a rapid pace that it's not clear that this is true anymore.

When analyst measure companies moats, they measure their strength in years/decades. How many years would you give Google Search at this point?

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#673

Post by diffuse_l »

thaumasiotes wrote: post #666
animal_spirits wrote: post #651

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly disagree. If Google was broken up 20 years ago, nearly ALL the services listed above would not have happened. They are all FREE too, mind you. Everyone would still be paying for email. The enormous amount of free education on YouTube would not have been accessible to the world. The economy that we know today would be vastly different and in my opinion far worse off. So much of the economic growth came off…

> I strongly disagree. If Google was broken up 20 years ago, nearly ALL the services listed above would not have happened. They are all FREE too, mind you. Everyone would still be paying for email. People weren't paying for email before gmail. It was predated by hotmail, Yahoo mail, and innumerable free online email offerings by small players. Being free wasn't even a selling point for gmail; the selling point was th…

Nitpick - Maps and Chrome were also acquisition. Also Android, for that matter

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#674

Post by scarface_74 »

dcow wrote: post #668
animal_spirits wrote: post #658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point. Maybe I'm too young and have bought into the narrative that Google was the first widely available and free email. Still I think though, the plethora of their other services widely available for free (maps, drive, sites, youtube) were extraordinary for the price, at least for me.

Firefox was also extraordinary for the price. point being that Google has never been the only option, just the most popular because why not your gmail is already plugged in.

Firefox is 90% funded by Google ads.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#675

Post by scarface_74 »

lolinder wrote: post #649
jahsome wrote: post #614

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm reading your comment as "someone should have done something a long time ago so it's not worth considering the consequences of doing it now." That fantasy doesn't seem to take into account the specific realities of current day.

No, the comment is saying that the situation is only going to get worse from here. There will never be a better time to solve Google's anticompetitive behavior. The consequences should be weighed and considered, but shrugging and letting Google keep on keeping on because it's too big to fail isn't a viable option.

Which one of those services are a “monopoly”?

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#676

Post by causality0 »

animal_spirits wrote: post #651
BrenBarn wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a large enough bank goes under, it takes out not just the bank, but huge sectors of the economy, affecting many more businesses and jobs. That's why the government bailed out the banks when they failed. That is why the banks should have been broken up into smaller banks long before we reached that point, and it is why Google should have been broken up long ago. The only way to prevent the situation you describe…

I strongly disagree. If Google was broken up 20 years ago, nearly ALL the services listed above would not have happened. They are all FREE too, mind you. Everyone would still be paying for email. The enormous amount of free education on YouTube would not have been accessible to the world. The economy that we know today would be vastly different and in my opinion far worse off. So much of the economic growth came off…

Buddy, Google didn't create YouTube. They bought it and ruined it.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#677

Post by scarface_74 »

fsh wrote: post #410
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #367

I'm not sure people understand what the consequences of taking away Google's ad revenue is. If a large enough bank goes under, it takes out not just the bank, but huge sectors of the economy, affecting many more businesses and jobs. That's why the government bailed out the banks when they failed. The same will happen when Google loses its ad revenue. Google is an ad company. By opening up all its trade secret data, i…

This list is very telling. Instead of a healthy marketplace of companies competing to sell their software and services, we end up with one monopolist who gives away mediocre products and in return taxes everything you buy (in the form of ad spending), and then annoys you with the same ads. How is this a desirable outcome?

The list is mostly BS. Android doesn’t even have a majority market share in any of those services except for Search related services.

And even if Gmail does have a majority of the market, there are plenty of other email providers.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#678

Post by fiddlerwoaroof »

fergbrain wrote: post #660
animal_spirits wrote: post #658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair point. Maybe I'm too young and have bought into the narrative that Google was the first widely available and free email. Still I think though, the plethora of their other services widely available for free (maps, drive, sites, youtube) were extraordinary for the price, at least for me.

> “their other services widely available for free” None of their services are free. You just pay for them in other ways, even if you don’t realize it.

I think this is sort of missing the point: I’m happy to trade a bit of attention here and there for services because I’m just going to go without a lot of things if I have to pay real money for them. If we go to a model where every site charges for usage, I will start using fewer services regularly and will use each service for more things which seems a bit counterproductive in terms of monopolies.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#679

Post by lolinder »

scarface_74 wrote: post #675
lolinder wrote: post #649

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the comment is saying that the situation is only going to get worse from here. There will never be a better time to solve Google's anticompetitive behavior. The consequences should be weighed and considered, but shrugging and letting Google keep on keeping on because it's too big to fail isn't a viable option.

Which one of those services are a “monopoly”?

I didn't use that word and no one in the chain above me did either. I specifically chose "anticompetitive behavior" to emphasize that a monopoly is not required to do damage to the free market or to trigger antitrust action.

Re: US vs. Google amicus curiae brief of Y Combinator in support of plaintiffs [pdf]

#680

Post by colechristensen »

animal_spirits wrote: post #651
BrenBarn wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If a large enough bank goes under, it takes out not just the bank, but huge sectors of the economy, affecting many more businesses and jobs. That's why the government bailed out the banks when they failed. That is why the banks should have been broken up into smaller banks long before we reached that point, and it is why Google should have been broken up long ago. The only way to prevent the situation you describe…

I strongly disagree. If Google was broken up 20 years ago, nearly ALL the services listed above would not have happened. They are all FREE too, mind you. Everyone would still be paying for email. The enormous amount of free education on YouTube would not have been accessible to the world. The economy that we know today would be vastly different and in my opinion far worse off. So much of the economic growth came off…

almost no one ever paid for email, there were many free providers and people got accounts from their isp

google bought youtube 19 years ago because their own attempt was doing poorly and youtube was booming right after its founding, they didn't win in the space because they were good at it, they bought success in a way that probably shouldn't have been allowed

you're acting like google invented ad supported online services

the problem is now that google doesn't have to be the best any more, they can be third best at nearly everything but still own the market share because they can afford to give things away for free which ruins competition

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