
Google Maps accused of unfair competition in France(for being free) - vaksel
http://tech.yahoo.com/news/afp/20090729/tc_afp/franceusinternetgooglecourt
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tumult
Before you get your knickers all twisted up, remember that you can sue for
whatever you want in most countries. It doesn't have to be a valid claim or
have some cultural significance.

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Gormo
I recall Amazon being fined by the French government a few years ago because
offering free shipping was "unfair competition".

It can't be good for innovation when you can sue your competitors simply for
offering better value.

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jhancock
If a company can subsidize a product or service (shipping, free maps so you
make money off ads, etc) at a loss, this is anti-competitive. I'm not saying
it is illegal or immoral. But it most certainly can be an effective
anticompetitive approach. It is reasonable for people/companies/government to
ask if society or their economy has crossed a line in terms of disabling
competition. This is nothing new. The U.S. has/had anti-dumping laws, they
just aren't used these days. Maybe the pendulum will swing back the other way,
who knows.

So when you say "It can't be good for innovation when you can sue your
competitors simply for offering better value." Well it depends. What is value
here? Subsidizing shipping can be seen as both offering value as well as using
capital reserves to kill off competition.

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jacquesm
"The French company provides the same services for a fee and claims the Google
strategy is aimed at undercutting competitors by temporarily swallowing the
full cost until it gains control of the market."

That's going to be a tough one to prove, if that really is their assertion in
the court documents they've basically killed themselves before it even gets
started. Google has a track record of NOT charging for any of their services,
why google maps - and then specifically for France - would be any different
difficult to argue for.

The judge can now simply say, ok, let's wait until that happens, then you can
claim your damages.

And in defense google could simply promise solemnly that they will never
charge French users for access to google maps. (which I assume is their
intention any way).

It's not illegal in France to allow access to a free service. Tough to compete
with free. Adapt or die.

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jhancock
I like free services as well as the rest of us. But Google is making money
indirectly off all/most of its free services. They certainly aren't creating
great products for us out of kindness. There isn't an easy answer here. The
free services are great, I wouldn't want to see them go away. But they are a
component of anticompetitive measures into the market.

Saying adapt or die simply isn't an acceptable answer here. If you have a
great map product but do not own an ecosystem of other products, such as
Google has, you are on the short end of things and the market becomes smaller
and less competitive.

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jacquesm
Absolutely. But let's contrast that with a topic that quite a few of us here
have probably come up against at some point in the past: I used to sell
software, license based. When the open source revolution happened there was
not one free competitor for the kind of software that I was writing, there
were many. The quality wasn't there, the features were not up to spec but the
basic functionality was there so overnight my market dried up.

I could have gone and sued the pants of whoever was 'destroying my market',
but instead I adapted and found new ways to monetize my skills.

Google has a method, and you've correctly identified it as indirectly making
money off a service and that is a principle that is out in the open.

The same with newspapers that suddenly found themselves faced with free
competitors and then on top of that had tons of online competition, also for
free.

Nobody has a 'right' to their businessmodel, whether you have a great product
or not does not enter into the equation, the marketplace is constantly
shifting and you have to be prepared for such shifts.

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jhancock
Good points. I have had my market destroyed in a similar fashion to what you
describe. I also did not think it was the right course to sue my new
competitors that were giving away their product. But if the French want to
have more strict and protectionist controls, so be it, its their economy. It
will be interesting to see how such lawsuits pan out.

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yardie
From the look of it it seems the company is trying to get the courts to prop
up their failing business model. If they think the only way Google can
monetize their operation is by eliminating competition first than they are
seriously deluded. Why only Google? Why not sue mappy, viamichelin, and all
the other companies providing free maps.

Also, you can't sue for just any reason. You have to make a valid case that
the company is doing direct harm to your business. If companies could sue for
any reason the free market would grind to a halt as failed businesses sue
successful businesses for being successful. What you can do is send a stupid
letter and a press release saying you are going to sue. They are hoping Google
will settle before it reaches court, because the judge will take one look at
this case and throw them out on their asses.

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daeken
You _can_ sue for anything. It doesn't mean the Judge won't throw it out or
that you even have a shot at winning, but you can file suit for any reason you
can think up.

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zngtk4
This seems wrong, but Google kind of deserves it -- Google has been involved
in antitrust and other actions against Microsoft (e.g. they have been actively
involved in the recent case against Microsoft in Europe regarding the "browser
ballot"). So they don't really have any right to complain when someone uses
the same types of laws against them.

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Hexstream
Not necessarily. _If_ Google's antitrust claims against Microsoft were true
and in good faith and the new claims against them are false and in bad faith,
the new false claims gain no legitimity from Google's previous claims and they
do have "the right to complain".

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gojomo
Expect this argument to be repeated for other services and in other countries.

Google makes giant profits in AdWords and AdSense core -- where they enjoy a
near-monopolistic market share.

They may then use that money to subsidize free offerings in many other
markets. This could be construed by many antitrust enforcers as unfair
competition, or even 'predatory pricing' if in fact it seems part of a long-
term strategy to make money in the targeted markets after the competition has
been driven away.

Google is concerned about such an argument; I just googled for [antitrust
subsidize] and the top hit was:

"Google Public Policy Blog: Is free an antitrust issue?"

[http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/07/is-free-
antit...](http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/07/is-free-antitrust-
issue.html)

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megaman821
I thought Google Maps is free only when publicly viewable. If you have a pay
site or want to include it in pay software you have to buy it. So the French
company has issue with Google's business strategy for Maps not that it is free
(because it is only free to some).

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graphene
An aspect of this I feel hasn't been addressed is that in this case, the
product of the commercial activity is information (in the form of a map),
which has a reproduction cost tending to zero. This will of course make it
difficult to sell profitably (the fact that in most cases the information
costs energy to produce, is beside the point).

To those who would argure that this is unfair competition, I would ask whether
they would feel the same about an encyclopaedia company suing wikipedia, or
the publisher of "Blurb for dummies" suing the guy who put a Blurb tutorial on
his website.

I would contend that there is no viable market here in the first place. The
example of Google maps proves my point, Google having to make money selling
ads, instead of the information itself.

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dantheman
I can't believe the number of apologists posting on this thread, even claiming
that's it just an ordinary lawsuit is ridiculous -- it should be thrown out of
court as soon as its presented.

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cabalamat
In related news, Perrier sues tap water, claims unfair competition. :-)

