
Android users in Europe will be asked which browser and search engine they want - ucaetano
https://www.blog.google/around-the-globe/google-europe/supporting-choice-and-competition-europe/
======
mythz
> we’ve always agreed on one thing一that healthy, thriving markets are in
> everyone’s interest.

We're so much in agreement that we're only going to trial that healthy,
thriving market in the EU - where we're legally obligated to.

~~~
Mirioron
That's because it's going to cause frustration in users. I guarantee it.

~~~
slim
Operating an Android phone for the first time involves going through a wizard
for setting up things like language, timezones, wifi, etc.. one more screen in
that wizard does not add any frustration

~~~
Mirioron
It creates more frustration. Going through that wizard annoys people. It
particularly annoys people that speak languages that aren't very widely
spread, because the language phones use isn't always easy to understand.

------
aboutruby
> On Android phones, you’ve always been able to install any search engine or
> browser you want, irrespective of what came pre-installed on the phone when
> you bought it.

 _cough_ _cough_ _cough_ , that google search bar in the home screen by
default is pretty Google Search specific.

~~~
0815test
It's integrated in the launcher, which is a replaceable part of the system.
Just pick a launcher that doesn't have it, or makes it optional.

~~~
acct1771
Your parents: "Wait...say that again?"

~~~
parthdesai
At least there is an option if you want to. Compare to that to the Android's
biggest rival, where different browsers are glorified skins on top of Webkit.

------
angott
It will be interesting to see how the different browser choices will be
presented. If the EU commission pushes for browsers to be featured with a few
lines of text and not just an icon (like they did back in the days with MSFT),
it could be a significant problem for Google.

Example: Mozilla would be able to advertise that Firefox provides ad-blocking,
as opposed to Chrome which doesn't. This has the potential to hurt mobile
advertising revenue significantly.

~~~
minxomat
Listing unique benefits was how the old msft implementation worked:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserChoice.eu](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserChoice.eu)

------
lostmsu
I like their title

> Supporting choice and competition in Europe

Like it was their initiative!

~~~
jake_the_third
And only in the EU...

Hey Google, how about supporting choice and competition in the rest of the
world?

------
qwerty456127
Probably as useful as the cookie warning law.

If this meant the Google stuff was not going to be installed if you choose
different and the device was still going to be fully functional (you could
still install apps from the store) that would be something but I doubt this is
the case.

By the way, why do they use the Chinese《一》character instead of hyphens?

~~~
boulos
> By the way, why do they use the Chinese《一》character instead of hyphens?

Are you sure that’s not an emdash?

~~~
zapzupnz
Copy and paste the character then run it through a search engine, is
definitely the Chinese/Japanese character for 'one'.

~~~
benatkin
Maybe it's a watermark technique.

~~~
zapzupnz
I don't think so, I can't see what the point would be. Why watermark a blog
post, incidentally making screen readers read out weird things, affecting
accessibility?

------
Smithalicious
So what's the point? You could always install a different browser and search
engine, and that really isn't so difficult that an average user couldn't
figure it out. I'm all for combating anticompetitive practices but this really
doesn't look like one. This just gives me a "users are idiots" vibe.

~~~
angott
> that really isn't so difficult that an average user couldn't figure it out
> [...] This just gives me a "users are idiots" vibe

It's not a matter of difficulty, but rather a matter of awareness. Based on my
experience from friends and family, I have reason to believe there is a
significant chunk of Android users who don't know they can use an alternative
default browser. Most people just click on the Chrome icon that comes built-in
at the bottom of their home screen, and that's all for them. It's not the
average HN user we are talking about, obviously...

~~~
Mirioron
Yes, and now that average user goes: why can't I use the internet on my phone?
It gives me this stupid pop up and I don't know how. Please fix it.

------
sanxiyn
A great day for consumer choice. US should do the same. (They did for
Microsoft!)

~~~
jwr
Fat chance, with the amount of lobbying in Washington DC by Google.

------
roasm
Non-European here. Does iOS have to do the same thing?

~~~
sigzero
Probably not since Apple doesn't license iOS to anyone else and solely
controls it.

~~~
roasm
Does that matter? I would think it would have to do with market share more
than any licensing. iOS has ~28% share in the EU.

[http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-
share/mobile/europe](http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/europe)

~~~
ucaetano
It matters, the EC defined the market as "licensable mobile operating
systems", and not "mobile operating systems".

If they were looking at "mobile operating systems", their antitrust ruling
would make no sense.

------
DeonPenny
Doesn't this subvert googles entire reason for building Android. Shouldn't
they just start charging in europe to use the software there? Like is would
incentivize them to push updates for europe

------
Mikeb85
Just an anecdote here, but I use Google and Chrome on Linux, where it's not
default, as well as Android.

------
billpg
How do I get my browser on the list?

(And it totally is a browser and not some keylogger and bitcoin miner with a
copy of lynx on top.)

------
callahad
The cynic in me is worried that Google taking its ball and going home: if
Chrome can't be the default, then nobody can.

I'm excited for increased choice, but Google is starting this race from a
position backed by a decade of anti-competitive licensing agreements around
Android. From the press release, this move seems designed to preserve that
lead by preventing other vendors from offering meaningful defaults.

I'd be especially curious to hear from the Samsung Internet team, as the press
release states that Google will be "asking users of existing and new Android
devices" which browser they would like to use.

------
shkkmo
Why just Europe?

~~~
Pharmakon
Because the EU has a history of at least pretending to care about consumer
rights, and (more) aggressively going after anti-competitive practices?

~~~
Mirioron
Yeah, and this pretending comes at the annoyance of the end-user.

~~~
krageon
I've never met a real person that's actually annoyed at these regulations,
only spurious internet humans.

~~~
Mirioron
You've never met anyone in real life that is annoyed by cookie pop ups? I find
that hard to believe.

~~~
krageon
In much the same way most people don't care at all about advertising modals
save for maybe a grunt meant to signify some annoyance, most people don't care
about cookie popups.

------
bfrog
I can only read so much horse manure in one sitting, bravo google, bravo

------
cronix
Sure, we'll allow you to change that stuff!! (thank goodness they didn't ask
what the OS itself is collecting)

------
rk404
I wish Google would take a page from Apple's book and be more forceful with
their public responses to this stuff.

Basically like Apple saying that they invest in their products and Spotify
just wants a free ride (which I agree with) Google has an even better case as
they also let users sideload apps and change defaults.

~~~
Barrin92
>Basically like Apple saying that they invest in their products and Spotify
just wants a free ride (which I agree with)

nobody's going to use a phone that isn't supported by applications. In fact
every application provided by developers to the apple ecosystem increases the
marginal value of the phone. In what world is that free riding? And why would
anyone support this egregious behaviour of giant companies commanding around
the rest of the market?

~~~
ViViDboarder
Commission for marketing and/or maintaining a platform for sale is not
uncommon... They’ve got a store, and if you’d like to sell there then you have
to pay a commission.

My real issue is that there is no alternative. You can’t opt out and use a
different store.

~~~
Barrin92
>Commission for marketing and/or maintaining a platform for sale is not
uncommon

I think this would be a strong point if commissioning the store was the
primary means of income for apple. But apple strategically uses the fees to
attack their competitors. Squeezing spotify for example with a 30% fee while
at the same time pushing out apple music for a ~30% lower price.

That in my mind is not a content agnostic platform seeking to make money as a
service provider, but leveraging a platform to attempt to gain monopolistic
power by force.

------
scarejunba
Oh Christ. I wish I could just express "give me your version" as a setting on
some universal identity service and they'd leave me alone.

------
Theodores
"Which interface to the Webkit/Blink browser technology do you want?"

"Which provider of Google Search results do you want?"

I will cheekily assume Microsoft are still craftily getting Google search
queries into Bing somehow. And that Duck Duck Go, Ecosia, Yahoo and everything
else are dipping into the Google goodness.

The EU should build their own search engine and browser. That is what is
happening in places like Russia and China where they don't want to be reliant
on Silicon Valley.

It seems silly to be not view information search and presentation of web pages
as a strategic thing in this day and age, particularly when there is Five Eyes
snooping in.

~~~
saagarjha
> I will cheekily assume Microsoft are still craftily getting Google search
> queries into Bing somehow. And that Duck Duck Go, Ecosia, Yahoo and
> everything else are dipping into the Google goodness.

What?

~~~
sam0x17
He is saying that non-google search engines are just repackaging google search
results because no one actually has the resources to build a search engine
anymore. Bing was already caught doing this like 10 years back if I remember
correctly, and while I doubt Bing still does this, I bet a number of the
smaller players do.

It's as easy as setting up a lambda with headless chromium and then
integrating those results into whatever internal results your system has (if
any) on the fly. Google is fast enough that this could be done without any
perceptible performance impact, and that's ignoring the possibility of massive
caching of common searches. It will look like normal web traffic to google,
and the lambda network will result in a diversity of IP addresses, so it might
never get flagged.

~~~
thekyle
I presume you are referring to AWS Lambda in which case wouldn't the IP
addresses be within the IP range used by AWS? If so, Google might have already
blocked those IPs.

~~~
sam0x17
Yes, except they haven't because I've done exactly this in a lambda with no
issues.

