
Google’s Rivals Gear Up to Make Antitrust Case - drkimball
https://www.wsj.com/articles/googles-enemies-gear-up-to-make-antitrust-case-11561368601?mod=rsswn
======
seltzered_
Somewhat related, last month there was an 'antitrust and competition
conference' at chicago booth school of business, and their videos came up last
weekend.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wu9q5fb6MO0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wu9q5fb6MO0)
is one of the panel videos with some interesting arguments:

FB's free basics implementation in Brazil is free for facebook-owned
properties (e.g. whatsapp), but not for general website usage. Claire Wardle
argues this creates a problem where free basic internet users are less
motivated to fact-check things (
[https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=1231](https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=1231) ,
specifically
[https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=1340](https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=1340)).

Barry Lynn of Open Markets had an interesting quote I'm still trying to think
about -
[https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=2523](https://youtu.be/Wu9q5fb6MO0?t=2523) \-
"The issue is not that the price is free, the issue is the price is imposed
outside the market. The issue that price is a function not of competition, but
a tool of power. Without a public price, you don't have a public. Without a
public, you can't protect democracy."

~~~
bduerst
Facebook Free basics also suffers the Tom's Shoes problem [1] - basically by
giving away the free service in a developing country, it kills the local
economy for the same service and sets it back, not forwards. By saturating the
ISP market, Facebook is hindering ISP development in Brazil.

This would be less of a problem if Facebook offered net neutral internet
service but they're not - FB is only offering free access to theirs and a
handful of partners websites. It's charity message of bringing "free internet
to people who don't have it" is a red herring to the problems it presents.

[1] [https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/one-one-
business...](https://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/one-one-business-
model-social-impact-avoiding-unintended-consequences/)

~~~
z3t4
It's probably Hanlon's razor. But if FB have altruistic motives they should
only offer their service where no commercial alternatives exist.

~~~
zrobotics
If they were motivated by altruism, wouldn't they offer full web access
instead of limiting it to Facebook & Wikipedia? What motivates them is finding
their next billion users in any way possible.

------
sandworm101
Facebook. Google will point to facebook's news feeds and internal mechanism as
evidence that Google is not alone in terms of news and information linking.
Similarly, there are many legitimate competitors in search. DuckDuckgo is a
minor player, but microsoft's Bing isn't.

I think that Google is far too big, but I just don't see an antitrust case in
the areas of news or search. Oldschool advertising would seem an option but
that is a decreasing area, not the place to make real change going forwards
imho. I'd like them to break up youtube, but there too Facebook's video
sharing is a valid competitor.

~~~
loudtieblahblah
> DuckDuckgo is a minor player, but microsoft's Bing isn't.

DuckduckGo, Qwant, and Bing are all the same player.

DDG and Qwant just pull Bing results.

Bing is the only real competitor to Google.

>or search.

Erm. I think it's absolutely there on search. The existence of competitors
doesn't negate monopoly status.

And the accusation can be legitimately claimed, that they use their monopoly
status in one market (search) as leverage to give other services in different
markets a leg up over the competition.

MS can't leverage Bing for the same - no matter how integrated Bing might be
into other products.

If Google tells people to use AMP or be de-ranked, that's monopoly power. Flat
out.

~~~
mrweasel
>DDG and Qwant just pull Bing results.

It there a source for this? People keep saying that DDG is just Bing, but I
can't find any indication of that actually being true. Sure, they may be using
Bing results, but they're seem to be mixed with result from other sources.

The only post I ever found on the subject is Gabriel Weinberg saying that DDG
is not just Bing.

~~~
Yizahi
Yeas, for russian segment it is Yandex. There is basically 4 real search
engines left in the world - Google, Bing, Yandex, Badoo.

~~~
rococode
Baidu in China too, but like Yandex it's another region where Google has
struggled to establish a strong presence.

~~~
jefftk
I think "Badoo" above was a typo for "Baidu"

------
tehjoker
I think it's important to remember that when we talk about competition, it
doesn't mean pick between two companies, one if which is much stronger. Strong
competition would mean dozens to hundreds of sustainable entrants. The
competition in this (and many other) markets is anemic.

~~~
ucaetano
> Strong competition would mean dozens to hundreds of sustainable entrants.

Absolutely not, there is such a thing as minimum efficient scale. Some markets
might only have room for 2 or 3 companies to operate efficiently.

~~~
tehjoker
I agree with you, but this idea undermines the justification of the free
market.

~~~
ucaetano
Nope. It doesn't in any way.

A free market is one where prices are set based on supply and demand without
restrictions on competition due to monopolistic powers, market reserve
regulations, etc.

There are always limits to competition, some due to scale, some due to market
size, some due to availability of resources. None of those prevent a market
from being free.

Even antitrust regulation doesn't necessarily prevent a market from being
free.

~~~
joshuamorton
To add, Adam Smith's original postulation of a free market was an explicitly
regulated market (for example to prevent monopoly influence).

There are all sorts of ways we aren't in that world (for example a free market
requires a fully informed set of buyers, which practically speaking never
exists).

~~~
ucaetano
Exactly! Free market != laissez faire.

But a market where exorbitant costs of regulation drive up the minimum
efficient scale to the point that no new entrants are possible is also not a
free market.

------
drak0n1c
A Google whistleblower today released internal documents and helped Project
Veritas obtain camera footage:

> Google Exec Says Don’t Break Us Up: “smaller companies don’t have the
> resources” to “prevent next Trump situation”

If a single company believes they have the informational monopoly needed to
control national politics, isn't that an admission of anti-trust liability?

[https://www.projectveritas.com/2019/06/24/insider-blows-
whis...](https://www.projectveritas.com/2019/06/24/insider-blows-whistle-exec-
reveals-google-plan-to-prevent-trump-situation-in-2020-on-hidden-cam/)

~~~
jowday
I wouldn't believe anything coming out of Project Veritas.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_O'Keefe](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_O'Keefe)

~~~
grayed-down
Why? Do you think they're deep-faking their videos of people admitting to
nefarious things?

~~~
V-eHGsd_
they have a well documented history of releasing selectively edited videos

~~~
grayed-down
Do you mean like mainstream television news does? The reason I ask is because
I have not noticed any big or even significant shifts in context between
whatever snippets they release and any raw footage that makes it out
afterwards. That's just me, and I'd like to think I'm being reasonable in
looking at this.

~~~
bduerst
I don't think 'mainstream television' tries to bait staffers into committing
voter fraud, fabricates accusations of underage sexual assault, or dresses up
as Bin Laden to make some point about border crossing in Mexico. This
"whatabout mainstream media" falls apart as a deflection because the laundry
list of things that James O'Keefe has done puts him pretty far into his own
camp as being a professional troll.

~~~
grayed-down
Investigative journalists are ALWAYS trying to bait their targets. They
wouldn't have a job if they didn't!

~~~
bduerst
How is paying a woman to lie about being sexually assaulted as a teenager (and
getting paid to abort the following pregnancy) actually investigative
journalism?

~~~
splintercell
> How is paying a woman to lie about being sexually assaulted as a teenager
> (and getting paid to abort the following pregnancy) actually investigative
> journalism?

You do understand that on the other side of the political spectrum there are
people (in large quantities) who don't believe that the teenager who is
sexually assaulted should be directed towards abortion?

You're rhetorical statement is as ridiculous as someone saying "How is going
to baker after baker and trying to find a hard working god fearing Christian
baker and forcing him to bake a cake he doesn't wanna bake, investigative
journalism?"

------
asnack
Every time there's a discussion about tech antitrust (google, fb, amazon, ms)
people point to each of these as being their competitors, therefore, there is
no monopoly or antitrust issue.

Perhaps we need to rethink antitrust in the context of the internet however.
These laws were written in the late 1800, and early 1900s, long before Google
existed. I think there should be some evaluation on needing a new framework of
what is antitrust for tech companies.

~~~
fyoving
The laws are fine, what we need is to not tailor laws according to selfish
political whims or to the whims of publishers and all other inferior
competition.

------
threezero
It’s not just their enemies. We would have been happy to continue being a
customer of Google if they hadn’t massively jacked up prices with little
notice when they recognized their monopoly advantage in maps. So now we’re
happy to be on board the anti-trust train.

~~~
robertAngst
They do not have a monopoly in Maps.

Say what it is, you built your platform using google, and they changed prices.

~~~
pitaj
Yeah what is it with people throwing "monopoly" at everything? Just because
they're an industry leader doesn't mean they're anything close to a monopoly.

~~~
bduerst
Being a monopoly justifies action, hence people who want action against
popular companies will try to rationalize it being a monopoly as a premise for
their disdain.

This monopoly/monopsony misclassification is seemingly a bi-weekly occurrence
on HN with regards to FAANG companies. Don't get me wrong, there are reasons
to criticize these tech companies, but calling them monopolies in markets they
are not is not the right way to do it.

~~~
gamblor956
Antitrust law does not require a monopoly, nor is a monopoly a violation of
antitrust law.

The two are strongly correlated but they're not the same.

~~~
bduerst
Oh for sure. Antitrust law is very nuanced, even by geography (e.g. US
requires market dominance, EU does not) but GP claimed _monopoly_ in maps,
which is more to the point of miss-attribution.

------
thomasec
I do not think this will go well for Google. They are not dealing with one or
two companies going after them - we're talking about dozens companies building
out cases over years that show potential anti-competitive behavior. Google
will have to address each of these individually, and as long as one sticks, I
think the dominoes start to fall. Think about all of the industries Google has
entered over the years - travel, retail, real estate, news - these are all
industries that have players with deep pockets, and mountains of data. It's
totally worth the cost of going all-in if it means either they get a
settlement, or Google has to make fundamental changes to their products,
and/or ad network.

------
nerdjon
I have a lot of mixed feelings on what this could mean for the other tech
companies.

But I hope something is done about Google. While they have done some good,
they have too much power over the internet. Looking at AMP as a prime example
of something that seems universally hated, but basically forced on users and
publishers or risk your placement in Google.

~~~
wffurr
"Universally hated" only in the HN echo chamber.

And even then some AMP defenders show up in the comments. It makes the mobile
web suck less in a way marketroids can understand.

------
fybe
Seems like Google is starting to do some work on trying to fight it.

Few days ago went on Google play store and was greeted with a modal telling me
I can install other search bars and it gave a list of Google, Bing, Yahoo and
DDG.

After that it tells you there are other browsers available to download and it
gives a choice of Chrome, Firefox, opera and some others.

Good move but will it be enough in a high profile case? We shall see

~~~
apocalyptic0n3
Are you in Europe? They had to do this to comply with an EU antitrust ruling
last year. [1]

1: [https://9to5google.com/2019/04/03/google-play-europe-
browser...](https://9to5google.com/2019/04/03/google-play-europe-browser-
search-choice/)

~~~
fybe
Oh that explains it. guess they could add it world wide

------
mfer
Two questions come to mind...

1) Does Google have a monopoly sized market share in search or ads? People
argue it does while using metrics to show it.

2) Does Google use this position to suppress competition? It is often argued
they do. Sometimes with reasoned cased. I've heard there are data based cases,
too.

This second part is what's triggering a lot of people to not appreciate the
monopoly.

~~~
hrktb
They've already been sued by the EU and found guilty in the case was on Google
Shopping. The second part is not much hypothetical at this point.

I think antitrust is not just based on the principle of monopoly or not at
this point, if I'm not mistaken being in a dominant position is enough for a
number of cases.

~~~
londons_explore
The Google Shopping case was really nuanced. Google argued (with data) that
they took actions in the best interests of the public, both individually and
collectively.

The other side _didn 't contest that_, but instead argued that those actions
were not in the best interests of those spammy comparison shopping websites.
(you know the ones which always advertise what you're looking for for a really
low price, and when you go there they redirect you through about 30 banner ads
before finally telling you they couldn't find the price they advertised
earlier unless you get 30 friends to sign up to 10 credit cards each, but here
it is anyway for double the price on amazon).

While there are lots of things Google was doing wrong, not promoting those
scummy sites was 100% in the public's best interests...

~~~
hrktb
From the statement ([http://europa.eu/rapid/press-
release_STATEMENT-17-1806_en.ht...](http://europa.eu/rapid/press-
release_STATEMENT-17-1806_en.htm))

> Google has come up with many innovative products and services that have made
> a difference to our lives. That's a good thing.

> But Google's strategy for its comparison shopping service wasn't just about
> attracting customers. It wasn't just about making its product better than
> those of its rivals. Instead, Google has abused its market dominance as a
> search engine by promoting its own comparison shopping service in its search
> results, and demoting those of competitors.

While it’s nuanced, “instead” doesn’t feel like agreeing did a good job at
this.

Also I’m not arguing Google can design good services, more that they’re proven
to abuse their position in documented cases.

PS: to get back to classics, I feel like hearing back discussion about how IE4
was way faster than Netscape, and was arguably a better browser. Or that
windows was effectively better than the competion and they bribed vendors just
to get better numbers.

Sure, we could agree on the individual products merits. It still harms the
market as a whole, and the customer in the long term.

------
fyoving
Luckily for Google in the US the grievances of a company's enemies/competitors
don't count for much.

I'll credit the WSJ for counting themselves among those enemies, but what I
find vexing with all these reports is the constant and casual mentions of
"breaking up" these companies as though it's a viable and realistic outcome
which it isn't and any self respecting publication should present things in
the proper context.

~~~
ma2rten
The problem with breaking up google is that the vast majority of revenue and
profits comes from search ads. You can't break up search ads from search.

~~~
darkpuma
Is youtube still being operated at a loss? If google runs a video sharing
platform at or near a loss, funded by cash they get from search ads, then how
can any other company possibly compete with them? By also running a video
sharing platform at or near a loss? There is a very small number of companies
that could conceivably do that.

This is precisely why google needs to be broken up.

~~~
v7p1Qbt1im
By your logic there would be no YouTube. Or no user generated video at all. I
imagine most people (including me) wouldn‘t like that.

~~~
darkpuma
> _" By your logic there would be no YouTube."_

In it's current form, no, and I'm fine with that. I'd like to see what a self-
sustaining youtube alternative looks like. The status quo is not divine
providence.

~~~
v7p1Qbt1im
> I'd like to see what a self-sustaining youtube alternative looks like.

What does that even mean? Clearly another platform of similar popularity would
end up heaving the exact same problems.

------
crazygringo
The thing is, according to _current_ antitrust law, there isn't much of a case
to be made.

I personally do think the US should be more aggressive in reining in what I
personally consider to be certain abuses (e.g. using your leadership in one
area, like search or app store, to favor your own items over others,
regardless of whether you're a monopoly or not).

But the problem is there aren't laws against that.

If we want to change things, change the _laws_ first.

~~~
maehwasu
The “should we use the judicial branch to legislate” ship sailed a long time
ago, and it’s not coming back to the harbor.

For better or worse, the judiciary as legislators is our system now, may as
well acknowledge it.

~~~
crazygringo
As someone who majored in political science including constitutional law...
it's not that simple.

The courts have the ability to "legislate" via precedent when choosing between
different conflicting laws or conflicting rights, and have an extra-wide scope
when it comes to interpreting the constitution, because it is so short and
intentionally broad/vague.

But when it comes to non-constitutional issues (e.g. antitrust), and a
situation is clearly covered by existing law (not at the "boundary" of a law
or between conflicting laws), the judicial branch can't do anything.

I mean, that's just not how courts work. And if a court did, it would be
overturned in appeal.

So, no -- I absolutely would never acknowledge the judiciary as legislators
now. That would be a complete constitutional and democratic breakdown, so
thank goodness that's not the case.

Don't confuse gridlock (slow lawmaking) with an unconstitutional usurpment of
power.

------
convivialdingo
Things google has the power to do:

* Ruin or make a business

* Manipulate or exclude information

* Imprison or ostracise using law enforcement and/or access to confidential information or even inuendo based on stupid things you did as a teenager.

* Manipulate an economy by emphasizing or suppressing information

* Manipulate a Democratic election with a degree of immunity from prosecution

This is the ultimate, god-like power that no unelected group should ever have.

------
wil421
Why would the government allow Google to buy all these companies and then just
end up blowing Antitrust smoke everywhere?

It’s weird the Obama administration allowed them to buy so many companies and
the Trump administration’s DOJ is talking about antitrust. I would’ve thought
the opposite.

~~~
HillaryBriss
yeah, I agree. But, OTOH, Democrats portray themselves as the "party of
ideas," intellectuals and academics, and socially tolerant/liberal people and
that's who Silicon Valley and Google are, so there was a natural alignment
between Obama and Google/SV. Also, it didn't hurt that most of Google's
employees were relatively young and probably voted for Obama. And Obama was
younger and his organization was more internet-savvy. Also, campaign
contributions were no doubt involved.

------
seaborn63
If the breakup does happen, the internet will become a brand new place, but if
it doesn't happen, Google creates Skynet for real.

Kidding, but it is interesting to think about what would happen if the breakup
does or doesn't happen.

~~~
v7p1Qbt1im
I‘m probably wrong, but at this point only a real (benevolent) super
intelligence can solve our biggest problems and questions (climate change,
pollution, energy, deep space travel, chronic and terminal diseases, mass
scale decision finding, consciousness).

Futurism aside. The only thing that will happen happen if Google is broken up,
is Microsoft/Amazon/Tencent/Baidu taking over their share. The internet is not
quite like other industries. The biggest possible scale will eventually
assimilate almost everything.

------
ishan1121
It's about time they broke Google up. Google alone has too much power on our
news and information. How do we not know they are not abusing their power?

~~~
myko
Look into Sinclair Broadcasting if you want to see who is abusing their power
regarding news and information.

Google is doing everything they can to be neutral - arguably more than they
should.

~~~
v7p1Qbt1im
But Sinclair et al. preach the politics of the current administration, so
they‘re safe.

------
abfan1127
can't compete in the market so get the government to break them up?

------
awakeasleep
Enemies or victims?

------
marktangotango
_Google’s Enemies Gear Up to Make Antitrust Case_

So customers and users are "enemies"? That's quite and indictment of their
business model!

Edit specifically this part, which I read as "customers and users":

 _News Corp, which owns The Wall Street Journal, and other publishers say
Google and other tech platforms siphon ad revenue away from content creators._

~~~
wstrange
The article specifically calls out competitors such as Yelp, TripAdvisor and
Oracle. I don't think these are Google's customers or users.

~~~
curt15
In which of Google's markets does Oracle compete?

~~~
GuB-42
Java.

Oracle and Google are currently what may be the biggest tech-related legal
battle of the decade. It is up to the supreme court now. To put it simply,
Oracle claims that Google hijacked Java for its Android ecosystem.

There may be some other areas where they compete, particularly when it comes
to cloud services, but I think Java is the big one.

~~~
curt15
But Google switched to OpenJDK a while ago, and since that has become the
reference Java implementation, how could Java be monetized nowadays for mobile
devices?

~~~
simion314
Weren't they in fact forked Java the platform? AFAIK you were not allowed to
create your incompatible Java version, Microsoft tried it withe their Embrace
Extend Extinguish tactics and lost in the courts.

What is weird in the Oracle vs Google is that they are debating copyright over
the APIs and that for me seems unrelated.

------
ycombonator
The Google exec Jen Gennai who was in the Veritas video just deleted her
twitter account
[https://mobile.twitter.com/gennai_jen](https://mobile.twitter.com/gennai_jen)

~~~
CapricornNoble
Archives of both of her known/suspected Twitter accounts:
[https://archive.fo/EwXSb](https://archive.fo/EwXSb)
[https://archive.fo/oWfPW](https://archive.fo/oWfPW)

