
Justice Department Is Preparing Antitrust Investigation of Google - Despegar
https://www.wsj.com/articles/justice-department-is-preparing-antitrust-investigation-of-google-11559348795
======
GeekyBear
The career officials at the FTC recommended antitrust action against Google
back in 2012, but the political appointees shut them down.

>When the Federal Trade Commission neared a momentous decision on whether to
charge Google with violating antitrust laws in January 2013, the White House
was watching closely.

New emails uncovered by the Campaign for Accountability, a public interest
watchdog organization, show that a White House advisor met with top Google
lobbyist Johanna Shelton and top Google antitrust counsel Matthew Bye twice in
the weeks before the FTC announcement.

And minutes prior to the final decision – in which FTC commissioners took the
unusual step of overriding their staff’s recommendation to sue, and voted to
settle the case instead – the White House official even sought Google’s
talking points in the matter.

[https://theintercept.com/2016/08/18/white-house-official-
coz...](https://theintercept.com/2016/08/18/white-house-official-cozied-up-to-
google-before-antitrust-lawsuit-was-shelved/)

~~~
DannyBee
FWIW: It sounds nefarious, but the DOJ/FTC/etc quite often meet with all
parties prior to taking antitrust action.

That's because (at least in the number of times i've been invited to meetings
with these sorts of regulators) the relevant folks are not idiots, and in fact
are trying to understand all sides of the issue before deciding what they
should do.

This is actually what you want them to do, as there are rarely, if ever, truly
disinterested parties in these sorts of things.

As an aside, i'm pretty sure Matthew was not the top antitrust counsel at
Google at the time. I believe it was Nikhil Shanbhag. Job titles on linkedin
seem to confirm my recollection.

~~~
GeekyBear
The fact is that the revolving door between Google and our government was
spinning pretty quickly during that period.

>The Campaign for Accountability (CFA) this week launched the first two of its
Google Transparency Projects. One of the projects – a visualisation of the
revolving door between Google, the White House and US government agencies – is
so dense, the website suggests viewing it on a desktop display.

As well as Googlers leaving the ad giant to join the administration, there’s
also a heavy traffic in the other direction, with federal employees leaving to
join Google. The project documents 61 staff taking key public positions after
leaving Google, or firms working closely with Google, and 171 leaving public
office to join [Google].

[https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/04/29/google_transparency...](https://www.theregister.co.uk/2016/04/29/google_transparency_project/)

~~~
threezero
Notice that no Googlers have a good response to this or the Eric Schmidt /
Hillary Clinton connection. Google’s ties to the Obama administration were
deep.

~~~
panarky
Which raises deep suspicions about the political motivations of this
"investigation".

Anti-trust is about companies using their market power to exclude rivals,
raise prices, and hurt consumers. It's not about consumers overwhelmingly
choosing a product because they like it more.

Can anyone really say that Google's practices are more anti-competitive than,
say, the dominant players in broadband or health insurance or wireless telecom
or household appliances?

~~~
BurningFrog
This is a bold take!

Google's close ties with the Obama administration makes the _Trump_
administration suspicious!

~~~
Dylan16807
Close ties are suspicious, strong swings in prosecution policy are also
suspicious.

~~~
oh_sigh
But it sounds like the career officials wanted this 7 years ago, but were
blocked by Obama's political appointees.

So, there is no swing in policy, at least among the career officials.

~~~
Dylan16807
That's a very good explanation! But it's certainly worth looking carefully
into it to reach/validate that explanation.

------
benologist
In the last ~year Google has admitted to accidentally-but-knowingly stealing
$75 million from Adwords customers, and settled a case they had fought four
years for $11 million to avoid revealing what happens to a banned Adsense
account's unpaid revenue. There is likely several hundred million dollars of
fraud just in these two 'edge cases' they ignored handling for decades, so
it's definitely time for someone to dig deep into this company.

[https://www.businessinsider.com/google-emails-adtrader-
lawsu...](https://www.businessinsider.com/google-emails-adtrader-lawsuit-
refund-ad-click-fraud-2019-5)

[https://www.searchenginejournal.com/adsense-
lawsuit/248135/](https://www.searchenginejournal.com/adsense-lawsuit/248135/)

~~~
soup10
lets not forget their latest and greatest of releasing chrome for free until
it saturated the market and became a monopoly then maliciously making changes
to reduce the effectiveness of adblockers like ublock origin

~~~
xkgt
And they did all they could to kill Windows Phone (a viable alternative
ecosystem at that time) by blocking access to Youtube[1] and providing sub-par
experience for their other services.

Now I fear Firefox has a similar sisyphean task at hand, trying to keep their
browser usable on google services. And for many of the users, that is same as
usability of the browser as a whole.

[1][https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/microsoft_on_the_issues/...](https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/microsoft_on_the_issues/2013/08/15/the-
limits-of-googles-openness/)

~~~
Zigurd
Microsoft managed to kill Windows Phone by itself and take Nokia, and a more
mature more viable smartphone OS, down with it. Windows phone was a "viable
alternative" by the end, but in the beginning it was uncompetitive without any
hindrances.

Also recall that mobile carriers and OEMs were opposed to Android because it
would further degrade their ability to create walled gardens. The carriers
lost control of apps, not for lack of trying. Imagine what a world that would
be.

The FANG succeed largely instead of a carrier-controlled mobile ecosystem.

You may think that replaces one kind of oppression with another, but if you
weaken the internet platforms, you strengthen the carriers who are now off the
net neutrality leash, and who see 5G as an opportunity to gain control of a
lot of what we now enjoy as an open internet.

~~~
p0nce
I've only met happy Windows Phone users

~~~
xkgt
I am not sure how much we can read into it because they are the ones who are
already bought in to that ecosystem.

Even I was a happy WP user and but I can't be sure how much of my satisfaction
was out of choice-supportive bias.

------
orev
Look, I get it — the issues with Google, Facebook, Amazon. But I can’t help
but think about how AT&T and other ISPs banded together to claim they
shouldn’t be regulated because they are Internet companies just like FANG
during the Net Neutrality discussions. When I see just how bad ISPs are
acting, in lack of competition, price gouging, content ownership, data
monitoring, it really seems they were successful in shifting the focus to FANG
and convincing everyone to forget about Net Neutrality.

This is not meant to whataboutism, but the truth is the public/news cycles can
only handle so many “tech” related items at one time. People are not “locked
in” to any of the FANG companies nearly as much as they are their physical
ISPs where they really do not have an option.

~~~
creato
I think more importantly, ISPs made a (in my opinion, bullshit) free market
argument that resonated with conservatives. At the same time, FANG made
themselves an enemy of conservatives. Conservatives are now in power.

~~~
jeremyjh
You could make the free market argument here too, but it won't appeal to them.
Conservatives have a sort of pact with business interests that are otherwise
neutral on social issues. They can look after each other because neither care
much about the other's priorities. FANG are not reliably neutral in that same
way, they are more like Hollywood in terms of "values". Of course their money
is just as good as anyone else's and conservatives will take a lot of it where
there is a tactical advantage but there can't be a long-term alliance.

------
nsomaru
I was the biggest Google fan ever. I recommended all their products to
everyone I know.

Gone are those days. I now trust Microsoft (heh! M!cr0$0ft, anyone?) more than
Google which is strange given I grew up rebelling against MS’s technical
desktop hegemony.

I wonder when Google decided “doing evil” was okay. I wonder how the SWE’s and
other senior people in this thread feel about working for a company that many
now consider scum. All their excuses and retorts can honestly take a hike: It
is my honest opinion that if you still work for Google you’re selling us all
out.

After years of serving malware through ads and doing nothing to stop it,
they’re now trying to stop us blocking ads?! That’s just the last of many
strikes that set me down this road.

~~~
googthrwy_
_I wonder how the SWE’s and other senior people in this thread feel about
working for a company that many now consider scum. All their excuses and
retorts can honestly take a hike: It is my honest opinion that if you still
work for Google you’re selling us all out._

Googler here, I understand why you may think Google is evil now and I'm not
going to say they are a perfect company. But I think you should consider that
it is a large company working on many different products. Not everyone is
working on Ads or various "evil" things. Many of us work on things that people
like and improve our lives.

If parts of the company is doing bad things, it doesn't make all of us sell
outs in my opinion. Just like how every American that pays taxes isn't a sell
out for all the bad things the US might do.

~~~
nsomaru
As far as I understand, the penalty for not paying taxes is incarceration or
heavy fines.

The penalty for not working for Google is effectively having to find work
somewhere else. Not exactly oranges to oranges.

I appreciate that you may be working on things that improve people’s lives.
How is that work funded? What would happen to those projects when they are
deemed not profitable enough or endanger the evil stuff?

I didn’t write that post lightly, but with a heavy heart and a bitter taste in
my mouth from a former #1 fan.

~~~
googthrwy_
I agree its not a perfect analogy but you could argue that you can go live
somewhere else too.

And yes, a lot of the work is funded by the "evil stuff" but Google is trying
to expand their enterprise offerings and their hardware business is growing as
well. I expect those to be profitable one day if not already.

~~~
prepend
Moving countries is extremely difficult and sometimes impossible. The US is
one of the easiest countries to immigrate to and we only have 14.4% of our
population having changes countries (coming in at least) [0]. This LinkedIn
article citing BLS stats says the average person will have 12-15 jobs in their
lifetime [1].

So I don’t think it’s very comparable to say “you can just change countries.”
The vast majority of people are stuck with their country, and the vast
majority of people change jobs.

It must feel bad to work at Google. Making odd comparisons might be a symptom
of explaining how positive things that are cool are still funded by ads that
are at least annoying, but seem to be turning out to be anticompetitive and
fraudulent even.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_the_United_Stat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_to_the_United_States)
[1] [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-many-jobs-average-
person-...](https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-many-jobs-average-person-have-
his-her-lifetime-scott-marker)

~~~
pimterry
> The US is one of the easiest countries to immigrate to and we only have
> 14.4% of our population having changes countries

Just to follow this tangent briefly - I'd be surprised if that first statement
is true by most definitions (I'd almost say the opposite), and the implication
that 14.4% of the population is therefore a high level certainly isn't.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_d...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_and_dependent_territories_by_immigrant_population)
has some detailed numbers. In short, although the US has the most immigrants
in the world in total, many major nations have double or much higher
percentages of foreign-born residents compared to the US. E.g. Singapore
(43%), Switzerland (29%), Australia (33%), and that's ignoring the tiny
countries with 50+%, or the middle eastern states with large migrant
worker/refugee populations, like UAE at 84%, Qatar at 74%, Jordan at 40%, etc
etc.

I don't really disagree with your main point - changing countries isn't _that_
hard as a US software developer, but changing jobs is certainly easier - but I
keep seeing the US portrayed like this, and it's not really true.

~~~
ganeshkrishnan
Australia does NOT have real highest percentage of foreign born and is a very
hard country to immigrate to.

Their foreign born are mostly from neighbors NZ and UK.

~~~
pimterry
It's not the highest by a long shot, and their process certainly isn't easy
(and I agree biased to friendly English-speaking nations), but 33% of the
population is still a _lot_ more than the US.

Or do you mean that that number isn't correct somehow? It's based on a UN
report, but I have no idea where their data comes from.

~~~
ganeshkrishnan
Out of 33% majority of them are from UK and NZ. I think around 90% of them.

Both of them can stay as long as they want in Australia but they are always
counted as "foreign born/citizens"

------
justinph
Dear Justice Department: Take a look at google AMP and how they use it to
strong-arm publishers by linking it to search placement. You'll find some
stuff.

~~~
fyoving
People don't seem to understand how this stuff works in the US, Google has
full editorial control over their search results protected by the first
amendment and that right was affirmed in court time and time again:

[https://searchengineland.com/another-court-affirms-
googles-f...](https://searchengineland.com/another-court-affirms-googles-
first-amendment-control-search-results-209034)

If you don't like their free no lock in service go elsewhere, and that's why
there is no sherman act case here, which is why if the DOJ actually does
anything here it would be a waste of time and resources.

~~~
glbrew
I'm not a lawyer but the first amendment argument is a separate concern than
antitrust violations. You can exercise your first amendment rights while still
breaching antitrust law.

~~~
fyoving
Depends on what's being investigated here, if the government would actually
want to compel Google to alter their search results then it's a first
amendment case.

~~~
tantalor
> Take a look at google AMP

The argument here is its unfair to bias ranking towards a preferred format. In
this case, something about excluding competitors, except AMP is completely
open-source[1] so...?

The counterargument is yes you can, because it's your
pamphlet/newspaper/website and you're the editor, not the government.

[1]
[https://github.com/ampproject/amphtml](https://github.com/ampproject/amphtml)

~~~
bduerst
Yeah, if AMP is antitrust then so is Facebook's Open Graph. Despite the hate
for both on HN, neither format is targeting competitors or hurting consumers
in this case.

~~~
_hl_
I think the antitrust argument against AMP is a bit more subtle. The argument
seems to be that Google is abusing it's market dominance to push sites into
using AMP. This in turn prevents them from using third party trackers, while
the pages will be served via Google caches when accessed from Google search.
Hence Google gets to track the visitor, while third party tracking from other
providers is prevented. I.e. Google is abusing it's power to thwart
competition in the analytics and ad-tech business.

Of course as a consumer, I don't really care whether it's some random company
or Google who gets to violate my privacy, and I especially couldn't care less
about lack of innovation in the privacy violation business, so I think the
antitrust angle here is pretty slim.

~~~
themacguffinman
Third party trackers are not prevented.

~~~
_hl_
You can use Google Analytics through the <amp-analytics> element [1], but
since AMP prevents third-party scripts that were not approved by Google, I'm
not sure how you would include other trackers in an AMP site.

[1]
[https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection...](https://developers.google.com/analytics/devguides/collection/amp-
analytics/)

~~~
themacguffinman
You can easily use other analytics vendors
[https://amp.dev/documentation/guides-and-
tutorials/optimize-...](https://amp.dev/documentation/guides-and-
tutorials/optimize-measure/configure-analytics/?referrer=ampproject.org)

------
mdorazio
If true, this will be a landmark case and should scare FB and Amazon as well.
Personally, I think this is a good thing and it's past time for the government
to at least set some boundaries, but there's no telling how it will play out
with the current administration and amount of lobbying dollars flying around.

~~~
d1zzy
Why would this have any relevance to FB and Amazon? I realize a lot of people
on HN don't like what these companies are doing with their data, but this
lawsuit is not about privacy at all so I don't see how it relates to those 2
companies.

~~~
GuardianCaveman
Ant-competitive practices? Facebook buying up any and all rivals like WhatsApp
and Instagram? They are a juggernaut and shouldn’t be able to own all social
media.

~~~
yeukhon
What’s wrong with buying competitions?

~~~
thanatos_dem
Well, in a word, it’s anticompetitive

~~~
yeukhon
Buying a competition is not anticompetitive. So why congratulate any
acquisition on HN?

~~~
thanatos_dem
Buying competition = removing competition

Removing competition is literally the most anticompetitive thing you can do.
Like definitionally.

That’s why all major (edit: US) acquisitions take months to years to get
approval from the SEC.

~~~
baddox
Buying a competitor is no more anticompetitive than causing a competitor to
shut down because they weren’t competitive enough.

What is supposed to happen to competitors that are actually less efficient
and/or produce less appealing products? Do people really expect “competition”
to mean a perpetual exact tie between two or more competitors?

~~~
jldugger
> Buying a competitor is no more anticompetitive than causing a competitor to
> shut down because they weren’t competitive enough.

Well first off, predatory pricing is a thing, where competition shuts down
because a market participant is deliberately losing money to gain market share
in hopes of raising prices after everyone else gives up.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predatory_pricing#United_State...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predatory_pricing#United_States)

But a competitor doesn't have to shut down to be bought out. In fact, why
would a company ever buy a competitor who's only alternative is shutting down?
Seems far simpler to buy the useful assets from the bankruptcy. Here's one
possibility I've seen: an inefficient incumbent buys a startup that has been
winning procurement bids away from them lately. They have deep pockets from
all the contracts not yet up for renewal, and can afford to buy the company
now while they only have a few source of cash flow. End result is that prices
remain high, and the borg lives on a little bit less cash flow until the
contracts they just bought are up for renegotiation.

> What is supposed to happen to competitors that are actually less efficient
> and/or produce less appealing products?

They sell less, and make changes. Maybe they drop prices, invest in efficiency
or pursue some differentiation strategy. It doesn't need to be a 50/50 but
winner-take-all markets should not be surprised when regulators come knocking.

------
rayiner
While I think an antitrust suit against Google would be a waste of time, they
really need to stop recommending Chrome every time you do a Google search with
a different browser. Just stop, that will not play well to a jury.

~~~
shereadsthenews
When will Apple stop sending me desktop notifications about switching to
Safari?

~~~
7402
I use Macs and iProducts all the time, and I've never seen one of these. What
do they look like? What do they say?

~~~
pfooti
[https://twitter.com/pfooti/status/527301101523963904?s=19](https://twitter.com/pfooti/status/527301101523963904?s=19)

From 2014 though.

------
ilaksh
I will go ahead and bring up a related issue. Most people seem to not see it
as being related but in my mind it is very closely related. So maybe consider
not burying my comment completely.

Part of the reason we have these technology monopolies is that they provide
ubiquitous platforms and that is very powerful for consumers and businesses
(as long as your goals don't conflict with their goals).

The issue is that these platforms are being provided by private interests, but
have so much scope that they act like public platforms.

My suggestion is to try to create public platforms that business or consumers
could tap into/build off of. This would allow for us to audit the mechanisms
and also provide a base layer that competition could be built on.

In my mind the obvious technical direction is decentralization technologies.
That's the only way such public networks could be feasible.

I actually see this as covering technology in an extremely broad sense. It
applies to everything from Google search and ads, to Amazon and online retail,
to Uber and taxi apps, maybe even the US dollar and currency, or perhaps even
government itself.

------
enitihas
I think the slowly most businesses would realize if you are a big company, it
makes much more sense to capture exclusively the high end market (iPhone) and
try to stay as much away as possible from the low end market. This gives you a
lion's share of the profits, while making sure you don't get labelled a
monopoly (and people asking you to make your platform open). This is the exact
model of Apple. iPhones dominate the high end market, and the high price
ensures both a.) high capture of the profit. b.) less market share due to
simply being out of reach for a lot of people.

Once you are in the above position, you can do anything on your platform, and
since you aren't a monopoly, you have much more leeway than your competitors.
Your competitor might be forced to unbundle and compromise the uniformity of
their platform, while you can simply choose to not even allow alternative
browsers, because you know, you aren't a monopoly. Getting the low end market
share might be come to seen as more of a headache than required.

~~~
teknopaul
Its an interesting take on things. Other view is that Apple is an abusive
monopoly any is getting away with it for the same reasons Google is. America
is permitting Monolpolies at the moment because it is scared of China.

Presumably the US has doubts that capitalism is best and is betting on state
supported Monoplies. ;)

~~~
kmlx
i don’t understand how Apple is an “abusive monopoly” when their iphone market
share is 15.8%, while samsung is at 17.3%.

was your characterisation related to their app store by any chance?

------
KirinDave
Distressingly absent from this list is the company that cheerfully collects
and sells even more data that Google about the average American's life and
collects MUCH more of their money: Amazon.

~~~
untog
Collects money, yes. But collects more data? I'm dubious.

~~~
ReverseCold
Maybe not more data, but perhaps more _important_ data?

"Things you've bought before or looked into buying before" seems like much
more useful data to sell ads than "non-shopping things you've searched for."
It's definitely a higher signal to noise ratio.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
If your Amazon receipts go to Gmail, Google collects not just all of that
data, but from every other site you've bought stuff from:
[https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/17/google-gmail-tracks-
purchase...](https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/17/google-gmail-tracks-purchase-
history-how-to-delete-it.html)

~~~
bduerst
Google stopped mining Gmail two years ago:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/23/technology/gmail-
ads.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/23/technology/gmail-ads.html)

Any aggregation or segmentation of emails by ML/AI algorithms, as your article
talks about, is analogous to having smarter filters in your inbox. It's tech
illiteracy to confuse these perception NNs with data mining for business
purposes.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
Your employer is collecting this data _right now_ , as my link points out. And
it's actually gotten better at it in the last few months, as I purged all of
my purchases from Gmail that it detected, and then a few weeks later, it found
more, as they'd refined their ability to mine more transactional emails.

It is absolutely mining email, and it's extracting purchase data from it, that
isn't even used in Gmail or revealed to users in any visible context, it's
buried in settings. What Google uses it for? I don't know, as you said, they
claimed they stopped using Gmail data _for ad targeting purposes_ two years
ago. But they're definitely working on extracting this very valuable and
marketable data... for some reason.

Is it possible that Google generically collects user purchase data, including
from Gmail, and then whilst not using "Gmail data" for ad targeting, it does
use the "purchase data" which has been generically made part of a user's
Google profile? That'd be splitting hairs real close, but it'd probably be
good enough for the lawyers.

~~~
bduerst
Again, last time you doxxed me on HN I told you my profile on HN, which you
looked at, says my opinions are my own and do not reflect any organization.

It's technical illiteracy to confuse parsing and filtering with data mining
for ads. Read the article, or don't, this is just a comment.

~~~
ocdtrekkie
I recognize the difference, but they're parsing and filtering the most
valuable advertising data, and then just... shoving it in settings and doing
nothing with it? There's no clear reason why Google is collecting purchase
data from Gmail, and actively working on refining the code used for it. If you
look at my comment that you originally responded to, I did not say they used
it for ad targeting, merely that they collected it, which is true. Even if
they do not use it for ad targeting, the only purpose your article states they
won't use that data, it's still very valuable research data to collect.

Not only that, but as the articles about purchase data parsing states, you
can't even opt out of it or remove items from Google's purchase history
information except to delete the emails themselves. Which, for people
entrusting their communications to Gmail, is a drastic step. It's surprising
to even have a "remove" button, but for it then to tell you, in order to do
so, you have to delete your emails.

As an aside, it's not doxxing someone when you post as your real name, and
publish your employer publicly under the same name. The "my opinions are my
own" line is a release of Google's legal liability for what you say, which is
why a lot of employers suggest or require similar statements. However, it's
psychologically impossible for your opinions to not be swayed by the employer
who pays you and whom you spend a large percentage of your time with,
regardless of whether or not you are "representing" them officially or not.

------
minimaxir
Relevant tweet from a Yelp SVP, who propagated many allegations of
anticompetitive behavior in Google Search:

> :)

[https://twitter.com/lutherlowe/status/1134621790720995328](https://twitter.com/lutherlowe/status/1134621790720995328)

~~~
Zhenya
Maybe someone will investigate their mafia-like treatment of small businesses
as well.

~~~
eanzenberg
Two wrongs.. whataboutism.. etc.

Maybe yelp had to resort to these monetizing tactics because their results
were buried by google promoting their own business-ratings copy-cat service?

------
daenz
Can someone knowledgeable in this area lay out some of the potential anti-
trust points that could be shown by the probe?

~~~
Covzire
This is just speculation, but I read somewhere recently that alleged that
Youtube wasn't the gift to the world it appears to be. While I love Youtube
for the most part (Free, High Quality), it is strange that we haven't seen
much competition. Maybe it's a loss leader for Google and nobody else can
afford the expense, or maybe they're doing something shady to make sure nobody
else can afford to compete.

~~~
cced
Can you please find this source? It seems to me like there’s quite a story
here if your idea is even remotely true.

------
telltruth
With Eric Schmidt leaving, the hanging sword has finally came down. He knew
how to play lobbyist network in DC even with unfavorable administration if you
had almost unlimited money supply. Breitbart publishing recent video leaks on
Google execs in tears on election results meant this was inevitable.

Google has LOT to lose from this. They had previously made absurd the argument
that they are not monopoly and Amazon is their biggest competition. Somehow
lobby money made this argument magically acceptable and everybody moved on.
Now they would have charges from Yelp, funding services like gmail using
search business to bankrupt other players, making arbitrary decisions for
advertisers, youtube piracy, website takedowns and de-rankings, Chrome
defaults, AMP...

However, I wonder what could be the end game here for the government? Google
is still very monolithic as far as revenues are concerned, so how do you even
break it up in any viable way? My guess is that they would probably impose
some fine and settlement agreement.

------
writepub
1\. I fully agree with an investigation into Google.

2\. Why hasn't any federal agency looked into Apple's behavior, where they
sell hardware (and here bestow it's ownership to the consumer), but continue
to play middleman in what apps the user is allowed to run. It's contrary to
the fundamental concept of ownership, and worse, to the tenets of decades of
general purpose computing

And before regurgitations of "it's unit sales aren't a majority" gets thrown
at me as a justification for monopolistic behavior, please note the truth [1]
that iOS install base/usage in the US is almost 10% more than Android, AND
iDevices constitute a majority.

[1]: [http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/united-
stat...](http://gs.statcounter.com/os-market-share/mobile/united-states-of-
america)

------
raleigh_user
Yep. Been coming. Platforms are super interesting with laws/regulations. Going
to be interesting to watch what is decided.

------
tyingq
The 2012 leaked memo from the last time they tried this:
[http://graphics.wsj.com/google-ftc-report/](http://graphics.wsj.com/google-
ftc-report/)

------
duxup
>closely examine Google’s business practices related to its search and other
businesses

Not a lot of detail.

------
m0zg
As an ex-Googler: good. Google has done a lot of good in the past, and that
continues today, but it's pretty clear nobody should have as much control over
"making information universally accessible and useful" as Google does.
Especially after they give up any pretense of "don't be evil".

I also very much hope FB is next.

------
simplecomplex
Google isn’t a monopoly and using a competing search engine is quite easy.

Pretty sad that providing an excellent service that customers love is seen as
a bad thing, especially on HN. Sad bitter people celebrating the thought of
Google being punished for being at the top of their game... get a life.

------
0xcde4c3db
Questions from someone who doesn't know a lot about antitrust law, in case
someone knowledgeable cares to chime in:

To what extent does antitrust law require specific intentional or knowing
conduct? Is there some "knew or should have known" standard that would require
Google to explain why they didn't anticipate or investigate some suspiciously
favorable placement of Google products/services/affiliates? Or can Google
basically shrug and say "algorithm" a lot and the Justice Department would
have an uphill battle to prove intent?

~~~
KirinDave
It requires no intent, and iirc the argument of Standard Oil before their
censure was precisely that they didn't mean to stifle trade, they were just
better than everyone else at it. The Supreme Court said they didn't really
care why or how, they cared that it was a monopoly in fact.

But historically anti-trust suits have usually been about what happens when
negative sentiment towards American mega-corporations grows too high.
Essentially the rules are different for big companies. In reality, most of the
things companies need to do to avoid anti-trust cases are performative. Even
more ironically, the super rich at the tops of corporate pyramids often end up
_profiting_ from these sorts of actions. All an anti-trust suit can do is
mandate companies fracture into multiple legal entities. Usually the same
owners retain their ownership, only now over dozens or more of companies which
each individually pay upwards.

What's even more distressing about these laws is that they're quite unusable
against entities that are at least as frightening, like Amazon (and
historically Walmart). Amazon is the omni-company, and now they're gonna get
into consumer telecom too. And because they're lateral as opposed to vertical
and they choked out the competition during a recession, they don't even have
to pretend the're offering a square deal to their resellers.

~~~
threezero
Amazon could very well be the next target. Their practice of driving out
smaller resellers in a category and then jacking up prices could be looked at
as an antitrust issue.

------
neonate
[http://archive.is/PHSfY](http://archive.is/PHSfY)

------
swalsh
Imagine what competition in the search space would do for adword prices. I
have no idea how one would go about breaking up google search, and the
infrastructure/IP behind it. Or changing consumer habits, but there would be a
lot of beneifts to everyone.

~~~
ThrustVectoring
Adwords prices are based off the bids submitted - whether this is done through
one centralized exchange or many competing ones makes little difference. Each
search-based digital advertiser will end up charging the maximum it can while
avoiding "vacancies".

------
electrotype
This should be part of some philosophy course: how can one become evil, even
when starting with good intentions.

------
lewisj489
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18647750](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18647750)

------
scotchio
Stop the bubbling

Stop the personalization engines

------
rzmnzm
I am quite creeped out by Google following me about and requesting that I rate
random shops

------
fyoving
I don't see how after the FTC came up empty the DOJ would fare any better as
arguable the sherman act is a much tougher route, and the competition
landscape has changed to google's detriment (amazon ads, facebook, etc).

Anyway the article is quite scarce and the source is the WSJ so they might be
trying to amplify some stuff or even advocate for it.

~~~
partiallypro
The FTC backed off because the administration at the time (2012-2013) were
friendly with Google.

~~~
acct1771
Source is probably controversial, but I'm interested in refutations:
[https://wikileaks.org/google-is-not-what-it-
seems/](https://wikileaks.org/google-is-not-what-it-seems/)

------
781
I'd be more interested in Google/Amazon/FB paying taxes than in anti-trust
actions.

~~~
bwb
They pay a ton of taxes :), payroll, property, etc.

Corporate taxes they pay on profits if you invest a ton you can deduct it from
profits. Nothing nefarious going on here.

~~~
ajdlinux
> Corporate taxes they pay on profits if you invest a ton you can deduct it
> from profits. Nothing nefarious going on here.

One's definition of "deductions" and "profits" can, of course, depend on how
much one spends on tax lawyers, one's appetite for testing the untested
boundaries of the relevant tax laws, and one's willingness to do fun and
interesting things with structuring international subsidiaries.

The ultimate result may or may not correlate with what the average citizen
would accept as legitimate. Whether you think this is okay is a matter of
opinion.

~~~
acct1771
We need to care about governance beforehand.

Tax laws are what you're looking to change.

------
fizwhiz
For everyone here squealing with glee: This will be just another Tuesday for
the legal team at Big G ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

~~~
partiallypro
You can't seriously believe this. The US bringing a case a vastly more a BFD
than Europe's prodding at companies for cash.

~~~
acct1771
See USA's FTC etc - we take our fair share of drive by fines, and change
nothing afterwards.

Doubt it'll happen in this case...people want blood from Google or FB, and
they're going to get it.

Other commenters had it right, though - ISPs, and lobbyists should be hanging
next to them.

------
mudil
Thank God! It's time to control this unethical and ruthless internet-
suppressing evil corporation. Google took over the internet and it thinks it
is theirs. Google took over the search. Google took over advertising, a real
currency of the internet. And they believe that this currency belongs to them.
Google hampers creation and creators on the internet. Google is a world wide
surveillance machine. Google controls too much. It's time to break this evil
behemoth.

And now let's listen to the Google fans and apologists about how everything is
just one click away...

~~~
dang
We've already asked you several times not to post like this. It breaks the
site guidelines. We're here for curiosity, not flamey rants.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
onetimemanytime
and third world countries are corrupt? They are just open about it and give
everyone a chance to bid. Imagine the hundreds of billions this decision was
worth to Google. Total cost to Google? Probably tens of millions, and a lot of
lobbying work was overlapping.

------
aleister_777
Good. To quote an old friend who worked for Google:

"I'm worried that if the rest of America knew what we were actually doing here
they would literally come here and kill us..."

~~~
asdfasgasdgasdg
As a Googler, that's a sentiment I have never heard expressed, nor have I felt
anything even remotely like it myself. My guess would be that most people
would feel a lot better about the company if they could see how the sausage
gets made. At least, judging by the reactions of my family members when they
ask me concerned questions and I explain how things work, that's what would
happen.

That being said, it will be interesting to see what comes out of this
investigation. I'm curious to know what practices they are going to zero in
on. No company should be immune to the law.

~~~
dvtrn
_As a Googler, that 's a sentiment I have never heard expressed_

I've seen a lot of Googlers coming here lately, professing to be Googlers and
stating "this hasn't been my experience".

Asked genuinely: as someone inside the company-with much better access to
sentiment, opinion and company culture than I could ever hope to have, is
Google truly that open and transparent to employees that you actually had an
expectation to see this sentiment "expressed" elsewhere?

(I would pose a similar to question to other FAANG employees who do the "as an
employee of faang[]:")

~~~
mav3rick
Many many googlers constantly advocate their resentment to the company. The
company gives more avenues for this than any other company in the world.

~~~
dvtrn
That's fantastic-that employees feel they can express resentment without
reprisal, however I'm left feeling that my question wasn't really answered-
regarding the sentiment quoted and the context being discussed via the article
linked.

 _" I'm worried that if the rest of America knew what we were actually doing
here they would literally come here and kill us..."_

This is a VERY specific and very interesting response to the goings on of your
employer. My company frequently has feedback surveys prompted by HR for
employee satisfaction, I still hear through back-channel mediums a lot of
gripes and kvetches that were uttered over libations with the understanding
that the discussion doesn't leave the bar.

I'm inquiring how insulated individuals at Google are from even _that_ level
of 'resentment' born dialogue between colleagues and coworkers.

~~~
joshuamorton
I think you're still assuming it's less open than it is. There's a (well
documented now) culture of what might be be described as direct and open
insubordination when management does things that are not well liked.

I think your question was answered, but you don't really believe it, because
it's difficult to believe.

------
mark_l_watson
If, and it is an impossible if, the big nine or ten AI companies (mostly in
USA and China) could be split into smaller companies like Judge Green did to
AT&T so many years ago, then, I think that would overall be a good thing.

However, it is not right for the large companies in just one country to be
split up.

Piketty in Capital in the 21st Century makes good points on how mass amounts
of capital earn more money than mass amounts of labor. It is the same winner
take all situation in high tech.

It is easy conceptually: governments just need to apply the law fairly. But in
my country (USA) corporate interests have almost totally co-opted both main
political parties and control most of the regulatory institutions.

