Senators Call for FTC Probe of Google's Results

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Another batch of politicians are going after Google for promoting its own properties in search results.

Two prominent members of the Senate antitrust subcommittee are urging federal regulators to investigate whether Google unfairly promotes its own properties in search results. Committee Chairman Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) sent a five-page letter (PDF) today to Federal Trade Commission Chairman Jonathan Leibowitz calling for "serious scrutiny" of Google's business practices.
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Didn't we just do this a few months ago? How much do you want to bet that the same thing happens this time? Politicians accuse Google of rigged results. Google denies the allegations. Nothing ever comes of it. Rinse and repeat every few months. :rolleyes:
 
Why does it matter? IT'S THEIR WEBSITE, if they wanted to, you would only see google related search results only.

I'm glad tax payer money is being spent well. :rolleyes:
 
wiseoracle said:
Why does it matter? IT'S THEIR WEBSITE, if they wanted to, you would only see google related search results only.

I'm glad tax payer money is being spent well. :rolleyes:
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And it was Microsoft's operating system. Yet that cost them billions.
 
I didnt know google was controlled by our govermnent? Mhm learn something new every day.
 
It's their search engine, so they can rig all they want as far as I'm concerned. They do it too much and I'll have to find an alternative. Seems pretty logical to me. Not sure why they have to be fair to others.
 
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
 
wuzupfoo said:
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
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Exactly.

Now whether they are or not remains to be seen...
 
wuzupfoo said:
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
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Too be fair if I had to pick one evil corporation to rule us all it would probably be Google anyways :)
 
wuzupfoo said:
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
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I'm not sure if it's anti-trust or not. There are paid ads, or adwords I think. Those, will show up at the top, usually with a different color background. All the other ones show up by relevance. I know our webmaster is always tweaking thing on our site for better rankings.

But are you paying every time you click "search" using Google? And the competition is weak anymore - used to be lots of good search engines, then Google figured out a better way to do it and everyone else started crying. Then there's Yahoo!... that turned into... hell, I don't know what Yahoo! is now days... a social search networking news engine?
 
Is there a public outcry about google's results?

Is there anything with MORE public outcry that the FTC might rather spend their resources on (*cough* telecoms)?
 
I honestly can't think of a single mega corporation with better behavior toward consumers than Google currently, and yet they can't catch a break.

I guess they should be investing more in our legalized, tax-deductible bribery scheme.
 
The economy is crashing down around us, gas prices wont drop below $3/gallon, Europe's economy is in freefall, the middle east is on fire, N Korea has a new leader that doesnt seem to be as "friendly" as the old one, China is starting a naval buildup in the Pacific but fear not, Congress is going to make sure Google is running their search engine properly. :rolleyes:

Sometimes I think the best thing that could happen to this country would be an asteroid crashing smack in the middle of DC.
 
Google has the shittiest trust ever. They got to be the number 1 search engine through hard work, good products, and customer service. If they're going to be punished for winning anyway, they should have just taken the easy way out and done what everyone else does, buy out the competition, bribe some politicians, and pay off ISPs to block access/slow down all their remaining competitors.
 
Just yesterday I got on my wifes computer went to her homepage which was Yahoo and typed genie garage door opener to try and get instructions on how to program the opener. Yahoo! came up with all these ads for buying garage door openers. So I typed in google, type in the same thing and there it was genies website with how to use the opener.

Thats why I use Google. They may be harvesting my dataz for the CIA, but at least they give me what I want in return.
 
Steve said:
Didn't we just do this a few months ago? How much do you want to bet that the same thing happens this time? Politicians accuse Google of rigged results. Google denies the allegations. Nothing ever comes of it. Rinse and repeat every few months. :rolleyes:
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They have to do something just to show that they are busy doing their job... without doing all the hard work of actually doing something useful of course:p
 
wuzupfoo said:
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
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That is what a company is supposed to do.
 
MacLeod said:
The economy is crashing down around us, gas prices wont drop below $3/gallon, Europe's economy is in freefall, the middle east is on fire, N Korea has a new leader that doesnt seem to be as "friendly" as the old one, China is starting a naval buildup in the Pacific but fear not, Congress is going to make sure Google is running their search engine properly. :rolleyes:
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For all the reasons you list...Google is a big target and the gov't is determined to get a share of their proceeds.
 
BBA said:
That is what a company is supposed to do.
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FALSE. A company is supposed to do everything it can WITHIN the law to grow itself. Anti-competitive actions are not within the law. Let google succeed because it has good products and services, not because they're forcing you or coercing you into using them.
 
the-one1 said:
Why?

If I went to Lutheran Church and wanted them to teach me about the Koran or Buddhism, They'd tell me to turn around and go home.
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Like Microsoft's operating system, if you're a big name in the world and the de facto standard, you have to play fair.

Google is a household name now. People trust Google to give them fair results. Google is taking advantage of this trust and using results that would create profit to them, not solutions for their customers. At this point, Google stops being a search engine and becomes an ad revenue server for themselves. I'm sure you can see the shadiness of that.
 
MacLeod said:
The economy is crashing down around us, gas prices wont drop below $3/gallon, Europe's economy is in freefall, the middle east is on fire, N Korea has a new leader that doesnt seem to be as "friendly" as the old one, China is starting a naval buildup in the Pacific but fear not, Congress is going to make sure Google is running their search engine properly. :rolleyes:

Sometimes I think the best thing that could happen to this country would be an asteroid crashing smack in the middle of DC.
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In my town gas price is $2.98 a gallon, and the FTC is an independent agency of the United States government with heads appointed by the President, not Congress. Not sure what you expect the FTC to do about the middle east and North Korea though.
 
Azhar said:
...and the FTC is an independent agency of the United States government with heads appointed by the President, not Congress. Not sure what you expect the FTC to do about the middle east and North Korea though.
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From the article not to mention the very first post in this thread:

Two prominent members of the Senate antitrust subcommittee are urging federal regulators to investigate....
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Its senators that should be busy worrying about how to fix our economy and not so much about how Google is running its search engine.
 
Ryan711 said:
FALSE. A company is supposed to do everything it can WITHIN the law to grow itself. Anti-competitive actions are not within the law. Let google succeed because it has good products and services, not because they're forcing you or coercing you into using them.
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Explain to me how self-promotion with your own product is anti-competitive? You are free to stop using Google anytime.

Some of you guys need to get a freaking clue.
 
At this point, why even try to come up with new ideas or better products? Just wait until someone thinks of something and executes it well, then copy them and have their company fined for being successful.
 
I'm sorry, can someone point me to the law that makes it a crime to provide a FREE service that occassionally promotes its own subsidiaries as a result of that FREE service ?

You can claim this is "unfair" or rigged, or whatever, but the fact is, unless we are going to start legislating how internet search algorithms can work, there is no crime taking place here. Everyone on earth is free to stop using Google if they don't like their service and instead use Bing or whatever other search tools there are.

People need to stop thinking that 1) everything they don't like is necessarily "criminal", and 2) that the pathetic inefficient, useless government is the answer to all your problems. NEITHER of those is true.
 
wuzupfoo said:
anti trust... thats why.. whether you like a company or not if it starts to throw its weight around to push out competition it is not a good thing.
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Sorry, you have to make a VASTLY more persuasive argument as to why this violates anti-trust law. I'm not even sure FREE services are subject to anti-trust laws.
 
Azhar said:
Like Microsoft's operating system, if you're a big name in the world and the de facto standard, you have to play fair.

Google is a household name now. People trust Google to give them fair results. Google is taking advantage of this trust and using results that would create profit to them, not solutions for their customers. At this point, Google stops being a search engine and becomes an ad revenue server for themselves. I'm sure you can see the shadiness of that.
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Which customers ? The ones that aren't paying them anything ?
 
sleepeeg3 said:
Explain to me how self-promotion with your own product is anti-competitive? You are free to stop using Google anytime.

Some of you guys need to get a freaking clue.
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You could ask the same question to Microsoft during the 90s. Seems it's you who needs to get a clue. I suggest you educate yourself on monopolies and the harm they can do instead of spouting uneducated bullshit pretending you have the SLIGHTEST idea of what you're talking about.
 
Ryan711 said:
You could ask the same question to Microsoft during the 90s. Seems it's you who needs to get a clue. I suggest you educate yourself on monopolies and the harm they can do instead of spouting uneducated bullshit pretending you have the SLIGHTEST idea of what you're talking about.
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Except Google does NOT have a monopoly on search. The barrier to entry is insanely low, they have two other large competitors (one of which is fucking MICROSOFT), and thousands of smaller competitors.
 
wizdum said:
Except Google does NOT have a monopoly on search. The barrier to entry is insanely low
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No it's not. Coming up with an algorithm that can compete with Google's is anything but trivial, not to mention the huge iron they have powering their backend, an infrastructure untouchable by any competitor without millions in cash to devote to the effort.

wizdum said:
they have two other large competitors (one of which is fucking MICROSOFT), and thousands of smaller competitors.
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Who is the other large competitor? It's not Yahoo, since they license search technology from Bing, just like most of the "thousands of smaller competitors" you mention.
 
CEpeep said:
No it's not. Coming up with an algorithm that can compete with Google's is anything but trivial, not to mention the huge iron they have powering their backend, an infrastructure untouchable by any competitor without millions in cash to devote to the effort.



Who is the other large competitor? It's not Yahoo, since they license search technology from Bing, just like most of the "thousands of smaller competitors" you mention.
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Coming up with a working search algorithm and some servers is nothing when you compare it to what it takes to get into other markets (you can't go to your local costco and pick up an oil pipeline or country-wide telcom network).

By admitting that Google competes with Bing, you just agreed that Google does not have a monopoly on search. Maybe it is you that should "educate yourself on monopolies".
 
wizdum said:
Coming up with a working search algorithm and some servers is nothing when you compare it to what it takes to get into other markets (you can't go to your local costco and pick up an oil pipeline or country-wide telcom network).

By admitting that Google competes with Bing, you just agreed that Google does not have a monopoly on search. Maybe it is you that should "educate yourself on monopolies".
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Sorry, I wasn't addressing your point about a monopoloy specifically (that being my first post in this thread), just trying to say that the barrier for entry into search technology is non-trivial and they have very few strong competitors in that sector.
 
deadrody said:
Which customers ? The ones that aren't paying them anything ?
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We're paying them plenty through ad services on millions of sites, which I have no problems with. It's their current search result that I have problems with.
 
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