European Parliament Votes in Favor of Breaking Up Google

[JeffDC]

The unfortunate thing here is its a self-inflicted monopoly. Why wouldn't it happen again.

That question has no answer. As AT&T have proven it can and does eventually happen again. The corporate profit motive is both infinite and inexorable. Not that it's evil or even undesireable, but the only effective counter to it is government regulation and protection. IMO these Title I/II protections have served our landline telephone network well for 80 years, or at least I can't remember the last time anyone was required to listen to a Geico commercial before dialing a telephone. Or mailing a package etc.

IMO it's the best we can do to deal with the current monopoly. Far from a perfect solution imo but until somebody offers a viable third option it's the only one available.

 

[Jagger100]

That question has no answer. As AT&T have proven it can and does eventually happen again. The corporate profit motive is both infinite and inexorable. Not that it's evil or even undesireable, but the only effective counter to it is government regulation and protection. IMO these Title I/II protections have served our landline telephone network well for 80 years, or at least I can't remember the last time anyone was required to listen to a Geico commercial before dialing a telephone. Or mailing a package etc.

IMO it's the best we can do to deal with the current monopoly. Far from a perfect solution imo but until somebody offers a viable third option it's the only one available.

AT&T reformed when the government allowed the hardline owners to charge a markup on competitor's access.

Basically the 'baby bells' started getting rich and making their competitors non-competitive at the same time. AT&T is actually Southern Bell Company. The Baby that came back to eat momma.

Anyway this happened within the full control of your vaunted government. After Reagan left who was the last President who gave a tiny shit about competition because of his anti-Communist positions. Even then, there could have been room for improvement.

 

[JeffDC]

After Reagan left who was the last President who gave a tiny shit about competition because of his anti-Communist positions. Even then, there could have been room for improvement.

A truly astonishing perspective imo, considering every U.S. president regardless of party prior to Richard Nixon refused to do official business with China and other Communist countries, Nixon "opened the gates to China", Reagan followed with eight continuous years of lying through this evil traitor teeth about the ability of capitalism to compete with socialist Communism. Anyone who is old enough to read can go back and read Reagan's "America's workers can compete with anyones!" speeches. Dozens exist.

 

[Jagger100]

A truly astonishing perspective imo, considering every U.S. president regardless of party prior to Richard Nixon refused to do official business with China and other Communist countries, Nixon "opened the gates to China", Reagan followed with eight continuous years of lying through this evil traitor teeth about the ability of capitalism to compete with socialist Communism. Anyone who is old enough to read can go back and read Reagan's "America's workers can compete with anyones!" speeches. Dozens exist.

Not sure what your point is, actually. But about not being able to compete. With China able to currency fix, use hard protectionist barriers to outside goods, treat their environment like an open sewer and the majority of their workers like slaves, I'm not sure there was a competition. That's a rigged game. The same rigged game people wanted to start with the Soviet Union. That Reagan froze out economically and hastened their collapse.

"American workers can compete" was really anti-protectionist rhetoric usually in context of trade with Japan that was/is employing many of the same anti-free trade practices as China does, but there was a big movement to have people look the other way.

Relations with China stalled under Reagan and the economic side was advanced primarily by Bush I & Clinton. With a minor stall from the Tiananmen Square Massacre in there under Bush I which Clinton totally pretended didn't exist when he sent officials to party with Chinese government officials in Tiananmen Square 10th anniversary in the Square itself.

Other than not having a clear point your recount of history is full of crap.

 

[JeffDC]

Other than not having a clear point your recount of history is full of crap.

Thank you for the point about currency fixing. Please remind us of the date that Nixon finished burying our gold standard.

 

[kbrickley]

So the EU wants to do their part to initiate the "Equalization of Opportunity Bill" of Atlas Shrugged ... although I disagree with many aspects of Ayn Rand's philosophy, it is sad to see society embrace the worst aspects of anti-capitalism

 

[CreepyUncleGoogle]

So the EU wants to do their part to initiate the "Equalization of Opportunity Bill" of Atlas Shrugged ... although I disagree with many aspects of Ayn Rand's philosophy, it is sad to see society embrace the worst aspects of anti-capitalism

I'd sorta agree with you on some of this, but I think in the end I hafta say, "No kbrickley. Just no," (but in a nice way, I promise) because competitive capitalism doesn't continue to exist without intervention once in a while to stop evil corporate empires like Google from taking over a multiude of related markets, shutting out competition, choking innovation, and kicking all of your pet puppies pretty much every day (the do know how many pets you own after all, plus the names of the pets, the ages of the pets, and their preferred food).

 

[kbrickley]

I'd sorta agree with you on some of this, but I think in the end I hafta say, "No kbrickley. Just no," (but in a nice way, I promise) because competitive capitalism doesn't continue to exist without intervention once in a while to stop evil corporate empires like Google from taking over a multiude of related markets, shutting out competition, choking innovation, and kicking all of your pet puppies pretty much every day (the do know how many pets you own after all, plus the names of the pets, the ages of the pets, and their preferred food).

“There's nothing of any importance in life - except how well you do your work. Nothing. Only that. Whatever else you are, will come from that. It's the only measure of human value. All the codes of ethics they'll try to ram down your throat are just so much paper money put out by swindlers to fleece people of their virtues. The code of competence is the only system of morality that's on a gold standard.” ― Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

I think the slippery slope is deciding what aspects of a vertical business are non-competitive ... as I said, I don't fully agree with Ayn Rand (I just started reading Atlas Shrugged finally) but I am somewhat sanguine about companies that claim they can't compete with Google because Google does too many things

Microsoft was penalized for integrating too many features into their operating system because consumers were too stupid to download new browsers or music players (so now we get a more crippled OS through government intervention) ... I see some of the same misguided policies directed at Google ... does Google engage in some questionable tactics (sure) ... should they be broken into pieces because the niche players don't want to work harder (I don't think so)

 

[JeffDC]

Microsoft was penalized for integrating too many features into their operating system because consumers were too stupid to download new browsers or music players (so now we get a more crippled OS through government intervention) ... I see some of the same misguided policies directed at Google ... does Google engage in some questionable tactics (sure) ... should they be broken into pieces because the niche players don't want to work harder (I don't think so)

Google could add the option (i.e. allowing users to manipulate and obfuscate their own search results) tomorrow if they wished, and they refuse to do so. Same way they refuse to stop censoring usenet traffic. If you're honest about why this is true you already understand the need for government intervention. There is no other advocate for the public interest regardless of country.

 

[kbrickley]

Google could add the option (i.e. allowing users to manipulate and obfuscate their own search results) tomorrow if they wished, and they refuse to do so. Same way they refuse to stop censoring usenet traffic. If you're honest about why this is true you already understand the need for government intervention. There is no other advocate for the public interest regardless of country.

I am just not sure what public interest is served by trying to break up Google ... there are other search engines available (Bing, Yahoo, etc) and people still choose to use Google (because it works) ... trying to force competition by crippling one company so that the other companies can compete easier doesn't seem to serve the public good

If Google is violating a law then fine them ... if there is no law that covers it then pass one ... when the government starts to interfere with business I am reminded of the old axiom "when all you have is a hammer then every problem looks like a nail" ... I agree that Google is not a perfect company but I also think that consumers inflict many of the corporate problems on themselves ... I don't believe that the government is there to protect or encourage stupidity in consumers ... if they seriously believe that Google is not good for consumers then they should advertise to convince consumers of that ... if they can't convince them then maybe Google isn't as bad as people think they are

 

[SGA76]

Bottom line, the EU just wants Google to slide them 250-500 million in cash for "research and development of competitive search engines" with another 50-60 million a year for X years, most of which will go into politicians' pockets and offshore accounts and any new startup will receive about 10k in grants that will need to be paid back over 5-10 years without interest, which will wind up in politicians' pockets or offshore accounts.

 

[Riccochet]

So, let me get this straight. The EU is pissed at Google for manipulating the results of the software they developed and provide to the people for free.

heh .... lol .... LOL

To all those thinking this is a good thing let me remind you. YOU DON'T PAY FOR GOOGLE. Advertisers do. Don't like their ad's or the manipulation of THEIR SOFTWARE? Don't use Google. Microsoft offers pretty much every service Google does, also for free.

Fucking people. I swear.

 

[JeffDC]

I am just not sure what public interest is served by trying to break up Google ... there are other search engines available (Bing, Yahoo, etc) and people still choose to use Google (because it works) ... trying to force competition by crippling one company so that the other companies can compete easier doesn't seem to serve the public good

Again I'm astonished that so many people wish to continue living in a world where nothing is known unless Google's legal department wishes it to be known. Are you honest enough to admit that Bing, Yahoo etc return search results that are, in nearly all cases, simply subsets of Google's?

The issue of how many search engines exist is incidental to the root problem: our country and the world desperate need of an objective search engine for the internet. Even if 10 million engines existed, obfuscated and manipulated results are equally useless as objective information. If Google's search engine isn't committed to the public domain, the only option is for civil governments to implement their own, state-funded and run engines that are objective and unmanipulated by law. Some countries have already done so and I'm not against the idea, since it assures at least some semblance of long-term objectivity, civil protection and accountability. As opposed to either being able to find something on the internet or not, depending on how Google's legal department is feeling today.

I'm telling you, just a few years will expose the true extent of today's abomination called Google. Their corporate motto is Don't Be Evil for chrissakes, you seem intelligent enough to do the fucking math.

 

[MrCaffeineX]

Basically, most of the world's problems today are caused by Google, energy drinks, and libertarians. The best thing ever for the planet is to get rid of all three, but totally squishing one of those three is a great start and will massively reduce gun crime, make people less obese, and stop [H] forum members from being grumpy old men who like always whine about their governments. Getting rid of Google might even like cut down on the number of NASCAR fans who wear camo clothing in public and have satellite TV, but live in a dumpy trailer full of scream-y kids.

Besides, it's never too late for a government to go all raging-barbarian-waving-a-giant-axe-made-from-rabid-irate-squirrels on a corporation. Even the EU just like bringing up the point at all is totally gonna make the whole world (yah, even the dumb people in the US who like Android phones and carry around their little creepster monitoring device everywhere ... even to the bathroom which is seriously gross guys so stop it) wake up and some people might go, "Hmmm..you know, maybe being a good little Google drone all my life isn't a great idea," which is super helpful in lots of ways.

 

[Biznatch]

Again I'm astonished that so many people wish to continue living in a world where nothing is known unless Google's legal department wishes it to be known. Are you honest enough to admit that Bing, Yahoo etc return search results that are, in nearly all cases, simply subsets of Google's?

The issue of how many search engines exist is incidental to the root problem: our country and the world desperate need of an objective search engine for the internet. Even if 10 million engines existed, obfuscated and manipulated results are equally useless as objective information. If Google's search engine isn't committed to the public domain, the only option is for civil governments to implement their own, state-funded and run engines that are objective and unmanipulated by law. Some countries have already done so and I'm not against the idea, since it assures at least some semblance of long-term objectivity, civil protection and accountability. As opposed to either being able to find something on the internet or not, depending on how Google's legal department is feeling today.

I'm telling you, just a few years will expose the true extent of today's abomination called Google. Their corporate motto is Don't Be Evil for chrissakes, you seem intelligent enough to do the fucking math.

What are you talking about with google's legal department? I'm not saying google is good, but this decision is effing stupid. Like others have said, they are a search engine. They crawl sites, store data and return results. They pay for the servers and code the software, if they want to manipulate the results then it's not the governments job to stop them.

The problem is now that they are manipulating too much and pushing too many adds, that the service is not as useful as it was before. I'm having to use alternate search engines now because google is filling my list with adds or specific sites that aren't useful. So they are slowly pointing the gun towards their foot, then all it will take is another company to create a better engine and become what google was. Rinse wash repeat.

And considering google search results are subset of the internet, then I would expect to see similar results between search engines. But saying they are just subsets of google searches implies they don't have a search engine/DB, they just google your search and filter the results. Got any proof on that or is that just hate/speculation?

 

[MrCaffeineX]

What are you talking about with google's legal department? I'm not saying google is good, but this decision is effing stupid. Like others have said, they are a search engine. They crawl sites, store data and return results. They pay for the servers and code the software, if they want to manipulate the results then it's not the governments job to stop them.

The problem is now that they are manipulating too much and pushing too many adds, that the service is not as useful as it was before. I'm having to use alternate search engines now because google is filling my list with adds or specific sites that aren't useful. So they are slowly pointing the gun towards their foot, then all it will take is another company to create a better engine and become what google was. Rinse wash repeat.

And considering google search results are subset of the internet, then I would expect to see similar results between search engines. But saying they are just subsets of google searches implies they don't have a search engine/DB, they just google your search and filter the results. Got any proof on that or is that just hate/speculation?

To be fair, I think his point was that the results from other search engines would also be returned by a Google search of the same terms, along with additional results. This makes sense because Google is arguably the most active crawler engaged in indexing the Internet.

Breaking them up under anti-trust regulations doesn't make much sense though. As a number of people have pointed out, they are not the only game in town and as far as we know, they are not actively engaging in anti-competitive practices.

The simple truth is that they built the modern search engine market as we know it. No, they were not the first search engine, but they are demonstrably the most successful to date. Their business model has been built around their search engine and it has allowed them to expand into other markets as well. This does not make them a monopoly.

Whether or not they are indexing enough of the Internet is also not grounds for anti-trust enforcement. If we had documented evidence of them intentionally preventing others from doing so, then perhaps we could discuss this course of action.

Since it is their money, their labor, and their equipment that they are using to generate their search results, they can do whatever they want with them. Other search engines are able to do the same, they are just operating with fewer resources currently.

Personally, I find myself using Google search less and less because of the increasing advertisements and multitudes of duplicate results. I'm not thrilled with their ever-increasing invasions of privacy either, so I'm hoping someone else rises to their level. Every other consumer can do the same, and when enough of us have moved on, Google will be a relic of Internet history like AOL.

 

[JeffDC]

What are you talking about with google's legal department? I'm not saying google is good, but this decision is effing stupid. Like others have said, they are a search engine. They crawl sites, store data and return results. They pay for the servers and code the software, if they want to manipulate the results then it's not the governments job to stop them.

In their market position it most certainly is the government's job to stop them. According to Google's own numbers they control two-thirds of global searches, with virtually all of the remaining one-third simply points back to their two-thirds. Or IOW please ask 100 random people what search engine they use first and get back to us with the results.

The problem is now that they are manipulating too much and pushing too many adds, that the service is not as useful as it was before. I'm having to use alternate search engines now because google is filling my list with adds or specific sites that aren't useful. So they are slowly pointing the gun towards their foot, then all it will take is another company to create a better engine and become what google was. Rinse wash repeat.

Google in their current position can limit everything from their own competition (both current and potential) to access to freeware sites, legitimate hacking sites, political discourse sites etc etc. The question isn't whether another, better engine is possible, the question is how does a world of eight billion people obtain objective information from the internet? The world has been made Google's whore, given the inaction of our own government. So other governments are doing it for us. Again I'll extend the challenge to anyone to come up with a viable third option.

 

[kbrickley]

Again I'm astonished that so many people wish to continue living in a world where nothing is known unless Google's legal department wishes it to be known. Are you honest enough to admit that Bing, Yahoo etc return search results that are, in nearly all cases, simply subsets of Google's?

The issue of how many search engines exist is incidental to the root problem: our country and the world desperate need of an objective search engine for the internet. Even if 10 million engines existed, obfuscated and manipulated results are equally useless as objective information. If Google's search engine isn't committed to the public domain, the only option is for civil governments to implement their own, state-funded and run engines that are objective and unmanipulated by law. Some countries have already done so and I'm not against the idea, since it assures at least some semblance of long-term objectivity, civil protection and accountability. As opposed to either being able to find something on the internet or not, depending on how Google's legal department is feeling today.

I'm telling you, just a few years will expose the true extent of today's abomination called Google. Their corporate motto is Don't Be Evil for chrissakes, you seem intelligent enough to do the fucking math.

What is the definition of an objective search engine ... all search engines are going to be subjective since the internet has many options that result from most searches and they can't all be shown simultaneously ... since all the current search engines are free they tend to have some preference for advertising built into them but all of them have a mixture of advertised links and crawled links in the first couple of pages

Governments are hardly subjective either ... they have their own agendas that are often as insideous (or even more so) than the corporate ones ... I am also a little nervous about the use of civil protection as a justification for government intervention ... the governments love to "protect" us from things for our own good ... I would prefer we find better ways to educate consumers to protect themselves

as for accountability, a company is always accountable in the ultimate way (if they produce a bad product then they usually fail ... if they produce a good product they succeed) ... we need governments capable of staying out of the way so the Darwinian economic processes can work the way they are supposed to

 

[JeffDC]

What is the definition of an objective search engine ... all search engines are going to be subjective since the internet has many options that result from most searches and they can't all be shown simultaneously

Absolute horseshit, and we know it's horseshit because Google themselves used to return objective, or at least unobfuscated, results.. until the inevitable forces of corporate profit put an end to it. A hit counter is a hit counter, the singular difference between search engines is whether it ignores hit counters. Period.

As we already know from commercial radio, cable TV and all other mediums that do not enjoy Title I/II protections, there is no bottom to this particular cesspool. Nothing can or will ever be enough to satisfy the forces of corporate profit, e.g. if you've been following recent news, now the RIAA/MPAA and other dinosaurs from last century have begun suing ISPs directly. At what point do you open your eyes to what's happening?

 

[pcjunkie]

Just downloaded the latest FF and sure enough the default search engine was switched to Yahoo (Bing). Couldn't switch it back to Google fast enough. It's the best search engine period. Everybody tracks everybody, its the Internet...I have more important things to worry about.

 

[kbrickley]

Absolute horseshit, and we know it's horseshit because Google themselves used to return objective, or at least unobfuscated, results.. until the inevitable forces of corporate profit put an end to it. A hit counter is a hit counter, the singular difference between search engines is whether it ignores hit counters. Period.

As we already know from commercial radio, cable TV and all other mediums that do not enjoy Title I/II protections, there is no bottom to this particular cesspool. Nothing can or will ever be enough to satisfy the forces of corporate profit, e.g. if you've been following recent news, now the RIAA/MPAA and other dinosaurs from last century have begun suing ISPs directly. At what point do you open your eyes to what's happening?

Hit rates are fine if you always want to reward the most popular sites ... we probably just need a fee based search engine that isn't dependent on advertising and it would be easy to implement such a system ... we don't need government intervention to accomplish that

The RIAA/MPAA are totally different animals from Google ... if anything, Google is almost communistic in nature with their desire for so many free services ... corporate profits are neither bad nor evil ... in fact, I would question the motives of any company who isn't in business to make a profit ... some companies are better at it than others and some are in businesses or markets where there is more profit potential but ALL good businesses are there to make a profit

 

[JeffDC]

as far as we know, they are not actively engaging in anti-competitive practices.

Meanwhile here on Earth, try a Google search for "alternate search engines" and see if Google returns a single link to a distributed engine (e.g. YaCy etc). They don't bother telling you about such programs because it's one of the very few real threats to their totalitarian business models. They wish to be and currently are the sole gatekeeper for at least 2/3 and practically closer to 95+% of the world's internet, and they legally fight any and all attempts by any civil government to remedy the problem and protect the public interest. They are used to the internet being treated as an "information service" (according to our currently dysfunctional SCOTUS), but these models do not and cannot fly when the internet is properly reclassified as an essential utility. Again I'll point y'all back to MS who recently announced the open sourcing of .NET. Another eventuality long-term and I'm thrilled to see MS's new head actually has one.

I'll pose the same question as I did with MS: if Google released their search engine to the public domain, what do you think the response would be, by governments, the public etc? I'm not looking for specific answers just interested to know opinions whatever they might be.

 

[kbrickley]

Meanwhile here on Earth, try a Google search for "alternate search engines" and see if Google returns a single link to a distributed engine (e.g. YaCy etc). They don't bother telling you about such programs because it's one of the very few real threats to their totalitarian business models. They wish to be and currently are the sole gatekeeper for at least 2/3 and practically closer to 95+% of the world's internet, and they legally fight any and all attempts by any civil government to remedy the problem and protect the public interest. They are used to the internet being treated as an "information service" (according to our currently dysfunctional SCOTUS), but these models do not and cannot fly when the internet is properly reclassified as an essential utility. Again I'll point y'all back to MS who recently announced the open sourcing of .NET. Another eventuality long-term and I'm thrilled to see MS's new head actually has one.

I'll pose the same question as I did with MS: if Google released their search engine to the public domain, what do you think the response would be, by governments, the public etc? I'm not looking for specific answers just interested to know opinions whatever they might be.

Whether Google is open sourced should be Google's choice and not the government's or the public's ... to think otherwise is to support the Looter mentality ... I definitely question the rationale that any one company (even Google) can be the gatekeeper of 70% of the internet ... there are too many other ways to access the web and not all of them involve Google

I don't feel that it should be Google's responsibility to point you towards their competitors ... they are a business who is offering a service for free ... if they received government money or were a non-profit with protected status then they should be forced to make accomodations ... but they are a publically held for profit business ... as long as they don't break an actual law somewhere then the government should let their business alone and let the market choose to support them or not

Again I get very nervous when people proclaim restrictions on business to support the "public interest" or "public good" ... that is the path of Ayn Rand's dystopian fantasy in Atlas Shrugged ... business should not be allowed to exploit the public but they are not there to serve the public good either ... a good business provides a service to the public or other businesses ... the service is useful and value added or it is not ... that is the only measure that should be applied