36 ms·

The European Commission versus Android

126 points by denzil_correa 8y ago

galadran 8y ago
A pretty well written analysis. I think the author is mistaken on two important points though. The author writes that due to Google Play Services, most Android apps are in fact Google Play apps and couldn't be used on a non-Google version of Android without a significant rework. I believe there's already a significant body of work on providing drop in replacements for Google Play Services, e.g. microG [1]. There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Secondly, the author complains that: > More broadly, the European Commission continues to be a bit too cavalier about denying companies — well, Google, mostly — the right to monetize the products they spend billions of dollars at significant risk to develop. There's a huge rift in how most Europeans and Americans see the role of regulators but without getting into that, I want to note Android was not Google's effort alone and hardly a significant risk. Android as a software stack is built on the back of the Linux Kernel and a dozen other open source frameworks (Java, sqlite etc). Equally, Google is hardly responsible for the hardware. Manufacturer's like HTC and Samsung invested far more in making Google a success than Google did. The same manufacturers that Google has been screwing over with its anti competitive practices... [1] https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/
- turbinerneiter 8y ago
  Imagine the EU would invest these 5 billions into funding microg, alternative app storrs and other drop in replacements for APIs and Apps.
  - megaman22 8y ago
    What exactly would the EU be spending that money on? Where does this kind of punitive fine revenue go into? Is it the general slush fund, or is it earmarked for some purpose?
    - IBM 8y ago
      It's distributed to all member states in the proportion that they contribute to the EU budget, after all appeals are completed.
      - candiodari 8y ago
        No it's not. It's contributed to the general fund of the EU. If you fully follow the money, it's mostly used to make local EU agricultural products cheaper, and for the government offices and jobs in Brussels and Strasbourg.
  - kbwt 8y ago
    They would build a really nice app store and then it would sit empty because it is not preinstalled and the network effects of Google Play make it pretty much impossible to gain any traction for an alternative.
    - turbinerneiter 8y ago
      The idea is that with microg as drop in replacement all the apps would still work without the play services and be as good as. Putting your app on this additional store would cost you just a click. The vendors can preinstall that and ship google-less phones. It will not happen, but if they really care about what they claim to care about, this is what they should spend the money on. Not sure if just putting a few on Google will help to get a better, healthier market.
- pluma 8y ago
  Also I can't really muster any sympathy if a company is punished for having spent "billions of dollars at significant risk" to develop something intentionally anti-competitive. That's like saying "but we spent a lot of money on really expensive lawyers to evade those taxes" when charged with tax evasion.
  - garmaine 8y ago
    Why would google develop Android otherwise?
    - adventured 8y ago
      The Google Android skeptics would prefer exactly that. Their ideal is that Android - as we know it today - collapses and Google loses its position with the product and in the mobile market. The fantasy is that then a truly free, pure, saintly solution can spring up and smite the evil money grubbing commercial interests. That's likely to have about as much success as desktop Linux among mass consumers (and for the same reason). The sole thing that collapsing Google's Android position will do, is redistribute a lot of that market power and tech ecosystem benefit to a few other US tech giants, some Chinese tech giants and possibly to a lesser extent to some European players and Samsung. The US would net lose a considerable hegemony. As such, the US Government - State Dept, NSA, CIA, et al. - should get involved on a strategic economic security basis, and attack a very large EU company in a manner that is crippling (something worse than the Volkswagen emissions hit). We're in the midst of an economic war with the EU, the more vicious parts of the US Government need to start getting involved. At a minimum, find an excuse to perhaps take down eg Deutsche Bank, it's particularly weak, so a $10 or $15 billion invented magic fine would probably be enough to force its collapse and nationalization.
      - IBM 8y ago
        This is a Google talking point, and a laughable one at that. The list of complainants is full of American companies. Here's DuckDuckGo for example: https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1019562507294461953 https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1019562507294461953
- bmcusick 8y ago
  More to the point, the EU didn't say "Google can't monetize Android". It just said that this tying arrangement between Google Search and Android is too anti-competitive. Android could find other, more transparent and competitive, revenue models.
  - simion314 8y ago
    Google does not even want or need to make money from Android they were/are afraid that iPhone and Windows mobile devices would not default to Google search, having all the mobile devices not defaulting to google gave them nightmares.
    - Multicomp 8y ago
      This. Remember that article about how they acted like a toddler to Microsoft when the latter wanted to have a YouTube app?[1] All to keep WP from being viable enough to have a significant market share of users, especially users that didn't know or care enough to swap out bing search for Google. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15970082/google-killed-windows-phone-not-iphone https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15970082/google-killed-wi...
      - FussyZeus 8y ago
        Careful now, can't be criticizing Google too much on HN, they send the wolves for you. I'd love to know how many of the people rallying around Google's defenses now were anti-Microsoft back in the day for doing what is basically the same damn thing they were doing with Internet Explorer, only IMHO worse because Google didn't even develop Android, they just picked it up and filled it to the brim with their software.
        kungtotte 8y ago
        I don't know which HN you've been reading, but there's a fairly strong anti-Google sentiment around here...
        8y ago
- martinald 8y ago
  I can't see how this microG is at all helpful. Sure it has a replacement to GCM but every app backend would have to be rewritten to support it. It's hardly a drop in replacement if every chat app doesn't support push notifications.
  - benwaffle 8y ago
    microG acts as a drop-in replacement for Google Play Services. Apps do not have to be rewritten
    - s73v3r_ 8y ago
      But if I, as a developer, want to send push notifications, I would have to send them somewhere else. I couldn't use the stuff I'm using for everyone else.
    - xg15 8y ago
      Yes, but you can't replace the parts that rely on Google's cloud infrastructure, such as push notifications. If a feature literally requires that you send a HTTP request to a Google web API, you can hardly use that app without Google's support.
- ucaetano 8y ago
  > There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Except that microG doesn't work. It is even far behind Amazon's own implementation of GMS, and Amazon has dumped piles of money into it. > The same manufacturers that Google has been screwing over with its anti competitive practices... Surprisingly, the manufacturers aren't the ones filing the anti-trust complaints in this case. The case was brought initially by Oracle, Microsoft & company.
  - prepend 8y ago
    But isn’t this reasonable since Samsung bringing up this lawsuit could be disastrous in harming their partnership with Google. The Microsoft case wasn’t brought about by Compaq and Dell either even though they were being hosed [0]. While the case was brought by states and DOJ, there was lots of pressure from Netscape/Sun. Not really their hardware partners. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor....
    - ucaetano 8y ago
      > But isn’t this reasonable since Samsung bringing up this lawsuit could be disastrous in harming their partnership with Google. Sure, but you can't make the claim that Samsung is then being screwed over by Google. > Not really their hardware partners. Sure, and Samsung preloads its own browser today.
      - taeric 8y ago
        Why can't you? You can concede they would get more screwed by dirtying their relationship, without conceding that they are in a great relationship now.
        ucaetano 8y ago
        > Why can't you? Because you have no information to make that conclusion. But if you want to make a wild guess, sure, go ahead.
- acct1771 8y ago
  Is microG, and Yalp, usage not against ToS?
  - benwaffle 8y ago
    it is
- VikingCoder 8y ago
  > hardly a significant risk. Oh come on.
- sweden 8y ago
  The API of Google Play Services is not really open to re-implementation by third parties. The fact that microG exists doesn't invalidate the author's point. Google allows microG to exist because it is something of a niche, it is not threatening to their model. The second point you are trying to make is not really clear.
- stefan_ 8y ago
  > There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Except the contract ??
  - lern_too_spel 8y ago
    The contract is to get Play Services. If they don't want Play Services, they don't need the contract.
    - s73v3r_ 8y ago
      And that's the issue the EU is having. Play Services is pretty much essential to having a successful smartphone product in much of the world (at least the US and the EU). Many, many Android apps are only distributed through the Play Store, and many of those rely on Google Play Services. So trying to ship a phone in those markets without Google Play Services is a non-starter. Google knows this, and so they have added anti-competitive restrictions to that contract. That is the behavior the EU is objecting to.
      - lern_too_spel 8y ago
        I never claimed otherwise. GGP said shipping microg would breach a contract. It doesn't.
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  "hardly a significant risk" Android is a massive, massive undertaking by any measure, and it doesn't matter that it uses Linux and other things. "Manufacturer's like HTC and Samsung invested far more in making Google a success than Google did" I totally disagree (edit: I disagree that they are spending 'massively more' but it's of course a lot) as most of what they are doing is commoditized, and the hardware aspects that they are actually competitive on ... those are differentiated in their models and they can capture the surpluses generated by that differentiation, which is to say those competitive aspects are not going back into 'Android' or any 'community' etc..
  - blub 8y ago
    Nope, Android v1 was a no-name product from a highly competent web service provider without any track record whatsoever in mobile OSes. Unsurprisingly, it wasn't a good product, so it needed to be open source to gain traction, since no one in their right mind would pay for it. Furthermore, it needed the device manufacturers on board, since Google had zero mobile HW experience, as can be seen on how they handled their Motorola acquisition. So Google actually owes device manufacturers quite a lot. It couldn't have done it without them. And you completely fail to appreciate how complex and important the Linux kernel is. Look at their Fuchsia effort: it was published in 2016 and was in dev for a couple of years probably. Still not ready for production. Now try to imagine what would happen if Apple had 3 extra years to develop iOS before Android was launched. Android would be stillborn. That's what Linux brought to the table.
    - sonnyblarney 8y ago
      We're not talking about Android v1, we're talking about Android now and all that's been invested in it. The 'complexity' of Linux is not relevant - it's a part of the underlying platform, in much the same way that it is in so many other products. Competitive manufacturers, mobile OS makers etc. all have access to the same Linux that Google does. Google has invested massively in Android, it's a product of theirs. If they can't 'bundle' whilst giving it away for free, their going to justify their investment by locking it up and selling it for money.
- ariwilson 8y ago
  Putting billions of dollars and hundreds of engineers' time into Android for years rather than something else does seem like the definition of a significant risk to me. Not to mention all the legal issues.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  "There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out." I would be shocked if 1). The licensing agreements with Google to get the Play Store in the first place allow that, and 2). If MicroG would be production ready. It might be fine for some enthusiasts and hobbyists, but I highly doubt it's ready to be shipped by default.
- utopcell 8y ago
  Screwing over ? Manufacturers have made a ton of money selling $800 devices every couple years.
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    One or two have. Most Android OEMs aren't making that much money, if they're making any at all.
IBM 8y ago
Sundar Pichai in 2009 [1]: >Second, Google believes that the browser market is still largely uncompetitive, which holds back innovation for users. This is because Internet Explorer is tied to Microsoft's dominant computer operating system, giving it an unfair advantage over other browsers. Compare this to the mobile market, where Microsoft cannot tie Internet Explorer to a dominant operating system, and its browser therefore has a much lower usage. By the way, I think it's absurd for Google to threaten that they may now charge a license for Android [2]. They're effectively saying that now that they've eliminated all competition over the past 10 years and achieved a dominant share of the market, they're going to raise prices. That's a slam dunk case even in the US's broken antitrust system. [1] https://publicpolicy.googleblog.com/2009/02/browsers-powered-by-user-choice.html https://publicpolicy.googleblog.com/2009/02/browsers-powered... [2] https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17585396/google-android-eu-fine-response https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17585396/google-android-e...
- lern_too_spel 8y ago
  The majority of Android phones (including all Samsung phones) have other browsers preinstalled.
  - mtgx 8y ago
    Relevant from 2014: https://www.androidcentral.com/theres-reason-youre-seeing-more-google-new-android-phones-google-wrote-contracts-way https://www.androidcentral.com/theres-reason-youre-seeing-mo...
  - mgiannopoulos 8y ago
    Replace "browser" with "app store" and you arrive where the parent comment was going.
    - lern_too_spel 8y ago
      The majority of Android phones sold (including Samsung) preinstall other app stores too.
trocadero 8y ago
I think the analogy of Google's castle being search and everything else a scorched earth tactic to protect that is perfect. It's the heart of my strongly ambivalent feelings about Google. If you take their major successes like Maps, Android, Chrome, GMail, Analytics they are all really good products. They aren't examples of a monopoly giving bad service or forcing an inferior product on consumers. The problem is that it sucks the oxygen out of the room for so many fundamental technologies that we use today. How do you compete with the combination of massive resources and a willingness to give away things for free?
- kodablah 8y ago
  Honest question, not tongue in cheek, if there's an instance where consumer utility and ability to compete are opposing forces, which do we side with? And if, as I suspect, it is nuanced and not a binary answer, do we ever consider one of the forces while trying to increase the other? Should the one doling out anti-competitive punishments be required to recognize consumer utility/happiness? Should the one implementing consumer utility/happiness be required to recognize its competitors' abilities? To me it seems the requirement to recognize the other opposing force is only on the implementer.
  - olau 8y ago
    I think the law is there to protect competitors, and that's it. Why the law is there is of course another matter. It's like if you go out and kill someone. That person may have been a really, really horrible person that our society is measuredly better off without. But unless there's some kind of self-defense involved, you're facing a sentence to prison. I'm not trying to equate killing with monopoly abuse, but I find it odd that the principle that if you break the law, you face the consequences results in so much questioning. These cases are meticulously prepared and come from complaints filed with the authorities. If you read all the paperwork, you'd most likely come to the same conclusion: Google abused their dominant market position.
    - kodablah 8y ago
      > I think the law is there to protect competitors, and that's it. I disagree. I think it's there (or should be there) to protect society/consumers, and that's it. I am saying that by excluding all other consumer effects and pretending that it's there to protect competitors potentially at the harm of society is invalid. Sometimes they align, sometimes they don't. > I'm not trying to equate killing with monopoly abuse, but I find it odd that the principle that if you break the law, you face the consequences results in so much questioning. Because the law is vague and subjective. It's not like we have algorithms or robots determining guilt. The thing that is odd is confusing questioning of the law with questioning of the idea of breaking laws. And I agree they probably did abuse their position, but that doesn't relate specifically to the comment you're responding to which is more about whether abuse is all that should be taken into consideration.
simosx 8y ago
Being pedantic here. It is in fact versus "Google's current business plan of Android", not Android per se.
kodablah 8y ago
> Still, it is an unsatisfying remedy: Google built Android for the express purpose of monetizing search, and to be denied that by regulatory edict feels off; Google, though, bears a lot of the blame for going too far with its contracts. This could be seen another way. Instead of going too far with its contracts, i.e. limiting the supplier side, the results of these regulations should entice future companies to not go too far on their distribution, i.e. limiting the demand side. If it becomes clear that having a dominant position in a market can be problematic, a reasonable company might do things to prevent it from happening including limiting growth, raising prices, stymying third-party ecosystems/distributions, and reducing feature investment. It can be argued that these punishments are predictable and easily avoided with self regulation, we just need to be sure we're happy with the forms this self regulation may take. Being in a dominant position is rare for sure, but in these rare cases, if I had a choice, I'd do everything I can do be just under dominant. Google might want to start realizing this with Chrome and surreptitiously support (...er...keep supporting) Firefox or not implement too many features before others can catch up.
- enitihas 8y ago
  Seeing this entire thing fold out, it seems the best monopolies for a corporation are the legal monopolies(like iOS), where there are still very high barriers for customers to switch, but you aren't dominating any well defined market segment.
  - lotsofpulp 8y ago
    Dominating the market segment of people with greater than median average disposable income seems to be best strategy.
    - enitihas 8y ago
      Exactly. It incentivizes corporations to focus on the richer market segment, where the profit margins can be high enough to compensate the relatively low volume, and leave the lower end of the market to be dominated by cheaper alternatives. A product dominating a very low revenue segment may come to be seen as not worthwhile. Not saying such a strategy should be the goal or will be easy, but that seems the natural direction large corporations may want to take.
enitihas 8y ago
While I understand that the law is not required to be a mathematical statement and requires case by case interpretation, I wonder if these leaves several burning questions on the table: 1. Was it illegal for apple to force install apple maps on iOS users, stiffling competing maps apps? 2. Is it illegal for apple to not provide other browsers JIT capabilities, effectively forcing them to be a skin on top of Safari? I understand that iOS has no market dominance. But if iOS reaches 60% shares in a country, can the country demand substantial changes to iOS to encourage competitors? 70%? 80%?. Does a company need to make its product more open as it starts dominating the market. Also, how would such market segments be defined for market domination? Phones? Smart phones? Phones with a particular characteristics? Phones with a particular OS(as phone inter operability is widely within OSes only) As the press release of the commission says "market for .... licensable smart mobile operating systems and app stores for the Android mobile operating system.". It seems using this vocabulary even Apple can be branded a monopoly, dominant in "unlicensable smart mobile operating systems and app stores for the iOS mobile operating system". Then isn't even apple using their dominance of "app store for iOS" to dominate other market segments?
- cageface 8y ago
  As Apple enthusiasts love to point out, a huge chunk of Android sales are low end feature phone replacements. If you exclude those then the two platforms are much closer to parity in marketshare. And Android's hold is precarious. Pretty much only Samsung is making any money on Android and even they are seeing declining sales for their flagship phones. I'm convinced if Apple ever offers a decent (not iPhone SE) iPhone at around the $300 price point it will be a bloodbath for Android OEMs. I'm convinced this decision will one day seen as a mistake by the EC. Hopefully it won't destroy what is a now a healthy & competitive marketplace with a lot of meaningful choice for consumers.
  - enitihas 8y ago
    Exactly, this decision will benefit apple a lot, as they would be free to integrate their platform and offerings in all sorts of ways, continuing to charge their premium, where as the "dominant" mobile OS will have to keep itself open and not force anything on users or makers.
JumpCrisscross 8y ago
Not bad timing for Norway's Opera's end-of-July IPO [1]. (Not suggesting any nefarious intent on the EU's end.) [1] https://seekingalpha.com/article/4187253-first-look-operas-106-million-ipo https://seekingalpha.com/article/4187253-first-look-operas-1...
- notreallyauser 8y ago
  Norway is not a member of the EU.
  - izacus 8y ago
    It is a member of EEA though and this ruling affects them.
- SyneRyder 8y ago
  I thought Opera was sold to a Chinese consortium (Kunlun, Qihoo and Golden Brick) back in 2016? [1] [2] Apparently they kept the Norway office as the headquarters though, and the website makes little reference to the Chinese office and no reference I could find to their new CEO. The Norwegian company that used to be called Opera Software is now called Otello Corporation - they also sold the name of their company together with the browser. [3] [1] https://www.engadget.com/2016/07/18/opera-browser-sold-to-a-chinese-consortium-for-600-million/ https://www.engadget.com/2016/07/18/opera-browser-sold-to-a-... [2] https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/406030 https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/406030 [3] https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/opera-software https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/opera-software
utopcell 8y ago
This is a well written summary. From the article, the European Commission requires Google to respond to these three accusations: > 1. Tying Google’s search and browser apps to the Google Play Store. From the user's perspective, this is not even true. For example, Samsung devices ship with their own browser on the home screen [a]. The user has to seek out the Chrome app (that is pre-installed) in order to use it. Besides, Play, Chrome and Search are Google's products and they should be allowed to bundle them as they wish. Technically, they could be one app. > 2. Paying OEMs to exclusively pre-install Google Search on every Android device they made. This point is moot. Google no longer does that. In fact, unbundling the Play store from search will force a bidding war for the default search engine, which will end up with Google paying to add Search on a product they are giving away for free. > 3. Barring OEMs that installed Google’s apps from selling any device that ran an Android fork. This feels absurd to me. Google is under no obligation to offer an open-source version of Android in the first place. If they decide to retract the OSS version, which is well within their right, how exactly are OEMs restricted ? How is EU better off in that case ? Is EU going to _force_ Google to give away Android for free ? [a] ..except in the US.
- blub 8y ago
  DuckDuckGo posted some info on their twitter which completely obliterates your point 1. Regarding point 3, I've said elsewhere why Android had [1] to be open source and why they can't easily [2][3] make it closed source. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17561391 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17561391 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17562074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17562074 3: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17556971 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17556971

126 points by denzil_correa 8y ago

A pretty well written analysis. I think the author is mistaken on two important points though. The author writes that due to Google Play Services, most Android apps are in fact Google Play apps and couldn't be used on a non-Google version of Android without a significant rework. I believe there's already a significant body of work on providing drop in replacements for Google Play Services, e.g. microG [1]. There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Secondly, the author complains that: > More broadly, the European Commission continues to be a bit too cavalier about denying companies — well, Google, mostly — the right to monetize the products they spend billions of dollars at significant risk to develop. There's a huge rift in how most Europeans and Americans see the role of regulators but without getting into that, I want to note Android was not Google's effort alone and hardly a significant risk. Android as a software stack is built on the back of the Linux Kernel and a dozen other open source frameworks (Java, sqlite etc). Equally, Google is hardly responsible for the hardware. Manufacturer's like HTC and Samsung invested far more in making Google a success than Google did. The same manufacturers that Google has been screwing over with its anti competitive practices... [1] https://microg.org/ https://microg.org/

turbinerneiter 8y ago
Imagine the EU would invest these 5 billions into funding microg, alternative app storrs and other drop in replacements for APIs and Apps.
- megaman22 8y ago
  What exactly would the EU be spending that money on? Where does this kind of punitive fine revenue go into? Is it the general slush fund, or is it earmarked for some purpose?
  - IBM 8y ago
    It's distributed to all member states in the proportion that they contribute to the EU budget, after all appeals are completed.
    - candiodari 8y ago
      No it's not. It's contributed to the general fund of the EU. If you fully follow the money, it's mostly used to make local EU agricultural products cheaper, and for the government offices and jobs in Brussels and Strasbourg.
- kbwt 8y ago
  They would build a really nice app store and then it would sit empty because it is not preinstalled and the network effects of Google Play make it pretty much impossible to gain any traction for an alternative.
  - turbinerneiter 8y ago
    The idea is that with microg as drop in replacement all the apps would still work without the play services and be as good as. Putting your app on this additional store would cost you just a click. The vendors can preinstall that and ship google-less phones. It will not happen, but if they really care about what they claim to care about, this is what they should spend the money on. Not sure if just putting a few on Google will help to get a better, healthier market.
pluma 8y ago
Also I can't really muster any sympathy if a company is punished for having spent "billions of dollars at significant risk" to develop something intentionally anti-competitive. That's like saying "but we spent a lot of money on really expensive lawyers to evade those taxes" when charged with tax evasion.
- garmaine 8y ago
  Why would google develop Android otherwise?
  - adventured 8y ago
    The Google Android skeptics would prefer exactly that. Their ideal is that Android - as we know it today - collapses and Google loses its position with the product and in the mobile market. The fantasy is that then a truly free, pure, saintly solution can spring up and smite the evil money grubbing commercial interests. That's likely to have about as much success as desktop Linux among mass consumers (and for the same reason). The sole thing that collapsing Google's Android position will do, is redistribute a lot of that market power and tech ecosystem benefit to a few other US tech giants, some Chinese tech giants and possibly to a lesser extent to some European players and Samsung. The US would net lose a considerable hegemony. As such, the US Government - State Dept, NSA, CIA, et al. - should get involved on a strategic economic security basis, and attack a very large EU company in a manner that is crippling (something worse than the Volkswagen emissions hit). We're in the midst of an economic war with the EU, the more vicious parts of the US Government need to start getting involved. At a minimum, find an excuse to perhaps take down eg Deutsche Bank, it's particularly weak, so a $10 or $15 billion invented magic fine would probably be enough to force its collapse and nationalization.
    - IBM 8y ago
      This is a Google talking point, and a laughable one at that. The list of complainants is full of American companies. Here's DuckDuckGo for example: https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1019562507294461953 https://twitter.com/DuckDuckGo/status/1019562507294461953
bmcusick 8y ago
More to the point, the EU didn't say "Google can't monetize Android". It just said that this tying arrangement between Google Search and Android is too anti-competitive. Android could find other, more transparent and competitive, revenue models.
- simion314 8y ago
  Google does not even want or need to make money from Android they were/are afraid that iPhone and Windows mobile devices would not default to Google search, having all the mobile devices not defaulting to google gave them nightmares.
  - Multicomp 8y ago
    This. Remember that article about how they acted like a toddler to Microsoft when the latter wanted to have a YouTube app?[1] All to keep WP from being viable enough to have a significant market share of users, especially users that didn't know or care enough to swap out bing search for Google. [1] https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15970082/google-killed-windows-phone-not-iphone https://www.theverge.com/2017/7/14/15970082/google-killed-wi...
    - FussyZeus 8y ago
      Careful now, can't be criticizing Google too much on HN, they send the wolves for you. I'd love to know how many of the people rallying around Google's defenses now were anti-Microsoft back in the day for doing what is basically the same damn thing they were doing with Internet Explorer, only IMHO worse because Google didn't even develop Android, they just picked it up and filled it to the brim with their software.
      - kungtotte 8y ago
        I don't know which HN you've been reading, but there's a fairly strong anti-Google sentiment around here...
      - 8y ago
martinald 8y ago
I can't see how this microG is at all helpful. Sure it has a replacement to GCM but every app backend would have to be rewritten to support it. It's hardly a drop in replacement if every chat app doesn't support push notifications.
- benwaffle 8y ago
  microG acts as a drop-in replacement for Google Play Services. Apps do not have to be rewritten
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    But if I, as a developer, want to send push notifications, I would have to send them somewhere else. I couldn't use the stuff I'm using for everyone else.
  - xg15 8y ago
    Yes, but you can't replace the parts that rely on Google's cloud infrastructure, such as push notifications. If a feature literally requires that you send a HTTP request to a Google web API, you can hardly use that app without Google's support.
ucaetano 8y ago
> There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Except that microG doesn't work. It is even far behind Amazon's own implementation of GMS, and Amazon has dumped piles of money into it. > The same manufacturers that Google has been screwing over with its anti competitive practices... Surprisingly, the manufacturers aren't the ones filing the anti-trust complaints in this case. The case was brought initially by Oracle, Microsoft & company.
- prepend 8y ago
  But isn’t this reasonable since Samsung bringing up this lawsuit could be disastrous in harming their partnership with Google. The Microsoft case wasn’t brought about by Compaq and Dell either even though they were being hosed [0]. While the case was brought by states and DOJ, there was lots of pressure from Netscape/Sun. Not really their hardware partners. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Cor....
  - ucaetano 8y ago
    > But isn’t this reasonable since Samsung bringing up this lawsuit could be disastrous in harming their partnership with Google. Sure, but you can't make the claim that Samsung is then being screwed over by Google. > Not really their hardware partners. Sure, and Samsung preloads its own browser today.
    - taeric 8y ago
      Why can't you? You can concede they would get more screwed by dirtying their relationship, without conceding that they are in a great relationship now.
      - ucaetano 8y ago
        > Why can't you? Because you have no information to make that conclusion. But if you want to make a wild guess, sure, go ahead.
acct1771 8y ago
Is microG, and Yalp, usage not against ToS?
- benwaffle 8y ago
  it is
VikingCoder 8y ago
> hardly a significant risk. Oh come on.
sweden 8y ago
The API of Google Play Services is not really open to re-implementation by third parties. The fact that microG exists doesn't invalidate the author's point. Google allows microG to exist because it is something of a niche, it is not threatening to their model. The second point you are trying to make is not really clear.
stefan_ 8y ago
> There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out. Except the contract ??
- lern_too_spel 8y ago
  The contract is to get Play Services. If they don't want Play Services, they don't need the contract.
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    And that's the issue the EU is having. Play Services is pretty much essential to having a successful smartphone product in much of the world (at least the US and the EU). Many, many Android apps are only distributed through the Play Store, and many of those rely on Google Play Services. So trying to ship a phone in those markets without Google Play Services is a non-starter. Google knows this, and so they have added anti-competitive restrictions to that contract. That is the behavior the EU is objecting to.
    - lern_too_spel 8y ago
      I never claimed otherwise. GGP said shipping microg would breach a contract. It doesn't.
sonnyblarney 8y ago
"hardly a significant risk" Android is a massive, massive undertaking by any measure, and it doesn't matter that it uses Linux and other things. "Manufacturer's like HTC and Samsung invested far more in making Google a success than Google did" I totally disagree (edit: I disagree that they are spending 'massively more' but it's of course a lot) as most of what they are doing is commoditized, and the hardware aspects that they are actually competitive on ... those are differentiated in their models and they can capture the surpluses generated by that differentiation, which is to say those competitive aspects are not going back into 'Android' or any 'community' etc..
- blub 8y ago
  Nope, Android v1 was a no-name product from a highly competent web service provider without any track record whatsoever in mobile OSes. Unsurprisingly, it wasn't a good product, so it needed to be open source to gain traction, since no one in their right mind would pay for it. Furthermore, it needed the device manufacturers on board, since Google had zero mobile HW experience, as can be seen on how they handled their Motorola acquisition. So Google actually owes device manufacturers quite a lot. It couldn't have done it without them. And you completely fail to appreciate how complex and important the Linux kernel is. Look at their Fuchsia effort: it was published in 2016 and was in dev for a couple of years probably. Still not ready for production. Now try to imagine what would happen if Apple had 3 extra years to develop iOS before Android was launched. Android would be stillborn. That's what Linux brought to the table.
  - sonnyblarney 8y ago
    We're not talking about Android v1, we're talking about Android now and all that's been invested in it. The 'complexity' of Linux is not relevant - it's a part of the underlying platform, in much the same way that it is in so many other products. Competitive manufacturers, mobile OS makers etc. all have access to the same Linux that Google does. Google has invested massively in Android, it's a product of theirs. If they can't 'bundle' whilst giving it away for free, their going to justify their investment by locking it up and selling it for money.
ariwilson 8y ago
Putting billions of dollars and hundreds of engineers' time into Android for years rather than something else does seem like the definition of a significant risk to me. Not to mention all the legal issues.
s73v3r_ 8y ago
"There is nothing that stops a manufacturer from providing microG instead of Play Services and hence cutting Google out." I would be shocked if 1). The licensing agreements with Google to get the Play Store in the first place allow that, and 2). If MicroG would be production ready. It might be fine for some enthusiasts and hobbyists, but I highly doubt it's ready to be shipped by default.
utopcell 8y ago
Screwing over ? Manufacturers have made a ton of money selling $800 devices every couple years.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  One or two have. Most Android OEMs aren't making that much money, if they're making any at all.

IBM 8y ago

Sundar Pichai in 2009 [1]: >Second, Google believes that the browser market is still largely uncompetitive, which holds back innovation for users. This is because Internet Explorer is tied to Microsoft's dominant computer operating system, giving it an unfair advantage over other browsers. Compare this to the mobile market, where Microsoft cannot tie Internet Explorer to a dominant operating system, and its browser therefore has a much lower usage. By the way, I think it's absurd for Google to threaten that they may now charge a license for Android [2]. They're effectively saying that now that they've eliminated all competition over the past 10 years and achieved a dominant share of the market, they're going to raise prices. That's a slam dunk case even in the US's broken antitrust system. [1] https://publicpolicy.googleblog.com/2009/02/browsers-powered-by-user-choice.html https://publicpolicy.googleblog.com/2009/02/browsers-powered... [2] https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17585396/google-android-eu-fine-response https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17585396/google-android-e...

lern_too_spel 8y ago
The majority of Android phones (including all Samsung phones) have other browsers preinstalled.
- mtgx 8y ago
  Relevant from 2014: https://www.androidcentral.com/theres-reason-youre-seeing-more-google-new-android-phones-google-wrote-contracts-way https://www.androidcentral.com/theres-reason-youre-seeing-mo...
- mgiannopoulos 8y ago
  Replace "browser" with "app store" and you arrive where the parent comment was going.
  - lern_too_spel 8y ago
    The majority of Android phones sold (including Samsung) preinstall other app stores too.

trocadero 8y ago

I think the analogy of Google's castle being search and everything else a scorched earth tactic to protect that is perfect. It's the heart of my strongly ambivalent feelings about Google. If you take their major successes like Maps, Android, Chrome, GMail, Analytics they are all really good products. They aren't examples of a monopoly giving bad service or forcing an inferior product on consumers. The problem is that it sucks the oxygen out of the room for so many fundamental technologies that we use today. How do you compete with the combination of massive resources and a willingness to give away things for free?

kodablah 8y ago
Honest question, not tongue in cheek, if there's an instance where consumer utility and ability to compete are opposing forces, which do we side with? And if, as I suspect, it is nuanced and not a binary answer, do we ever consider one of the forces while trying to increase the other? Should the one doling out anti-competitive punishments be required to recognize consumer utility/happiness? Should the one implementing consumer utility/happiness be required to recognize its competitors' abilities? To me it seems the requirement to recognize the other opposing force is only on the implementer.
- olau 8y ago
  I think the law is there to protect competitors, and that's it. Why the law is there is of course another matter. It's like if you go out and kill someone. That person may have been a really, really horrible person that our society is measuredly better off without. But unless there's some kind of self-defense involved, you're facing a sentence to prison. I'm not trying to equate killing with monopoly abuse, but I find it odd that the principle that if you break the law, you face the consequences results in so much questioning. These cases are meticulously prepared and come from complaints filed with the authorities. If you read all the paperwork, you'd most likely come to the same conclusion: Google abused their dominant market position.
  - kodablah 8y ago
    > I think the law is there to protect competitors, and that's it. I disagree. I think it's there (or should be there) to protect society/consumers, and that's it. I am saying that by excluding all other consumer effects and pretending that it's there to protect competitors potentially at the harm of society is invalid. Sometimes they align, sometimes they don't. > I'm not trying to equate killing with monopoly abuse, but I find it odd that the principle that if you break the law, you face the consequences results in so much questioning. Because the law is vague and subjective. It's not like we have algorithms or robots determining guilt. The thing that is odd is confusing questioning of the law with questioning of the idea of breaking laws. And I agree they probably did abuse their position, but that doesn't relate specifically to the comment you're responding to which is more about whether abuse is all that should be taken into consideration.

simosx 8y ago

Being pedantic here. It is in fact versus "Google's current business plan of Android", not Android per se.

kodablah 8y ago

> Still, it is an unsatisfying remedy: Google built Android for the express purpose of monetizing search, and to be denied that by regulatory edict feels off; Google, though, bears a lot of the blame for going too far with its contracts. This could be seen another way. Instead of going too far with its contracts, i.e. limiting the supplier side, the results of these regulations should entice future companies to not go too far on their distribution, i.e. limiting the demand side. If it becomes clear that having a dominant position in a market can be problematic, a reasonable company might do things to prevent it from happening including limiting growth, raising prices, stymying third-party ecosystems/distributions, and reducing feature investment. It can be argued that these punishments are predictable and easily avoided with self regulation, we just need to be sure we're happy with the forms this self regulation may take. Being in a dominant position is rare for sure, but in these rare cases, if I had a choice, I'd do everything I can do be just under dominant. Google might want to start realizing this with Chrome and surreptitiously support (...er...keep supporting) Firefox or not implement too many features before others can catch up.

enitihas 8y ago
Seeing this entire thing fold out, it seems the best monopolies for a corporation are the legal monopolies(like iOS), where there are still very high barriers for customers to switch, but you aren't dominating any well defined market segment.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  Dominating the market segment of people with greater than median average disposable income seems to be best strategy.
  - enitihas 8y ago
    Exactly. It incentivizes corporations to focus on the richer market segment, where the profit margins can be high enough to compensate the relatively low volume, and leave the lower end of the market to be dominated by cheaper alternatives. A product dominating a very low revenue segment may come to be seen as not worthwhile. Not saying such a strategy should be the goal or will be easy, but that seems the natural direction large corporations may want to take.

enitihas 8y ago

While I understand that the law is not required to be a mathematical statement and requires case by case interpretation, I wonder if these leaves several burning questions on the table: 1. Was it illegal for apple to force install apple maps on iOS users, stiffling competing maps apps? 2. Is it illegal for apple to not provide other browsers JIT capabilities, effectively forcing them to be a skin on top of Safari? I understand that iOS has no market dominance. But if iOS reaches 60% shares in a country, can the country demand substantial changes to iOS to encourage competitors? 70%? 80%?. Does a company need to make its product more open as it starts dominating the market. Also, how would such market segments be defined for market domination? Phones? Smart phones? Phones with a particular characteristics? Phones with a particular OS(as phone inter operability is widely within OSes only) As the press release of the commission says "market for .... licensable smart mobile operating systems and app stores for the Android mobile operating system.". It seems using this vocabulary even Apple can be branded a monopoly, dominant in "unlicensable smart mobile operating systems and app stores for the iOS mobile operating system". Then isn't even apple using their dominance of "app store for iOS" to dominate other market segments?

cageface 8y ago
As Apple enthusiasts love to point out, a huge chunk of Android sales are low end feature phone replacements. If you exclude those then the two platforms are much closer to parity in marketshare. And Android's hold is precarious. Pretty much only Samsung is making any money on Android and even they are seeing declining sales for their flagship phones. I'm convinced if Apple ever offers a decent (not iPhone SE) iPhone at around the $300 price point it will be a bloodbath for Android OEMs. I'm convinced this decision will one day seen as a mistake by the EC. Hopefully it won't destroy what is a now a healthy & competitive marketplace with a lot of meaningful choice for consumers.
- enitihas 8y ago
  Exactly, this decision will benefit apple a lot, as they would be free to integrate their platform and offerings in all sorts of ways, continuing to charge their premium, where as the "dominant" mobile OS will have to keep itself open and not force anything on users or makers.

JumpCrisscross 8y ago

Not bad timing for Norway's Opera's end-of-July IPO [1]. (Not suggesting any nefarious intent on the EU's end.) [1] https://seekingalpha.com/article/4187253-first-look-operas-106-million-ipo https://seekingalpha.com/article/4187253-first-look-operas-1...

notreallyauser 8y ago
Norway is not a member of the EU.
- izacus 8y ago
  It is a member of EEA though and this ruling affects them.
SyneRyder 8y ago
I thought Opera was sold to a Chinese consortium (Kunlun, Qihoo and Golden Brick) back in 2016? [1] [2] Apparently they kept the Norway office as the headquarters though, and the website makes little reference to the Chinese office and no reference I could find to their new CEO. The Norwegian company that used to be called Opera Software is now called Otello Corporation - they also sold the name of their company together with the browser. [3] [1] https://www.engadget.com/2016/07/18/opera-browser-sold-to-a-chinese-consortium-for-600-million/ https://www.engadget.com/2016/07/18/opera-browser-sold-to-a-... [2] https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/406030 https://newsweb.oslobors.no/message/406030 [3] https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/opera-software https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/opera-software

utopcell 8y ago

This is a well written summary. From the article, the European Commission requires Google to respond to these three accusations: > 1. Tying Google’s search and browser apps to the Google Play Store. From the user's perspective, this is not even true. For example, Samsung devices ship with their own browser on the home screen [a]. The user has to seek out the Chrome app (that is pre-installed) in order to use it. Besides, Play, Chrome and Search are Google's products and they should be allowed to bundle them as they wish. Technically, they could be one app. > 2. Paying OEMs to exclusively pre-install Google Search on every Android device they made. This point is moot. Google no longer does that. In fact, unbundling the Play store from search will force a bidding war for the default search engine, which will end up with Google paying to add Search on a product they are giving away for free. > 3. Barring OEMs that installed Google’s apps from selling any device that ran an Android fork. This feels absurd to me. Google is under no obligation to offer an open-source version of Android in the first place. If they decide to retract the OSS version, which is well within their right, how exactly are OEMs restricted ? How is EU better off in that case ? Is EU going to _force_ Google to give away Android for free ? [a] ..except in the US.

blub 8y ago
DuckDuckGo posted some info on their twitter which completely obliterates your point 1. Regarding point 3, I've said elsewhere why Android had [1] to be open source and why they can't easily [2][3] make it closed source. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17561391 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17561391 2: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17562074 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17562074 3: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17556971 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17556971