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"Chrome - browsers" And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web

"Chrome - browsers" And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web. Seperate that and there will be no more chrome as there is no other source of income. (Except maybe a little bit from ChromeOS). Otherwise I get it, it is mostly politics to threaten google to reach this.: "It's quite likely to make Google dump this proposal, on the advice of their antitrust lawyers." But a breakup of google(alphabet) is something very unrealistic and actually not something I want to see, unless we also break up Microsoft at the same time. Otherwise we end up with Microsoft dominating the web again. No thank you, I still remember those times.

Andrew_nenakhov 3y ago
Well maybe from search engines, who'd pay to be the default search option? So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla.
- hutzlibu 3y ago
  "So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla." Yeah, with tracking and ads from the browser enabled by default and by now allmost non existent marketshare. The money from ad companies does not come with no strings attached. (But I still use Firefox btw.)
Joeri 3y ago
Money for developing chrome is not an issue. Google search could pay chrome to be the primary search engine just like they pay mozilla. Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…
- JellyYelly 3y ago
  > Google search could pay chrome to be the primary search engine This doesn't sound like a good idea if your goal is to prevent these two companies (or divisions of the company) for co-conspiring.
- hutzlibu 3y ago
  "Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…" Microsoft surely will continue to develope edge. That is my main issue with this thing, because they surely would like to be the one with the dominating browser again and if google has to drop chromium, Microsoft will just overtake it. Antitrust and breakup is not a simple thing to do right.
  - omnimus 3y ago
    Then lets break up Microsoft too.
    - flagrant_taco 3y ago
      There's plenty of questionable business practices that Microsoft could probably be slapped on the wrist for of anyone cares, but I'm not actually sure there's a good antitrust claim that could lead to a breakup there.
      - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
        There's always bundling a web browser with their OS and giving it an unfair advantage over all other browsers, aka the exact thing they were sued for last time.
        vel0city 3y ago
        ChromeOS bundles its own browser and goes even further in preventing people from installing their own than Windows. Imagine if on the first boot of ChromeOS it asks if you want to use Chrome, Edge, Safari, or Firefox.
        yencabulator 3y ago
        In related news, ChromeOS is separating the GUI shell from the browser: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36977107 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36977107
- mike_hearn 3y ago
  At that point nothing would stop AdCorp from cutting a deal with the new ChromeCorp that says "you get incentive payments for each page load that presents a remote attestation that no ad blockers are present". It wouldn't be seen as anti-competitive then because there are multiple ad serving companies and multiple browser companies, and anyway, legislators would expect and find it reasonable that browsers only get paid referral fees for page loads that do actually display ads. In fact if it goes to court you might not get what you expect - judges (who likely don't use ad blockers much themselves due to age) might perceive browsers who take ad incentive payments but allow ad blocking to be engaged in fraud.
  - pyrale 3y ago
    > At that point nothing would stop AdCorp from cutting a deal with the new ChromeCorp that says... I suspect judges that just ordered an antitrust would not be kind to people to people who essentially ignore the order by recreating an informal structure.
    - mike_hearn 3y ago
      Why? Company breakups are about increasing competition. It's not about killing the Baby Bells by cutting them off overnight from what they need to survive. ChromeCorp would be both free to cut similar deals with other ad networks, and incentivized to do so, that would be sufficient for governments concerned about monopolies and anti-trust. It's important to keep things mentally separate here. There is nothing anti-competitive about remote attestation, no more than there is about TLS. It's just far too general a tool for that. Even much more restricted versions as used by the smartphones, games consoles, Windows managed network security etc have never been claimed to be anti-competitive. That would be a very novel legal theory that's unlikely to work on its own (you can use the tech in ways that are anti-competitive, but it needs someone to actually do so). So if Google were to be broken up, it'd have to be for wider competition and market health concerns, it wouldn't be to do with any specific API getting added to Chrome. And then if they were split up, they'd need to formalize arrangements in contracts that are today informal, like how Chrome is funded exactly. At that point, do you think the newly born AdCorp will just accept paying lots of money for ad impressions to Chrome when the users aren't going to see them? Google tolerates it today for a mixture of reasons e.g. a lot of their own staff use ad blockers, they want to be able to recruit very widely for many different projects, etc. A company specialized only in advertising would have fewer such concerns and could easily demand more aggressive measures, indeed, their new shareholders might insist upon it. Whereas today Google isn't really susceptible to stockholder pressure and is willing to let a lot slide.
- o1y32 3y ago
  I guess you have no idea how much money it costs to develop something like Chrome, especially at Google's salary.
  - pocketarc 3y ago
    Google currently plays Apple billions ($15B supposedly) to be the default search engine on Safari, and another half a billion a year for Firefox. For Chrome, with their gigantic market share, they'd pay billions (just like they pay Apple). Browsers are complicated, but let's not pretend that that kind of money wouldn't be enough.
    - edgyquant 3y ago
      I’m not sure what you mean. Google would continue to pay chrome to advertise?
      - andsoitis 3y ago
        They’re saying: Google (the search company) would pay ChromeCorp (company behind Chrome/Chromium) big money to be the default search engine in the browser. Google already pays both Mozilla and Apple in this way. Theoretically this money should be enough to finance the continued investment in Chrome.
  - bee_rider 3y ago
    It might be nice to have less web browser development, fewer engineers who need to add a new feature to get a bullet point for their review. Rendering a website should not be a huge project. Websites are a medium for transmitting ideas; communication. A communication scheme that requires a massive engineering effort to interpret it is bad. A web browser should be something that a small community team can throw together in a couple months.
- bee_rider 3y ago
  It shouldn’t be necessary to pay so much to develop Chrome in the first place. Web standards have gotten so unimaginably complex that only two of the richest companies in history can produce a web browser (and then somehow, inexplicably, Mozilla manages to almost keep up; wildly impressive on their part). That figuring out the funding required to draw a website is seen as a big issue is a symptom of the problem.
onli 3y ago
Mozilla makes money with Firefox. Brave does with brave. It is not impossible that Chrome could. ChromeOS, default search engine, integrated VPN offering, ... The browser has a monopoly market share, income would be huge fast.
- abenga 3y ago
  Mozilla makes money from whom? Isn't it like mostly Google?
  - onli 3y ago
    https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-2021-fs-final-1010.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-202... <-- yes, the biggest part are royalties for search engine placement. Part of that is from Google, likely the biggest part. It's still something that Chrome could do as well.
- ekianjo 3y ago
  Mozilla feeds from Googles hands to ensure an awesome pay for their execs
mnd999 3y ago
Call me old skool, but how about charging for it?
- freedomben 3y ago
  When every other browser is free, that sounds like a death sentence
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    Maybe, but I know that I'd happily pay for a browser that was better than the ones that currently exist, as long as it wasn't a subscription/SaaS thing. So I know there's some sort of market. How large it is, I have no idea. Has anyone actually done this market research?
account42 3y ago
> But a breakup of google(alphabet) is something very unrealistic and actually not something I want to see, unless we also break up Microsoft at the same time. Otherwise we end up with Microsoft dominating the web again. No thank you, I still remember those times. This isn't the 90s anymore. Smartphones exist, where Microsoft is irrelevant.
wslh 3y ago
> And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web. This is their business problem, not ours. Since Chrome, the browser, is in some way a new OS paradigm we can think that the open source community would take it seriously to build a new one and/or improve/fork Firefox in the same way we have Linux, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD, etc, etc. I think the main issue is UX/UI where the open source community doesn't excel, yet.

Andrew_nenakhov 3y ago

Well maybe from search engines, who'd pay to be the default search option? So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla.

hutzlibu 3y ago
"So far, it mostly worked for Mozilla." Yeah, with tracking and ads from the browser enabled by default and by now allmost non existent marketshare. The money from ad companies does not come with no strings attached. (But I still use Firefox btw.)

Joeri 3y ago

Money for developing chrome is not an issue. Google search could pay chrome to be the primary search engine just like they pay mozilla. Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…

JellyYelly 3y ago
> Google search could pay chrome to be the primary search engine This doesn't sound like a good idea if your goal is to prevent these two companies (or divisions of the company) for co-conspiring.
hutzlibu 3y ago
"Microsoft could fund chromium based on their use in Edge. Etc…" Microsoft surely will continue to develope edge. That is my main issue with this thing, because they surely would like to be the one with the dominating browser again and if google has to drop chromium, Microsoft will just overtake it. Antitrust and breakup is not a simple thing to do right.
- omnimus 3y ago
  Then lets break up Microsoft too.
  - flagrant_taco 3y ago
    There's plenty of questionable business practices that Microsoft could probably be slapped on the wrist for of anyone cares, but I'm not actually sure there's a good antitrust claim that could lead to a breakup there.
    - yjftsjthsd-h 3y ago
      There's always bundling a web browser with their OS and giving it an unfair advantage over all other browsers, aka the exact thing they were sued for last time.
      - vel0city 3y ago
        ChromeOS bundles its own browser and goes even further in preventing people from installing their own than Windows. Imagine if on the first boot of ChromeOS it asks if you want to use Chrome, Edge, Safari, or Firefox.
        yencabulator 3y ago
        In related news, ChromeOS is separating the GUI shell from the browser: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36977107 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36977107
mike_hearn 3y ago
At that point nothing would stop AdCorp from cutting a deal with the new ChromeCorp that says "you get incentive payments for each page load that presents a remote attestation that no ad blockers are present". It wouldn't be seen as anti-competitive then because there are multiple ad serving companies and multiple browser companies, and anyway, legislators would expect and find it reasonable that browsers only get paid referral fees for page loads that do actually display ads. In fact if it goes to court you might not get what you expect - judges (who likely don't use ad blockers much themselves due to age) might perceive browsers who take ad incentive payments but allow ad blocking to be engaged in fraud.
- pyrale 3y ago
  > At that point nothing would stop AdCorp from cutting a deal with the new ChromeCorp that says... I suspect judges that just ordered an antitrust would not be kind to people to people who essentially ignore the order by recreating an informal structure.
  - mike_hearn 3y ago
    Why? Company breakups are about increasing competition. It's not about killing the Baby Bells by cutting them off overnight from what they need to survive. ChromeCorp would be both free to cut similar deals with other ad networks, and incentivized to do so, that would be sufficient for governments concerned about monopolies and anti-trust. It's important to keep things mentally separate here. There is nothing anti-competitive about remote attestation, no more than there is about TLS. It's just far too general a tool for that. Even much more restricted versions as used by the smartphones, games consoles, Windows managed network security etc have never been claimed to be anti-competitive. That would be a very novel legal theory that's unlikely to work on its own (you can use the tech in ways that are anti-competitive, but it needs someone to actually do so). So if Google were to be broken up, it'd have to be for wider competition and market health concerns, it wouldn't be to do with any specific API getting added to Chrome. And then if they were split up, they'd need to formalize arrangements in contracts that are today informal, like how Chrome is funded exactly. At that point, do you think the newly born AdCorp will just accept paying lots of money for ad impressions to Chrome when the users aren't going to see them? Google tolerates it today for a mixture of reasons e.g. a lot of their own staff use ad blockers, they want to be able to recruit very widely for many different projects, etc. A company specialized only in advertising would have fewer such concerns and could easily demand more aggressive measures, indeed, their new shareholders might insist upon it. Whereas today Google isn't really susceptible to stockholder pressure and is willing to let a lot slide.
o1y32 3y ago
I guess you have no idea how much money it costs to develop something like Chrome, especially at Google's salary.
- pocketarc 3y ago
  Google currently plays Apple billions ($15B supposedly) to be the default search engine on Safari, and another half a billion a year for Firefox. For Chrome, with their gigantic market share, they'd pay billions (just like they pay Apple). Browsers are complicated, but let's not pretend that that kind of money wouldn't be enough.
  - edgyquant 3y ago
    I’m not sure what you mean. Google would continue to pay chrome to advertise?
    - andsoitis 3y ago
      They’re saying: Google (the search company) would pay ChromeCorp (company behind Chrome/Chromium) big money to be the default search engine in the browser. Google already pays both Mozilla and Apple in this way. Theoretically this money should be enough to finance the continued investment in Chrome.
- bee_rider 3y ago
  It might be nice to have less web browser development, fewer engineers who need to add a new feature to get a bullet point for their review. Rendering a website should not be a huge project. Websites are a medium for transmitting ideas; communication. A communication scheme that requires a massive engineering effort to interpret it is bad. A web browser should be something that a small community team can throw together in a couple months.
bee_rider 3y ago
It shouldn’t be necessary to pay so much to develop Chrome in the first place. Web standards have gotten so unimaginably complex that only two of the richest companies in history can produce a web browser (and then somehow, inexplicably, Mozilla manages to almost keep up; wildly impressive on their part). That figuring out the funding required to draw a website is seen as a big issue is a symptom of the problem.

onli 3y ago

Mozilla makes money with Firefox. Brave does with brave. It is not impossible that Chrome could. ChromeOS, default search engine, integrated VPN offering, ... The browser has a monopoly market share, income would be huge fast.

abenga 3y ago
Mozilla makes money from whom? Isn't it like mostly Google?
- onli 3y ago
  https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-2021-fs-final-1010.pdf https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2021/mozilla-fdn-202... <-- yes, the biggest part are royalties for search engine placement. Part of that is from Google, likely the biggest part. It's still something that Chrome could do as well.
ekianjo 3y ago
Mozilla feeds from Googles hands to ensure an awesome pay for their execs

mnd999 3y ago

Call me old skool, but how about charging for it?

freedomben 3y ago
When every other browser is free, that sounds like a death sentence
- JohnFen 3y ago
  Maybe, but I know that I'd happily pay for a browser that was better than the ones that currently exist, as long as it wasn't a subscription/SaaS thing. So I know there's some sort of market. How large it is, I have no idea. Has anyone actually done this market research?

account42 3y ago

> But a breakup of google(alphabet) is something very unrealistic and actually not something I want to see, unless we also break up Microsoft at the same time. Otherwise we end up with Microsoft dominating the web again. No thank you, I still remember those times. This isn't the 90s anymore. Smartphones exist, where Microsoft is irrelevant.

wslh 3y ago

> And the money is coming from where? Chrome exists mostly, so the ad buisness gets more data and they can influence the direction of the web. This is their business problem, not ours. Since Chrome, the browser, is in some way a new OS paradigm we can think that the open source community would take it seriously to build a new one and/or improve/fork Firefox in the same way we have Linux, OpenBSD, FreeBSD, NetBSD, etc, etc. I think the main issue is UX/UI where the open source community doesn't excel, yet.