That's an interesting remark, for your profile links to Google Cinema Club, among other things, so I take it you're not based in China yourself. Regarding the

That's an interesting remark, for your profile links to Google Cinema Club, among other things, so I take it you're not based in China yourself. Regarding the article and the auctions, I recall the internship at Google in the noughties. There was an overview talk on search and ads. One thing that was clear back then, the ads are not ranked by the bids alone. They are ranked by bid multiplied by ad score. As the ad gets displayed more and more, the score tends to be based on the click-through rate of the ad. That way, a bad ad that does not get clicked on effectively cannot be forced to display by bidding high. On the other hands, in most reporting on these antitrust cases, folks read "auction" and the picture they have in mind is like an art auction, the highest bidder wins. Then they report on obvious things as if this was some revelation of manipulation.