5 ms·

How would they even sell it, chrome is based off of chromium. What is there to sell exactly? You can already fork chromium

bogwog 2y ago
> What is there to sell exactly? The user base
- tedunangst 2y ago
  And what do I, the new owner of this user base, do with it?
  - vivekd 2y ago
    1. make your search engine the default 2. make your website the default 3. make it easier to access your suite of web services Eg. imagine instead of defaulting to google everything you typed in the search bar defaulted to chatgpt. Imagine open AI could buy that at a discount
    - jonhohle 2y ago
      Or the triumphant return of Yahoo!? (hypothetical, not interrobang)
    - tedunangst 2y ago
      So basically invite the DOJ to immediately take it away again?
      - vivekd 2y ago
        probably not going to be a popular take on this forum, but to me it looks like anti trust and securities laws are enforced almost randomly. Is Google a monopoly using its control to limit competition - yes but so is pretty much all of FANG and many successful businesses for that matter. Anti trust activities are not about any one act (such as routing browsers to your site), it's more about whether the fates choose your company to end up in the DOJs roulette wheel.
        bogwog 2y ago
        This is a bad/uninformed take. The OP is about one particular anti-trust trial that ended already (with Google losing), and is in the remedies phase. The DOJ and FTC have been suing a lot of other companies over anti-trust, including the other big tech companies. Some of those are still ongoing, some haven't started yet, some have already ended.
      - concinds 2y ago
        But the DOJ wouldn't take it away. The parent comment describes exactly what the DOJ's desired outcome looks like. That's what will happen if the DOJ gets their way. It's the only possible outcome. The people praising the DOJ's decision don't understand just how stupid it is.
      - gorbypark 2y ago
        I think the distinction is that the new Chrome company wouldn't be a "monopolist". If Chrome was a separate company and did exactly the same as Google is doing currently, there might be no problem. It's when a company "abuses" its market position to enter/capture/distort another market (or maintain the original market) is when in theory regulators have an issue. For example, free software is allowed, but when Microsoft used its dominance in the OS market to push a free browser on the world at the detriment to Netscape, regulators took issue. The issue is that Google's dominance of the search/ad business is distorting the browser market. This is my take, anyways (I'm not a lawyer or American).
      - rawgabbit 2y ago
        Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me. Google can no longer be trusted with Chrome; time to give it to another caretaker.
    - nobody9999 2y ago
      >1. make your search engine the default >2. make your website the default >3. make it easier to access your suite of web services Chrome is not a search engine. Chrome doesn't have a "suite of web services." That's Alphabet/Google. Chrome is just the browser.
  - mrandish 2y ago
    Be careful. Asking these kind of obvious questions might make you ineligible to be hired as a government bureaucrat.
    - devnullbrain 2y ago
      FYI the name for this type of comment is 'thought terminating cliche'.
- teractiveodular 2y ago
  Logged-in Chrome users are tied to Google logins. The mind boggles at the complexity of trying to somehow separate Chrome identities from Google identities, much less explain that to the general populace for whom "Google", "Chrome" and "browse the Internet" are largely interchangeable.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > Logged-in Chrome users are tied to Google logins Third-party sign in with Google [1]. [1] https://www.google.com/account/about/sign-in-with-google/ https://www.google.com/account/about/sign-in-with-google/
  - ForHackernews 2y ago
    We had this for ~20 years. It wasn't mind-boggling complex. On the contrary, it was much simpler: you didn't have to "log in" to a piece of software that ran on a computer you owned under a user account you already logged into.
    - Wytwwww 2y ago
      You don't HAVE to login unless you want to share your passwords, history, bookmarks etc. between your devices. Simpler = not having those features (which most users seemingly find useful).
      - perryizgr8 2y ago
        Except if you logon to gmail it automatically logs you in the browser.
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - smolder 2y ago
        > those features (which most users seemingly find useful) Do they? I would rather not have a "browser account" and just back up my own bookmarks like I was doing 20 years ago.
SahAssar 2y ago
The userbase and trademark are both very valuable. I'm guessing it would also come with some controlling positions in the chromium open source project, since those are mostly held by google by being the biggest developer and user of the project.
hermitdev 2y ago
> What is there to sell exactly? widevine and all the other DRMy bits. Or, better yet, deprecate and disable all the DRMy bits. (One can wish)
cloudking 2y ago
Good question. Chrome itself isn't a standalone business, the money generated through Chrome still primarily comes from Ads. The hardware tied to Chromebooks generates some revenue, but even ChromeOS is essentially free. They generate a tiny amount of revenue selling ChromeOS management tools in Workspace. Why not spin off an actual revenue driver like YouTube?

bogwog 2y ago

> What is there to sell exactly? The user base

tedunangst 2y ago
And what do I, the new owner of this user base, do with it?
- vivekd 2y ago
  1. make your search engine the default 2. make your website the default 3. make it easier to access your suite of web services Eg. imagine instead of defaulting to google everything you typed in the search bar defaulted to chatgpt. Imagine open AI could buy that at a discount
  - jonhohle 2y ago
    Or the triumphant return of Yahoo!? (hypothetical, not interrobang)
  - tedunangst 2y ago
    So basically invite the DOJ to immediately take it away again?
    - vivekd 2y ago
      probably not going to be a popular take on this forum, but to me it looks like anti trust and securities laws are enforced almost randomly. Is Google a monopoly using its control to limit competition - yes but so is pretty much all of FANG and many successful businesses for that matter. Anti trust activities are not about any one act (such as routing browsers to your site), it's more about whether the fates choose your company to end up in the DOJs roulette wheel.
      - bogwog 2y ago
        This is a bad/uninformed take. The OP is about one particular anti-trust trial that ended already (with Google losing), and is in the remedies phase. The DOJ and FTC have been suing a lot of other companies over anti-trust, including the other big tech companies. Some of those are still ongoing, some haven't started yet, some have already ended.
    - concinds 2y ago
      But the DOJ wouldn't take it away. The parent comment describes exactly what the DOJ's desired outcome looks like. That's what will happen if the DOJ gets their way. It's the only possible outcome. The people praising the DOJ's decision don't understand just how stupid it is.
    - gorbypark 2y ago
      I think the distinction is that the new Chrome company wouldn't be a "monopolist". If Chrome was a separate company and did exactly the same as Google is doing currently, there might be no problem. It's when a company "abuses" its market position to enter/capture/distort another market (or maintain the original market) is when in theory regulators have an issue. For example, free software is allowed, but when Microsoft used its dominance in the OS market to push a free browser on the world at the detriment to Netscape, regulators took issue. The issue is that Google's dominance of the search/ad business is distorting the browser market. This is my take, anyways (I'm not a lawyer or American).
    - rawgabbit 2y ago
      Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice shame on me. Google can no longer be trusted with Chrome; time to give it to another caretaker.
  - nobody9999 2y ago
    >1. make your search engine the default >2. make your website the default >3. make it easier to access your suite of web services Chrome is not a search engine. Chrome doesn't have a "suite of web services." That's Alphabet/Google. Chrome is just the browser.
- mrandish 2y ago
  Be careful. Asking these kind of obvious questions might make you ineligible to be hired as a government bureaucrat.
  - devnullbrain 2y ago
    FYI the name for this type of comment is 'thought terminating cliche'.
teractiveodular 2y ago
Logged-in Chrome users are tied to Google logins. The mind boggles at the complexity of trying to somehow separate Chrome identities from Google identities, much less explain that to the general populace for whom "Google", "Chrome" and "browse the Internet" are largely interchangeable.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > Logged-in Chrome users are tied to Google logins Third-party sign in with Google [1]. [1] https://www.google.com/account/about/sign-in-with-google/ https://www.google.com/account/about/sign-in-with-google/
- ForHackernews 2y ago
  We had this for ~20 years. It wasn't mind-boggling complex. On the contrary, it was much simpler: you didn't have to "log in" to a piece of software that ran on a computer you owned under a user account you already logged into.
  - Wytwwww 2y ago
    You don't HAVE to login unless you want to share your passwords, history, bookmarks etc. between your devices. Simpler = not having those features (which most users seemingly find useful).
    - perryizgr8 2y ago
      Except if you logon to gmail it automatically logs you in the browser.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    - smolder 2y ago
      > those features (which most users seemingly find useful) Do they? I would rather not have a "browser account" and just back up my own bookmarks like I was doing 20 years ago.

SahAssar 2y ago

The userbase and trademark are both very valuable. I'm guessing it would also come with some controlling positions in the chromium open source project, since those are mostly held by google by being the biggest developer and user of the project.

hermitdev 2y ago

> What is there to sell exactly? widevine and all the other DRMy bits. Or, better yet, deprecate and disable all the DRMy bits. (One can wish)

cloudking 2y ago

Good question. Chrome itself isn't a standalone business, the money generated through Chrome still primarily comes from Ads. The hardware tied to Chromebooks generates some revenue, but even ChromeOS is essentially free. They generate a tiny amount of revenue selling ChromeOS management tools in Workspace. Why not spin off an actual revenue driver like YouTube?