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Arguably, Google divesting Chrome would be great for the web. This piece seems to be looking at Google at large (and I think all of Alphabet would be better sco

Arguably, Google divesting Chrome would be great for the web. This piece seems to be looking at Google at large (and I think all of Alphabet would be better scope there). Certainly this would be unpopular here but I would be all for aggressive trust-busting beyond what the DOJ has done historically, including vertical integrations. Right now tech is a strange feudal state with hundreds of thousands of small teams anchored to a few hydra-like super-corporations on a consuming destructive rampage. Somehow, with the most advanced computer and technological systems to ever be known by man, we're looking to increase working hours and cut benefits, for "profits" that are not quite realized by the labor class or the end users. Gonna be interesting to see what happens. I know Wall Street will place their bets for what they want to happen right along side what's obviously going to shake out once the market becomes 'rational.'

fumufumu 2y ago
[dead]
Spooky23 2y ago
The administration doesn’t give a shit about the web, and DOJ is a fully political entity. They’ll extort Google for whatever concession they want, and Chrome will remain.
- g-b-r 2y ago
  They'll demand half of Google's rare earths deposits
  - tempodox 2y ago
    Or just the keys to total surveillance and suppression of web content they don't like.
    - bilbo0s 2y ago
      Well now to be fair, total surveillance and suppression of any content they don't like is worth a whole lot more than rare earth deposits to a government.
    - fragmede 2y ago
      Why would they need to do that when they already have the formula down? How much have you been hearing about all the protests?
      - bmacho 2y ago
        Why wouldn't they? Also they have the have the formula because they've already done it. And it works, why wouldn't they want to keep doing it, but more?
      - acdha 2y ago
        Things are going to get more heated as the voluntary economic downturn heats up. The current protests get some coverage but we’re starting to see even the loyalists realize that they won’t be spared, and that is likely to increase protests considerably.
- whatwhaaaaat 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - Spooky23 2y ago
    The constitution establishes that a core role of government is to provide for the general welfare of the people, and public health is part of that. I’m generally in favor with government efforts to combat misinformation. I’m also fine with wartime propaganda within limits for similar reasons.
    - whatwhaaaaat 2y ago
      Aaaand that is why trump won.
    - LexGray 2y ago
      I am not fine with war time propaganda. I want to know what the government is choosing to do and why. I am not against war and even the occasional puff piece about how sexy the latest military tech is sexy is fine. It still is necessary in this day and age to stomp those that strip others of human rights and lives, yet I cannot think of any military action since Vietnam I have felt comfortable that I have not been outright lied to about underlying causes, methods used, and the after affects. My full adult life it has seemed the government is convinced it is the Illuminati with a mandate to gaslight the public. That bad decisions don’t matter and no one is responsible seems like a horrible status quo when lives, the environment, and our tax dollars are at stake. 9/11 turned wartime propaganda into an excuse to strip freedoms that certain parties have been lusting after and no promises were kept about timelines for them being returned. When trust is abused to that extent the government should lose any rights to do so again.
    - CaffeineLD50 2y ago
      Given the dreadful state of public health this is a total fail. Epidemic obesity alone is a nightmare: heart disease, cancer, stroke, you name it. Trump, to his credit, is taking fentanyl seriously but heart disease is a bigger killer.
- victorbjorklund 2y ago
  You are probably right.
- dehrmann 2y ago
  Biden or Trump administration? This remedy was originally proposed under Biden's DOJ.
  - Spooky23 2y ago
    It’s still around and the admin continued it. Biden’s DOJ was slooooooowly pursuing anti-trust more seriously. That’s not a Trump priority. So what’s the reason?
- libertine 2y ago
  Google would just need to buy many Trump coins on the next drop. If he ever got Russian money, that was a great opportunity for it.
pessimizer 2y ago
> aggressive trust-busting beyond what the DOJ has done historically, including vertical integrations. Vertical integration was a huge part of what they went after historically, until a bunch of people "convinced" the US that the standard should be "consumer harm." The cool thing about consumer harm is that you can come up with any bullshit argument about how prices will go down and access and quality up in the future from some merger, and nobody can disprove it because it's a counterfactual (he said, she said.) And when prices go up, it's just <shrug>, who could have known? I know what vertical integration is today, though. It's not a hypothetical, it's a selling point to investors. I can just tell you no. Any clear metrics or standards for antitrust action can't be tolerated. The goal is to force us to go on vibes. Then they say we have bad vibes. Competition brings down prices. Laissez-faire leads to pseudo-Communism with royal families, courtiers, and technicians making up the top 10%, and everybody else gets to be a (debt) slave i.e. feudalism. We should err towards breaking more things up than would be ideal, not less. If I make you divest from something, you sell it and get whatever future value out of it today. It's not a punishment according to SCOTUS when they're looking at TikTok (which is why they said the TikTok ban wasn't a bill of attainder.) We charter these companies, and they operate for our benefit, which is why we grant them limited liability and a whole bunch of other treats. What you divest is going to go to somebody just like you, but someone who is not financially entangled with you. The only reason you want to keep it all is to do things that I don't want you to do with it, I don't want you doing unproductive market manipulation, I want you to put that energy into competing.
- crabmusket 2y ago
  > The only reason you want to keep it all is to do things that I don't want you to do with it Surely, the reason you want to keep it is because owning and controlling thing A and thing B allows you to make more profit personally than being a controlling owner of thing A or thing B. That said, I agree with your post and also think nations should err more on the side of breaking things up. Concentrations of power distort markets and resist democratic control.
gtsop 2y ago
> Somehow, with the most advanced computer and technological systems to ever be known by man, we're looking to increase working hours and cut benefits, for "profits" that are not quite realized by the labor class Somehow?? This is capitalism 101. Not a "strange feudal state" nor anything else.
boxed 2y ago
> Arguably, Google divesting Chrome would be great for the web. Because then Chrome would slowly rot since there's no one to fund development, leading us to WebKit being the only engine, as Firefox is also defunded. I don't see how that's better.
- quinnirill 2y ago
  That’s assuming the divested Chrome would then proceed to lose its gigantic market share and thus the mind-boggling proceeds from defaulting to Google as the search engine. They might even be able to afford a bigger development team, if need be.
  - burnerthrow008 2y ago
    But what makes you think the DoJ allow Google to continue paying Chrome to have Google as default? Google is already not allowed to pay Apple to be default.
    - wffurr 2y ago
      >> Google is already not allowed to pay Apple to be default The antitrust remedy isn’t set until the September hearings and won’t take effect until after years of appeals hearings.
- pmontra 2y ago
  The new owner of Chrome can sell it to the manufacturers of Android devices. Royalties. They can even make it closed source or enforce a not for commerce license. That would make manufacturers choose between paying those royalties, installing Firefox, investing in their own browser (a fork of Chrome or their very own tech.) Some of them will pay royalties.
- rishav_sharan 2y ago
  Why do you think so? Google can continue to contribute to chromium as they are doing now, alongwith other contributors like Microsoft
- 2y ago
thfuran 2y ago
I think google should be forced to divest AdSense.

fumufumu 2y ago

[dead]

Spooky23 2y ago

The administration doesn’t give a shit about the web, and DOJ is a fully political entity. They’ll extort Google for whatever concession they want, and Chrome will remain.

g-b-r 2y ago
They'll demand half of Google's rare earths deposits
- tempodox 2y ago
  Or just the keys to total surveillance and suppression of web content they don't like.
  - bilbo0s 2y ago
    Well now to be fair, total surveillance and suppression of any content they don't like is worth a whole lot more than rare earth deposits to a government.
  - fragmede 2y ago
    Why would they need to do that when they already have the formula down? How much have you been hearing about all the protests?
    - bmacho 2y ago
      Why wouldn't they? Also they have the have the formula because they've already done it. And it works, why wouldn't they want to keep doing it, but more?
    - acdha 2y ago
      Things are going to get more heated as the voluntary economic downturn heats up. The current protests get some coverage but we’re starting to see even the loyalists realize that they won’t be spared, and that is likely to increase protests considerably.
whatwhaaaaat 2y ago
[flagged]
- Spooky23 2y ago
  The constitution establishes that a core role of government is to provide for the general welfare of the people, and public health is part of that. I’m generally in favor with government efforts to combat misinformation. I’m also fine with wartime propaganda within limits for similar reasons.
  - whatwhaaaaat 2y ago
    Aaaand that is why trump won.
  - LexGray 2y ago
    I am not fine with war time propaganda. I want to know what the government is choosing to do and why. I am not against war and even the occasional puff piece about how sexy the latest military tech is sexy is fine. It still is necessary in this day and age to stomp those that strip others of human rights and lives, yet I cannot think of any military action since Vietnam I have felt comfortable that I have not been outright lied to about underlying causes, methods used, and the after affects. My full adult life it has seemed the government is convinced it is the Illuminati with a mandate to gaslight the public. That bad decisions don’t matter and no one is responsible seems like a horrible status quo when lives, the environment, and our tax dollars are at stake. 9/11 turned wartime propaganda into an excuse to strip freedoms that certain parties have been lusting after and no promises were kept about timelines for them being returned. When trust is abused to that extent the government should lose any rights to do so again.
  - CaffeineLD50 2y ago
    Given the dreadful state of public health this is a total fail. Epidemic obesity alone is a nightmare: heart disease, cancer, stroke, you name it. Trump, to his credit, is taking fentanyl seriously but heart disease is a bigger killer.
victorbjorklund 2y ago
You are probably right.
dehrmann 2y ago
Biden or Trump administration? This remedy was originally proposed under Biden's DOJ.
- Spooky23 2y ago
  It’s still around and the admin continued it. Biden’s DOJ was slooooooowly pursuing anti-trust more seriously. That’s not a Trump priority. So what’s the reason?
libertine 2y ago
Google would just need to buy many Trump coins on the next drop. If he ever got Russian money, that was a great opportunity for it.

pessimizer 2y ago

> aggressive trust-busting beyond what the DOJ has done historically, including vertical integrations. Vertical integration was a huge part of what they went after historically, until a bunch of people "convinced" the US that the standard should be "consumer harm." The cool thing about consumer harm is that you can come up with any bullshit argument about how prices will go down and access and quality up in the future from some merger, and nobody can disprove it because it's a counterfactual (he said, she said.) And when prices go up, it's just <shrug>, who could have known? I know what vertical integration is today, though. It's not a hypothetical, it's a selling point to investors. I can just tell you no. Any clear metrics or standards for antitrust action can't be tolerated. The goal is to force us to go on vibes. Then they say we have bad vibes. Competition brings down prices. Laissez-faire leads to pseudo-Communism with royal families, courtiers, and technicians making up the top 10%, and everybody else gets to be a (debt) slave i.e. feudalism. We should err towards breaking more things up than would be ideal, not less. If I make you divest from something, you sell it and get whatever future value out of it today. It's not a punishment according to SCOTUS when they're looking at TikTok (which is why they said the TikTok ban wasn't a bill of attainder.) We charter these companies, and they operate for our benefit, which is why we grant them limited liability and a whole bunch of other treats. What you divest is going to go to somebody just like you, but someone who is not financially entangled with you. The only reason you want to keep it all is to do things that I don't want you to do with it, I don't want you doing unproductive market manipulation, I want you to put that energy into competing.

crabmusket 2y ago
> The only reason you want to keep it all is to do things that I don't want you to do with it Surely, the reason you want to keep it is because owning and controlling thing A and thing B allows you to make more profit personally than being a controlling owner of thing A or thing B. That said, I agree with your post and also think nations should err more on the side of breaking things up. Concentrations of power distort markets and resist democratic control.

gtsop 2y ago

> Somehow, with the most advanced computer and technological systems to ever be known by man, we're looking to increase working hours and cut benefits, for "profits" that are not quite realized by the labor class Somehow?? This is capitalism 101. Not a "strange feudal state" nor anything else.

boxed 2y ago

> Arguably, Google divesting Chrome would be great for the web. Because then Chrome would slowly rot since there's no one to fund development, leading us to WebKit being the only engine, as Firefox is also defunded. I don't see how that's better.

quinnirill 2y ago
That’s assuming the divested Chrome would then proceed to lose its gigantic market share and thus the mind-boggling proceeds from defaulting to Google as the search engine. They might even be able to afford a bigger development team, if need be.
- burnerthrow008 2y ago
  But what makes you think the DoJ allow Google to continue paying Chrome to have Google as default? Google is already not allowed to pay Apple to be default.
  - wffurr 2y ago
    >> Google is already not allowed to pay Apple to be default The antitrust remedy isn’t set until the September hearings and won’t take effect until after years of appeals hearings.
pmontra 2y ago
The new owner of Chrome can sell it to the manufacturers of Android devices. Royalties. They can even make it closed source or enforce a not for commerce license. That would make manufacturers choose between paying those royalties, installing Firefox, investing in their own browser (a fork of Chrome or their very own tech.) Some of them will pay royalties.
rishav_sharan 2y ago
Why do you think so? Google can continue to contribute to chromium as they are doing now, alongwith other contributors like Microsoft
2y ago

thfuran 2y ago

I think google should be forced to divest AdSense.