12 ms·

How much are you willing to pay to put the brakes on your competitor and to catch up fast? $100 per customer now to prevent them from locking into the iPhone i

by buro9 17y ago

How much are you willing to pay to put the brakes on your competitor and to catch up fast? $100 per customer now to prevent them from locking into the iPhone isn't quite so ludicrous if you also have a long-term strategy to get that money back (and then some) using the advertising in the shipped google services. Besides, you have a war chest for just such things... but instead of spending it on acquisitions you can use it to help buy customers, they become happy with you too.

moron4hire 17y ago
If this is Google's strategy, then they are becoming more like Microsoft every day.
- pyre 17y ago
  As long as I have the ability to completely remove Google's version of Android, and put on a custom version of my own, I'm not that concerned with the rest.
kiiski 17y ago
I'm not really familiar with the subject, but if Google uses their profit from online advertising to get people to use their phones (by selling them cheaper than "possible"), wouldn't that be the same as Microsoft putting ie in Windows? So what do the anti-competition laws say about this?
- mcav 17y ago
  Google doesn't have a monopoly in mobile phones, so the anti-competition laws probably wouldn't affect them much.
  - gojomo 17y ago
    Actually, the potential issue would be whether they are using profits from one monopoly (search) to undercut competition in another competitive market (mobile phones). A guest post at TechCrunch actually had a good overview of the ways Google might face antitrust action: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/01/what-an-antitrust-case-against-google-might-look-like/ http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/01/what-an-antitrust-case-...
- alex_c 17y ago
  No - as far as I understand it, the issue with IE wasn't that Microsoft used profits from Windows to give away IE, it's that they used a monopoly product (Windows) to give an unfair advantage to IE (out-of-the-box distribution not accessible to their competitors).

by buro9 17y ago

moron4hire 17y ago

If this is Google's strategy, then they are becoming more like Microsoft every day.

pyre 17y ago
As long as I have the ability to completely remove Google's version of Android, and put on a custom version of my own, I'm not that concerned with the rest.

kiiski 17y ago

I'm not really familiar with the subject, but if Google uses their profit from online advertising to get people to use their phones (by selling them cheaper than "possible"), wouldn't that be the same as Microsoft putting ie in Windows? So what do the anti-competition laws say about this?

mcav 17y ago
Google doesn't have a monopoly in mobile phones, so the anti-competition laws probably wouldn't affect them much.
- gojomo 17y ago
  Actually, the potential issue would be whether they are using profits from one monopoly (search) to undercut competition in another competitive market (mobile phones). A guest post at TechCrunch actually had a good overview of the ways Google might face antitrust action: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/01/what-an-antitrust-case-against-google-might-look-like/ http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/01/what-an-antitrust-case-...
alex_c 17y ago
No - as far as I understand it, the issue with IE wasn't that Microsoft used profits from Windows to give away IE, it's that they used a monopoly product (Windows) to give an unfair advantage to IE (out-of-the-box distribution not accessible to their competitors).