European Union: You're not allowed to be successful.

SquallStrife wrote:

European Union: You're not allowed to be successful.

No, it's more like you can't use your dominant position in one area as a bludgeon to destroy competition in other areas that are not a part of your core business. Forcing them to spin off the search engine business places their other divisions on a more equal footing with competitors.

After reading the Engadget article, an old saying comes to mind: what goes around comes around.

For years Google chastised others (including Adobe and Microsoft) for either buying out or suffocating to death any potential competitors. Now the European Union is accusing Google of doing the same thing - and Google is trying very hard to wiggle out of a potential split in their operations. In the end, I say let the chips fall where they may; either Google stays whole, or their search engine will still prosper as a separate entity. I just hope Google learns something from all this (if their corporate image doesn't get in the way).

sliderider wrote:

SquallStrife wrote:

European Union: You're not allowed to be successful.

No, it's more like you can't use your dominant position in one area as a bludgeon to destroy competition in other areas that are not a part of your core business. Forcing them to spin off the search engine business places their other divisions on a more equal footing with competitors.

What a load of crap, and surprising given your free-market ramblings of the past.

Microsoft includes a web browser with their OS, and it's antitrust. Apple includes Safari and that's fine.

Google offers search and email, and that's antitrust. Yahoo offers search and email, and that's fine.

In all cases, the consumer has free and unmitigated freedom to choose their search, email, social networking, video sharing, cloud storage, etc provider. But of course, it can't possibly be that Google simply offers the superior product, and that's why they're so popular.

If other companies want to take market share away from Google, they should start by making products that don't suck, rather than bitching to the EU to handicap a foreign company.

If you informed yourself you'd know it's not about search and mail... Go, read some actual articles on the issue and don't make things up...

Dominus wrote:

If you informed yourself you'd know it's not about search and mail... Go, read some actual articles on the issue and don't make things up...

Did I say it was just about "search and mail"???

I just listed some examples of what each company does. I'd still be typing it if I methodically listed every single service that every single one of those companies offered.

Not to mention the part of Google being targeted here is in fact Search. I don't need to "make things up" 😉

There's no need to talk down your nose at people. Starting posts with "If you informed yourself" or "If you bothered to read" is really obnoxious.

Well, if you make the statement "search and mail is antitrust" then back that up with facts. Don't bring up examples that are not the culprit.

Dominus wrote:

Well, if you make the statement "search and mail is antitrust" then back that up with facts. Don't bring up examples that are not the culprit.

Like I said, I'd still be typing if I'd gone "Offering search and mail and ads and social networking and video hosting and bla bla bla bla bla". I hoped it wouldn't be taken quite so literally.

Again, read the articles before writing nonsense. Especially when you compare what Google does to what Yahoo does.
The problem is not that Google does a, b, c,... z. It's that it has a search monopol in Europe and is abusing this monopol. Yahoo does not have that monopol.

I myself aknowledge the problem but am not sure that breaking up Google would in some way help against this.

And sorry to be obnoxious in your opinion but if people just write without reading and thinking it seems that I just have to be obnoxious. I'd rather be obnoxious and drive the kiddies away to have intelligent discussions with adults than reading more stuff that is miles off the topic.

Dominus wrote:

Again, read the articles before writing nonsense.

No nonsense here.

Dominus wrote:

Especially when you compare what Google does to what Yahoo does.
The problem is not that Google does a, b, c,... z. It's that it has a search monopol in Europe and is abusing this monopol. Yahoo does not have that monopol.

I know.

And personally, I feel that whether or not their search engine is the most popular is irrelevant. They aren't *really* a monopoly. Google doesn't control your Internet connection, using a different search engine is as simple as typing 5 different letters into your address bar. So either the EU bureaucrats don't know of any other search engines, or they think EU citizens are idiots that can't spell anything other than Google.com.

It would be a different story if, for instance, Google sold laptops that would only work with Google search/mail/etc (and had no possibility of being reconfigured), and those laptops were the market leader by taking a loss to undercut the competition.

But as it stands, blocking yourself from using Google anything, search included, is as easy as a few clicks.

I felt the same way about the Internet Explorer fiasco. Installing a different browser is a few easy clicks. Nothing about Windows prevented you from installing a new browser or making it the default. The EU was treating its citizens like idiots. (For the record, I did agree with other parts of the MS antitrust case/s)

Which goes back to my original statement: In the EU you aren't allowed to be successful. If your competition can't match your product or service, the government will help them meet you or beat you.

Dominus wrote:

And sorry to be obnoxious in your opinion but if people just write without reading and thinking it seems that I just have to be obnoxious. I'd rather be obnoxious and drive the kiddies away to have intelligent discussions with adults than reading more stuff that is miles off the topic.

I did read, and I did think. It's unfortunate that our opinions differ so greatly on the matter.

SquallStrife wrote:

What a load of crap, and surprising given your free-market ramblings of the past. […]
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sliderider wrote:

SquallStrife wrote:

European Union: You're not allowed to be successful.

No, it's more like you can't use your dominant position in one area as a bludgeon to destroy competition in other areas that are not a part of your core business. Forcing them to spin off the search engine business places their other divisions on a more equal footing with competitors.

What a load of crap, and surprising given your free-market ramblings of the past.

Microsoft includes a web browser with their OS, and it's antitrust. Apple includes Safari and that's fine.

Google offers search and email, and that's antitrust. Yahoo offers search and email, and that's fine.

In all cases, the consumer has free and unmitigated freedom to choose their search, email, social networking, video sharing, cloud storage, etc provider. But of course, it can't possibly be that Google simply offers the superior product, and that's why they're so popular.

If other companies want to take market share away from Google, they should start by making products that don't suck, rather than bitching to the EU to handicap a foreign company.

In order for free markets to exist, there has to be competition. When one company manages to buy out or destroy all competitors that is not an example of a free market. There is nothing at all contradictory with anything I may have said in the past.

sliderider wrote:

In order for free markets to exist, there has to be competition. When one company manages to buy out or destroy all competitors that is not an example of a free market.

It seems like the ultimate expression of free market. One player has come up with the "killer" product that nobody has been able to match, and has capitalised on it.

It's not Google's fault that startups are falling over themselves to be bought up and "get rich quick", rather than slowly building their ideas into real challengers.

The problem is not that the EU officials don't know how to use a different search engine. The problem is that Google became the de facto standard search engine in the EU (the percentage is in the article) AND is ABUSING the power that comes with this.

Reading this makes me think of the completely destroyed Windows 9x installs that I have come across that were taken over and locked to AOL services.

More on the reasoning of the EU http://www.businessinsider.com/heres-why-euro … -google-2014-11

There is no such thing as a free market. Most industries are oligarchies. Perfect examples: airlines (only a few left in the US), computers (only a few left globally), cell phone carriers (only a few left in the US) and the list goes on and on.

One of the few EU initiatives I agree with. Next should be Intel. Split in: designs/chips/fabs.

SquallStrife wrote:

sliderider wrote:

In order for free markets to exist, there has to be competition. When one company manages to buy out or destroy all competitors that is not an example of a free market.

It seems like the ultimate expression of free market. One player has come up with the "killer" product that nobody has been able to match, and has capitalised on it.

It's not Google's fault that startups are falling over themselves to be bought up and "get rich quick", rather than slowly building their ideas into real challengers.

A free market is based on consumers making their own choices. If you have two stores in a town selling identical products, then competition forces both of them to do business in a manner that benefits consumers. The one that fails to do that will drive their customers to their competitor. If one of those competing stores goes under and nobody steps up to replace it, then the surviving store can raise their prices and treat the customers like crap because where else are they going to go? That's not a free market.

sliderider wrote:

If one of those competing stores goes under and nobody steps up to replace it, then the surviving store can raise their prices and treat the customers like crap because where else are they going to go? That's not a free market.

Again, that seems like it is pretty free. Free to succeed, free to fail, no propping up by government.

The consumers have made their choice, and they still have the choice to search using something that isn't Google.

Also, Google's competition haven't "gone under", they're right there, just a few clicks or keystrokes away.