4 comments
They also need to provide an at-cost syndication of the search index to any who want it for ten years to correct for anticompetitive behavior in the market. Basically, Google has to give competitors a card to the Library of Babylon. Ten. Years. Search will never be the same. This is a shellacking by Justice and the Plaintiffs against Google. I honestly don't know how Chrome survives on its own without search attached—ironically, perhaps as a non-profit foundation? That'd be pretty funny. Ostensibly advertisers would still want preferential access to the dominant browser, in whatever shape it ends up, but then...wouldn't it baldly just be an ad viewing apparatus? This is an unbelievable opportunity for Mozilla, which I have every confidence they can fumble. |
There's more to this remedy than just the sell-off. Let's read some PDFs, gang.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/25356126-doj-proposed-final-judgement-of-google-search-remedies
Google is prohibited from disincentivizing Apple from getting into the search game. That might seem weird, but many times during the case, Apple reps made clear that the Google deal was a set of handcuffs in this regard. With the arrival of Apple Intelligence, this opens the door to a new Apple search product.
Google can't acquire search competitors without prior consent from DoJ and Plaintiff States. So now's the time to innovate in the ad space, I guess?
Now, Android stuff.
Holy crap. So basically they need to allow you to remove Google search from Android. Indeed, later on in Section V, it is enumerated that no Google Search product or AI product can be "mandatory" in Android.
The strictures are worth reading in full. And if Google doesn't like it, Justice allows them to choose to divest of Android instead of complying!
There's more to this remedy than just the sell-off. Let's read some PDFs, gang.
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/25356126-doj-proposed-final-judgement-of-google-search-remedies
Google is prohibited from disincentivizing Apple from getting into the search game. That might seem weird, but many times during the case, Apple reps made clear that the Google deal was a set of handcuffs in this regard. With the arrival of Apple Intelligence, this opens the door to a new Apple search product.