Google Antitrust Suit May Go Forward

TechForensics writes "KinderStart, whose page hits and AdSense revenue dropped sharply after changes by Google demoted its appearance in search results, brought suit claiming the search engine effectively suppressed its first amendment rights by lowering the site's visibility. While the Court rejected that argument out-of-hand, it appeared more amenable to KinderStart's argument that since it was a search page, Google's suppression of a rival search engine is prohibited by antitrust laws. The suit may go forward with the judge's commentary."

Comments

well...

[awing0]

I'm sure if you set up a hamburger stand in Burger King's parking lot they would surely have you removed. They are trying to build their business of a search engine on the back of Google's. No one forces Google down your throat, it just happens to be the #1 search engine. Google's ranking is its "parking lot", a property of Google. Every scumbag website loves to cry when Google delists their deserving ass. Even if you didn't deserve it, it is their search ranking. KinderStart should focus on Yahoo or MSN and watch when they do the same thing as Google. If KinderStart.com had better content, it would rise on its own. Digg or Slashdot didn't jump into the top 10 of sites on the web because of Google, it did it with good content and the search results came after.

Kinderstart

[Bongo Bill]

What is KinderStart anyway? I searched for it, and it seems that there are plenty of results completely unrelated to the plaintiff. Why wouldn't KinderStart be suing them? I find it rather implausible that Google would suppress a search engine that does not pose a real threat, given that the results for the similar pages link on a search for "Google" prominently displays so many of their strongest competitors.

And never mind that Google, being a private enterprise, can present its results any way it wants (assuming that the claims are accurate), so that there's no grounds for a lawsuit. This whole incident smells frivolous.

Re:Kinderstart

[DavidTC]

One thing should get this thrown out of court. Tada. Google UK is fourth, after frickin Altavista of all places, and real Google is fifth. Then MSN Search and Yahoo.

If Google were going to, nonsensically, manipulate the search rankings for itself, surely it would not have actual competitors, not little guys that no one has heard off, on its first result page. (In fact, putting little guys up there would be the best bet. Put up the crappiest engines no one's ever heard of when people people look for alternatives, and no one will leave.)

Re:Kinderstart

[DavidTC]

Except that Kinderstart and Google are not in the same market. Kinderstart is, despite them trying to confuse the issue, a directory, not a search engine. What's more, they are a very focused directory. There is no way in hell they can even vaguely compete with Google.

And here's a fun link. Search Google for 'kids'. What's the topmost result? Yahoo!'s Web Guide for kids.

Oh, yeah, Google's really trying to corner that market. They not only don't even have a directory for children, but point people looking for one of those at a very big competitor to their actual business, general search.

That's like, the exact opposite of abusing your monopoly position. Someone comes into a hamburger place (google) and wants some ice cream (Kid friendly stuff), and you don't have any, you direct them to a directly competing hamburger place (yahoo) that has ice cream (Their kid directory), instead of just an ice cream place (kinderstart), in the hopes they'll come back to you for the hamburgers.

Re:I suppose that the outcome

[The Ultimate Fartkno]

...and after people go there and spend five minutes, they'll see exactly what I did. Namely, that Kinderstart is just another generic link site full of SEO craplinks, half of which are either broken or go to squatter sites because the domains have expired. The sad part is that Kinderstart is (at least in theory) aimed at child development and the links that do work generally lead to *really* crappy sites like "Auburn Birth Works® & HypnoBirthing®."

Yeesh... Google couldn't have shitcanned that site quickly enough.

Re:Uh.

[TenLow]

..and if you search for "search engine" the top 3 are dogpile, altavista, and metasearch. google.co.uk is fourth.

A stupid conversation I'd like to see

[rs79]

"Hello Paypal this is google. Can you please put a link to our payment system?"

"What? No. Fuck off".

"But, we have a link to yours!"

"Huh? Ok. Fuck off".

"Maybe we'll take out all references to Paypal if you won't reciprocate"

"We'll sue. Fuck off".

"So, that's a no?"

Once you let judges have a say in how and what Google has in it's index you open a real can of worms and how hard would it be for some very good attorney and some very bad judge to decide that indeed the nature of the web is cooperation and reciprocal links and Google should have a link to it from paypal OR the Goog gets to take out Paypal if they won't reciprocate.

Stupidist lawsuit. Ever.

Kill the legal system please

[Timedout]

This sort of litigation is the cause of so many injustices. While we waste our time smacking down these stupid cases all sorts of money/time/attention is drawn away from more important issues. I mean, there are real and serious things to be debated and decided by those who work for and with our justice department, but we spend all our time arguing about something that doesn't particularily make sense at all. Since when does google HAVE to do anything? People have a choice in using their system or not; they are not a monopoly. (Isn't MSN the most used search engine still?)