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FTC Expands Its Google Antitrust Investigations
New submitter smithz writes "Bloomberg is reporting that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission is expanding its antitrust probe of Google Inc. to include scrutiny of its new Google+ social networking service. Google this week introduced changes to its search engine so that results feature photos, news and comments from Google+. The changes sparked a backlash from bloggers, privacy groups and competitors who said the inclusion of Google+ results unfairly promotes the company's products over other information on the Web. Before expanding the probe, FTC was already investigating Google for giving preference to its own services in search results and whether that practice violates antitrust laws. The agency is also examining whether the company is using its control of the Android mobile operating system to discourage smartphone makers from using rivals' applications. Google is facing similar investigations in Europe and South Korea."
This is the very consequence many people imagined the moment Google announced this. For clear examples of how Search Plus pushes Google+ over relevant results, read this article by Danny Sullivan at SearchEngineLand. Some of the examples include popular music artists, like Katy Perry, who has one of the most popular Facebook pages but doesn't appear in the Search Plus results because she doesn't have a Google+ account. How is that delivering the most relevant results, which was the original goal of the Google search engine? In fact, Google's search engine is becoming less useful at delivering relevant results compared to alternatives, with the major example in that link being a search for "gold price" on Google versus Wolfram Alpha: Google gives you a big, brown box of sponsored links, while Wolfram Alpha gives you a simple price chart.
The biggest reason, in my opinion, to dislike Search Plus is that it continues the trend of search engine bubbling that is filtering the content you see on the Internet today, possibly limiting you from seeing opposing information that might change a currently held perspective.
I'm a bit baffled by this sentence: "whether the company is using its control of the Android mobile operating system to discourage smartphone makers from using rivals' applications."
What applications is being talked about here? I'm assuming with rivals means either MS/Apple, or maybe other search engines and e-mail hosting and so on, but none of that really makes sense. Don't they develop Android in cooperation with the Open Handset Alliance, which includes said smartphone makers? Or is Google requiring certain applications not to be shipped on their phones as a requirement for licensing the Google apps? Does that even matter as long as end-users can install whatever they want on their phones anyway? I don't see Apple or MS offering google apps on their phones.
I guess I'm missing something, I can't really make sense of that statement. Can someone enlighten me?
Let's see, Microsoft has bing search, upcoming arm tablets with windows 8, azzhure cloud, a lock on nearly 100% of the home PC market, a java clone named .net, proprietary lock-in document formats that are mandated throughout the US government (and most businesses), and the government is looking at google?
Talk about incompetence. I guess the US is picking on the new kid because Microsoft sent them home crying after the abject failure of the Penfield / Kotar-Kelly solution to the Microsoft monopoly in the 200X's. What an embarrassing fail this government is.
It is three clicks to turn off this functionality.
Seach settings, select to not use personalized search, and then save.
Much more clear to use (or not use) than any change that Facebook ever made.
I like you, Stuart. You're not like everyone else, here, at Slashdot.
When they started defaulting their logged in users to https, they also hid the referrer from the subsequent page. They say this was for security, but in reality, it was an antitrust action forcing people to either use google analytics or use pay per click. I would like to see that on the agenda as well.
Needs to buy some of the same government people Microsoft has.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
That's ridiculous. It seems like these days successful is synonymous with monopoly. What is anti-competitive, exactly, about having a feature that requires someone to sign up?
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
I would like to see the FTC members investigated for how many of them own Apple or Microsoft products or stock. These companies are desperate to destroy Google, who has done nothing wrong and is driving them out of business, and it wouldn't surprise me that they would stock the government with their fanboys and shills to accomplish this.
Nobody is forced to use Google products or services, they choose to do so because of Google's superiority and innovativeness. These charge are absolutely baseless and I look forward to Google being vindicated. Hopefully they file a countersuit afterwards for libel and harassment.
Bonch and his puppet accounts are well known for posting pre-typed pro Apple or anti-Google as first posts. There are a couple of similar Microsoft shill acounts that are almost certainly paid astroturfers. Bonch and the others may or may not be paid. They get modded down regardless of content.
Slashdot has become as bad as sites like Freerepublic or DailyKOS in terms of groupthink. If anyone goes against the chosen view, it gets squelched.
Google zealots have become worse than Apple and MS fanboys when it comes to defense of their chosen company and intolerance of any critical opinions.
I complain about Google all the time, and often get modded up. Bonch is just a troll and deserves to be modded down. Take a look at his other posts.
Posted anonymously because this is off-topic.
And I have supported Google for years.
But recently their cocky and "our stuff is better use it" attitude has been really annoying recently.
Their recent push to kill any and every project that isn't used by EVERYONE EVER has also pissed me off, since I used many of them frequently.
One of them was one I used everyday and that was Google Chrome Sidetabs. Don't give me your "oh it was an experiment boohoo", it wasn't harming a damn person by being there, its not like the damn UI changes are the reason. (seriously, it doesn't, check the buildbot)
The worst part was, they don't even have an official replacement. Just some crybaby saying "oh it a bad attempt, come back in another year and we will have something for you".
I recently updated Chrome only to have it return with 40+ pages all crushed in to tiny little tabs. (that is my average!)
WHY HAVEN'T THEY IMPLEMENTED SCROLLING AND MINIMUM SIZE TABS YET?
It's like the Chromium devs are casual web users, not having more than 5-10 tabs open at a time. (if THAT)
If I had the time, I'd fork it harder than Angelina Jolie. It is embarrassing, a piss poor effort at best.
Anyway. Completely behind this.
They are pushing their own services on their search engine and using it to their advantage.
Just because they are one company, doesn't mean they can just happily do this without consequence.
They should have to push their advertising as much as any other company needs to. They should have to make their own services as searchable and relevant as anyone else.
Ironic, considering the reason half their damn products got cancelled was because they failed to advertise the damn things. An advertising company not advertising? Who'da thunk it?
So much for that Innovation Company.
All this reminds me of was the times with Microsoft. Oh, wait, that still hasn't really changed and they are even trying to do it even now with forcing competition (Linux) off of the PC market and tablets.
Here, Microsoft, little tip, buy a hardware company and beat it. We don't want your lockdown. It is how crApple get away with it, how about you take some lessons from your late buddy Steve. Do it for him, Steve the 2nd.
This was, funnily enough, pushed forward by Microsoft.
Investigations by the same company who failed hard in the past.
Separate branches in the same company should be separate entities and still have to pay their own way. (or, in other words, have their default finances "cut" to the amount the payment cost, possibly even lowering salaries if the branch isn't profitable enough. It is the only fair way. )
Google Labs was the best thing to happen to them. Now there is nothing. Google, like all good companies, is slowly going to shit and becoming Yet Another Money Machine.
I'm thinking of setting my own e-mail server up soon. I can't afford to have all my information tied to a Gmail account.
As much as I used to love Google and a few of the developers (likewise with some of the MSDN people and MS Research), it is now at Like and slowly, but surely, going to indifferent.
Because most people know the real reason Google is getting investigated by authorities is because a group of competitors and Microsoft partners led by Microsoft have been filing complaints like mad with governments all around the world. So people know this is bogus. Also Bonch is a known paid troll just take a quick look at his posts. He is owned by Microsoft, Apple, and RIAA/MPAA to name a few. His employer is a well known lobbying/public relations entity and hence his posts reflect as such.
And people say there are Apple and Microsoft shills on Slashdot? That last paragraph reads like stock phrases from a marketing suit. "...Google's superiority and innovativeness...these charges are absolutely baseless and I look forward to Google being vindicated..." And it gets modded as Insightful!
I use Google products too, but come on. Google is huge, and if they're overstepping their bounds, they should be investigated just like Microsoft was a decade ago.
"Sufferin' succotash."
yep Smithz also
Really - ALL of the alleged accusations are practiced daily by other technology companies which have major shares - like ms, apple. Especially apple is almost fascist compared to what others can do with their handsets, including anyone using their software. microsoft even as of now pushes ie9, hotmail, msn through windows. they are even wanting to 'kill' ie6 - it does not matter whether you want it or not, for good or bad measure.
...
This 'investigation' comes right at the time when sopa thing heated up, mainly because of google's participation and open anti-sopa advocacy. a major force - imagine if google went 'dark' and educated users for one day about sopa. there would not be anything left in the name of sopa after that day
so this is a preemptive strike. they are basically launching an investigation, to scare/caution google, so they wont be so vocal about this sopa shit. if they comply, its going to die out. if they dont, the investigation will find that they are doing anti competitive practices and penalize them. everything was fine when google was cooperating with the current administration for realizing their 'technological vision'
corporate bastardry and big media money in action. nothing else.
Read radical news here
representative means congressmen. senators. these make the laws. and no, advisors dont mean shit - whatever the leashholder pays for, is legislated.
google needed to buy representatives. meaning, congressmen or senators. none of these would happen. or sopa.
Read radical news here
Some companies are paying people to astroturf. Some people with mod points are modbombing them. Astroturfing (And other forms of advertising or trolling) are most effective when they are mostly or even entirely true, just omitting the facts that don't support the desired conclusion. For example, pointing out the correlation between skin colour and conviction rate in the USA leads the reader to one conclusion, while pointing out the correlation between police search rate and skin colour or skin colour and economic class paints an almost inverted one. When presented with a post of the first category, you can either reply with one of the other points, or just moderate it as a troll. The second is easier and, if the poster persists in this behaviour, probably more deserved.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
As I understand anti-trust laws, It can't just be because somebody happens to be dominant and they leverage that in another product. There has to be something where the consumer is practically speaking unable to choose because of said dominance.
Quick, get the tinfoil hat out before it's too late!
From the linked article:- Cecelia Prewett, an FTC spokeswoman, declined to comment on the widening of the agency’s investigation.
I interpret that to read "declined to comment on *claimed* widening of the agency's investigation.
I don't equate every investigation launched by the FTC as evidence of any wrongdoing - anymore than I equate a Department of Transport investigation into cars taking off from the lights all by themselves. They respond, by nature, to complaints. The complaints don't have to be valid.
Hint: automotive industry in trouble - find Fiat guilty (of not catering to fat feet). Rinse and repeat the next time the native automotive industry loses sales to a foreign competitor.
I had no idea that Slashdot was such an important site that people are actually paid good money to troll the discussions on it.
He is owned by Microsoft, Apple, and RIAA/MPAA to name a few.
Why don't you add the Bilderbergers and the Illuminati to the mix?
------RM
Google offers many services that are very good, and are among the best available.
They SHOULD be high in the rankings.
Normally I'd be totally with Google on this, but I believed they've whined about other "monopolies" where the monopoly only exists because people choose the product from among dozens of other alternatives. In other words a make believe monopoly.
So instead of backing google, I'll go with a Nelson Munz "ha ha".
Separate branches in the same company should be separate entities and still have to pay their own way. (or, in other words, have their default finances "cut" to the amount the payment cost, possibly even lowering salaries if the branch isn't profitable enough. It is the only fair way. )
Yes, that would be... But think... Microsoft would not have entered to game console markets ever. Microsoft would not have ever entered to Search engine markets... Sony would not have ever developed PS3...
Youtube could be something different... Twitter, Facebook and other similar sites would never have existed...
And I like the idea... as big corporations and competition ain't good for customers
The CEO of Google rough quote "we are here to provide or improve service to customers, we are not here to worry if our competitors are falling behind or they can keep up".. They talked to Facebook and Twitter.. With Twitter people have rumored it to be over money, and it was either a question of money or both sites decided to pull out of talks to bitch and whine over Google providing a better personal search.
Google has said nothing other then they had talks, and it seems from the Quotes of Facebook and Twitter to the idiot press, they left these "talks" out of there comments.
Personally I think this whole "Personalized Search" concept is stupid.
Why the hell would I want to search 1-2 paragraph posts by the unwashed masses (including my own) instead of proper ARTICLES posted to the internet? The whole concept is asinine.
What's next? Searching the insightful wisdom of 140 character tweets? *LOL*
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Perhaps Google should change its famous strapline from "do no evil" to "do no hypocracy".
I mean, there are tons of other more mean things on the Net and yet FTC is wasting time on this pointless investigation.
I have no association to Google what-so-ever - alright, I *do* use Google to search for stuffs online, but that's it - and I just don't see any point of accusing Google of antitrust or whatsoever when Google isn't doing anything of such.
There are better uses of tax payers money, IMHO.
Have we all forgotten how Google actually calculates which web links appear at the top of the results??
Nobody links to Facebook profiles; thus they will not be on the front page -- Unless Google's personalized search algorithms determine you're the kind of person who would prefer a Facebook profile over, say, her actual website or Wikipedia article.
Google actually used to index Twitter feeds, and PAID Twitter for them. Twitter cut them off. Facebook was approached with the same opportunity, and they declined. It is the fault of those companies and the hyperlink posters of the 'Net - not Google's - that Google+ results are the only social results on the page.
And even then, only if you have a Google+ account in the first place.