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Google, FTC Settle Antitrust Case
itwbennett writes "According to an ITworld report, 'Google has agreed to change some of its business practices, including allowing competitors access to some standardized technologies, to resolve a U.S. Federal Trade Commission antitrust complaint against the company.' This includes 'allow[ing] competitors access to standards-essential patents the company acquired along with its purchase of Motorola Mobility.' Also among the business practices Google has agreed to stop is 'scraping Web content from rivals and allegedly passing it off as its own, said FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz.'" SlashCloud has some more details, including links to the agreement itself and Google's soft-pedaling description of "voluntary product changes."
How many billions did Google spend on Motorola?
... more like this will follow. Google needs to be taken down a few pegs before they get any more big and arrogant than they already are. They already tried the old dog new tricks thing with Microsoft and we all know how that worked out.
'scraping Web content from rivals and allegedly passing it off as its own'
uhh looks like their search engine business is over? i mean really, people go to google first before their rivals.
So, would there be a problem if Google scraped Web content from rivals and proudly proclaimed it was passing it off as its own?
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
It should be against the law to settle anti-trust cases. They should all go to court.
Google essentially won here, and that's exactly how it should be. The government has no place telling Google what it can and cannot do on its own website - they're guaranteed freedom of speech, and Google.com is the outlet for that speech. They have every right to order search results however the hell they want to, and it's good to see that the feds didn't decide otherwise.
The other concessions have a bit more basis in reality, but it's bullshit that Motorola can't seek injunctions for technology that made mobile phones possible while asshole companies like Apple and MS can seek injunctions for rounded corners.
and the horse it rode in on.
FUCK YOU TOO
Scraped content is against Google' s own webmaster guidelines, where were they passing it off as their own?
All Google agreed was that the patents it holds which are essential to the implementation of certain mobile-telephony standards will be licensed under FRAND terms. They didn't agree to let them be used for free or anything.
Why weren't those already the terms? Standards bodies are supposed to, if they're doing their job, approve standards with some kind of FRAND licensing condition, in order for the standards to actually function as standards. The point of a standard is that everyone making a device with a certain kind of functionality is supposed to conform to certain agreed ("standard") behavior. To do that, they have to be able to legally able to implement the standard, which means any patents essential to the implementation need to be generally available to any third party for licensing, on reasonable and nondiscriminatory terms.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Wrong gambit.
MS/Apple/Oracle/Rockstar/Fairsearch's gambit just failed with this settlement.
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130103/10491421570/as-expected-ftc-announces-close-google-investigation-with-no-antitrust-charges-minor-tweaks-to-biz-practices.shtml
There is more funny version of this on readwrite (dot) com. Sounds like Microsoft was very involved in this.
just before I looked at the paycheck that said $6422, I be certain that my sister was actually earning money in their spare time on their apple labtop.. there aunt haz done this 4 only about 15 months and as of now cleared the depts on there villa and bought a new Lotus Elan. this is where I went, http://www.cloud65.com/
This is a political statement, the politicians look like they're doing something, Google appears to have been reprimanded, but in reality, no change was made. The patents are already and have been under FRAND. The real FRAND, not the Apple definition ("F stands for Free!")
What happened to your main account bonch?
Did it get it get modded down into oblivion for your hilariously pathetic anti-Google tirades?
How many other alts are you posting with today? Never mind, they are easy to spot...
"regarding the specific allegations that the company biased its search results to hurt competition, the evidence collected to date did not justify legal action by the Commission .. The evidence did not demonstrate that Google's actions in this area stifled competition in violation of U.S. law".
AccountKiller
The limitations in the no-injunction rule are fairly narrow; they don't prevent Google from getting license revenue, and they don't prevent Google from seeking injunctions if the other party doesn't agree to a specific set of commitments regarding actually paying FRAND licensing fees once they are settled. And they only apply to standards-essential patents. So, there's still quite a bit of value in the Motorola patent portfolio.
I can "haz" money then? meowww
Scam spam = ban
It might have been, if they did that, but the FTC investigated that claim and didn't find support for it, saying:
Google is required by the Consent Order to make a very specific offer regarding FRAND licensing (to the point that the order includes fill-in-the-blank demand letters Google is to use) before seeking injunctive relief; the FTC sees this as a correction to Google/MMI's past approach in these cases where, in the FTC's view, Google/MMI didn't do as much as it should have regarding seeking a FRAND licensing commitment before seeking injunctive relief.
Its not really a big loss for Google, since Google would be quite happy for other parties to have the option of making the commitment that the letter offers instead of going through an injunction process (which allows Google to demand reciprocal licensing as part of the offer), and even moreso Google would be quite happy with the FTC's stated intent that the proposed approach would become a general model for handling of disputes centered on the use of standards-essential patents.
I think allegedly is used correctly. Maybe if it read " 'scraping Web content from rivals and sheepishly passing it off as its own, said FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz.' Then I would be a bit confused :)
That said, the language of the TFS and timothy's editorializing Google as "soft-pedaling" are pretty lame click-trolling. The biggest complaint was the search results (not mentioned in TFS, or even the slashcloud article at all). The FRAND patent stuff was a recent addition to the now-closed investigation.
PocketPermissions Android Permission Guide
For the Microsoft shills and companies involved with FairSearch. All of Microsoft's lobbying, attack ads and smear campaigns have failed yet again.
Except that Motorola never offered them for 'free'. They wanted substantial trade off's from Apple in order to offer the patents, and a ridiculous cost per device while others payed substantially less. The cross licensing requirement is something which the FRAND agreement states cannot be required as a condition. Although many companies might agree to such trades, they cannot be forced to give up their own valuable copyrights and/or licensing as a condition for licensing a FRAND patent. It was idiotic that they tried to do this, and it's the primary reason they dropped all FRAND related lawsuits in the UK. They were about to get their asses handed to them if they didn't.
Wow the case and its verdict really talks a load about the FTC initiative to drive transparency and equal access to new technology. BTW Google is fighting a similar case in EU. Details Here