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Google To Comply With EU Search Demands To Avoid More Fines (bloomberg.com)
Google will comply with Europe's demands to change the way it runs its shopping search service, a rare instance of the internet giant bowing to regulatory pressure to avoid more fines. From a report: The Alphabet unit faced a Tuesday deadline to tell the European Union how it planned to follow an order to stop discriminating against rival shopping search services in the region. A Google spokeswoman said it is sharing that plan with regulators before the deadline expires, but declined to comment further. The EU fined Google a record 2.4 billion euros ($2.7 billion) in late June for breaking antitrust rules by skewing its general search results to unfairly favor its own shopping service over rival sites. The company had 60 days to propose how it would "stop its illegal content" and 90 days to make changes to how the company displays shopping results when users search for a product. Those changes need to be put in place by Sept. 28 to stave off a risk that the EU could fine the company 5 percent of daily revenue for each day it fails to comply. "The obligation to comply is fully Google's responsibility," the European Commission said in an emailed statement, without elaborating on what the company must do to comply.
A corporation obeys laws. The way it should be.
It's a tragedy that Google, probably the most successful company in the world with the possible exception of Apple, is bowing to the socialist EU demands to change the business model that has given them such success. Only in the EU would people be so jealous of success that they actually force a company to share their business under penalty of financial duress. Honestly Google should just pull out of Europe and say fuck em. D-bags.
You can't use the service you own to advertise your products over others? Huh?
Obeying the law is much harder when they make the law as vague as possible, then just tell the company they are in violation and have to fix it - without telling them what "fixed" looks like.
Unlike, say, MS-Office or Adobe Acrobat, no one is forced to use the Google search engine, for compatibility or any other reason. If users don't think it's showing them the best prices, they can use Bing or Yahoo or whatever. People use Google because it still gives the best search results. It's a free service after all, and if Google doesn't want to include comparison-shopping sites in the results, that should be its right. If Google were an EU-based company, it wouldn't be an issue.
We often see the EU drag Google and Microsoft on to the carpet for another kangaroo court session, but does the EU actually do anything more than just be an instrument of xenophobic anti-Americanism? They need to clean their own house.
A good example: If VW were an American company and was discovered breaking the diesel emissions requirements, how long would they exist in Europe before being fined out of existence?
2.7B fine to ensure that Google will route your shopping click to search vendors making millions off from affiliate kickbacks. That's why these shopping search vendors are mad, it isn't the advertising revenue, it the up to 10% affiliate kickbacks they want. And you're a fool if you think stores paying large affiliate kickbacks have the lowest prices.
Instead of having a specially tailored version of search for each Constitution-free country, produce one limited version that would be, being the lowest common denominator of each of those countries' set of rules, usable in each. It would index only approved Chinese sites, would have nothing criticizing Putin or Erdogan, would forget individuals by default, and would bring up no restaurant listings during Ramadan. With so many restrictions built into it, Google Censored could be implemented by that French staff that has to work a thirty-hour week.
Next thing the EU will force Google to censor or filter out anything critical of the EU regime under the guise of "Fake News".
The EU is going down the road of China and other totalitarian regimes. I thought the UK would be safe but the Torries internet policy was just as bad which is scary.
Make SELinux enforcing again!
Yo, Google, tell the EU to shove it up their flaming arses. Turn off Google in the EU for 60 days, see how they like trying to do anything using Bing or Yahoo.
I'd give it 15 days before the EU comes begging to have Google turn things on again, without having to change anything.
breaking antitrust rules by skewing its general search results to unfairly favor its own shopping service over rival sites
Google has a shopping service? If so, they haven't been very good at favoring it, because I live in the EU, and I've never had it come up in search results.