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this post was submitted on 26 Jan 2024
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Yeah, it's a "what's new" OS update, but that includes Safari features, which isn't strictly an OS thing. Microsoft got a lot of flak for including IE with the OS (well, a bit more than that, they tried to block Netscape from accessing "private" APIs that IE had access to), and it seems to follow that Apple should get a similar amount of flak for having an unfair advantage with Safari having access to OS features before anything else.
Is advertising "abusing monopolistic power"? I get Microsoft getting hit with anti-trust because they actively prevented competition, but both MS and Apple advertise their other products through their OS (e.g. IE and Safari, Office 365 and iCloud, etc).
Google should absolutely get hit with anti-trust when they are shown to make their sites perform worse on other browser engines (happens a lot w/ Firefox, where just changing user-agent improves perf). But I'm not so sure that they should be hit with anti-trust for advertising their other products, because that's an establish practice.
A changelog is a changelog. If safari updates are in OS updates, then yeah that's where the changes will be listed.
In a completely different market.
At the time, browsers were sold as standalone software. MS including it was an unfair advantage in that context.
Nowadays browsers aren't distributed in that way, installing another browser takes seconds and they're free. It's nowhere near as anti-competitive.
Please don't distort my words. I never said that. You know exactly what I said and the meaning behind it.
Google using their position in Search and on YouTube and Gmail to push you to install Chrome is an abuse of market position.
I never said advertising is an abuse of monopolistic power and you know that.
I don't know why you're being so needlessly combative here?
I'm not trying to be combative, just wondering what the policy would look like.
Sure, and I would expect to see the Safari changelog when I launch Safari. But I get it when I upgrade my OS, and Safari (in my eyes) isn't an OS feature. I don't use Safari, so seeing Safari changelog is an ad. Likewise for Edge on Windows, I don't use Edge, so seeing an Edge changelog from an OS update is an ad (not sure if MS still does that, I haven't used Windows in years).
Google advertises its products on its search page. Microsoft advertises its products on its OS (initial run, pretty much every update). Apple does the same with macOS.
So what exactly is the proposed change? Do we block advertising for other products if you have a certain share of the market? Or does it come down to the manner of advertising?
In my mind, "monopolistic behavior" means doing something to undermine competition. If you're merely pushing your own services and not interfering with other options, I don't think that's anti-competitive. For example, is Valve's pushing of its Steam Deck on their store anti-competitive? Valve is dominant on the PC gaming market and I wouldn't be surprised if they're dominant in handheld PC gaming as well (e.g. compare to Ayaneo, Asus ROG Ally, etc). That sounds similar to how Google is dominant in both search and browser market share. I don't think Valve should be treated as a monopoly though since they're not really doing monopoly things (no exclusives except a handful of Valve-made titles, no special discount for using Steam Deck, etc).
I get it, Google is bad, but what exactly are they doing that's bad that should be restricted? What exactly should the law look like? We can't punish companies because we feel they're doing bad things, we need a system of laws that specifically lays out what's not okay. AFAIK, Google doesn't meet the current standard, so what exactly should that standard be?