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fdw | 2 years ago
The market for these loss-leading services is skewed because Google subsidizes their free offerings so that they improve their ads branch. Because it is hard to compete with a free (actually money-losing) service, it is very hard for competitors to spring up. And thus the whole thing is anti-competitive.
If they were separate companies and had to compete on their own merit, not subsidized by the ads division, they'd have to ask for money too. Then, competitors actually have a chance to offer something better. And through that, the reach of the ads business is limited unless they start to work with the competing services. This opens up the market for other ad markets, too.
And then we are a step closer to the free market that is efficient and good for consumers.
danaris|2 years ago
The argument "but if you spin off this major part of the company, it wouldn't be profitable enough to survive on its own" is the whole damn point. Using your monopoly in one area to prop up an otherwise-unprofitable arm controlling another area is exactly the kind of behavior antitrust law is designed to combat.
Too many people (especially around here) seem to forget that.
izacus|2 years ago
With Apple, Amazon and Microsoft doing the same in same markets... are we? Because it doesn't seem like "whap the random company that didn't pay enough for marketing" strategy isn't really working into establishing proper competition that benefits society.
Maybe... a different approach needs to be taken? How about starting to talk about legislation which would force large companies to allow competition into their vertical integrations - ALL of them, not just the single pet megacorp we hate this week. Level playing field and all that.
wuschel|2 years ago
How would the market change in the wake of such a move? I can imagine that other companies will try to rebuild what Google was in other form. And these companies might not be US entities.