It's pretty obvious that Americans are complaining because Google is a US company and they want it to succeed even at the cost of unethical or illegal behaviour as determined by foreign jurisdictions, and that they deem their own laws to be exceptional and superior to those of all other nations.
See? I can make totally unsubstantiated claims too.
The point being all your comment does is serve to distract from the actual issues in question by turning the issue into a tribal us-versus-them conflict. It's tedious and unproductive.
I'd wager if the US's own regulatory agencies were doing their jobs then each of the 'big four/five' tech companies would have faced penalties in the past on various issues.
They haven't because of that thing you mentioned, protectionism.
Some people need to drink less the libertarian kool-aid, Google is still recovering from missing out China and will do anything do anything eventually to satisfy EU
Your comment lacks anything with relationship with real life.
If it is obvious, it will be easy to explain the reasons for it
> I am quite sure that google considered simply pulling entirely out of Europe. It wouldn't affect them as much as you think - it's the internet, you can run a website from anywhere.
I'm quite sure that Google is glad to not have people like you as CEO.
> And it's not like the EU would prevent their citizens from buying ads from Google
Tell me how a company like Google, or Apple or Microsoft can do business with the EU without being there. And please, no't give nonsensical reasons like internet is everywhere, that just shows that you don't know much about economy.
It's pretty obvious that the EU is only doing this because Google is a US company.
I am quite sure that google considered simply pulling entirely out of Europe. It wouldn't affect them as much as you think - it's the internet, you can run a website from anywhere.
And it's not like the EU would prevent their citizens from buying ads from Google, so their revenues would not be affected all that much. Their EU sales force could be through a third party (so that Google would not have any assets in the EU).
All that Google would lose is EU employees.
The bare fact this this plan I am outlining is even worth considering rather than bow to the EU demands tells you a lot.