Re:Missouri Attorney General launches investigation of Google
by thephyber on Wednesday November 15, 2017 @02:05AM
(#15701966)
> As as Tesla goes they are still a very small company compared to their competition so I don't think there is any need to think about their market power and suppression of competition.
It all depends how you slice and dice, which is the flexibility and the unjust part of anticompetitive lawsuits.
Did MS have a "monopoly" on browsers just by bundling IE with Windows? How much effort would it take for consumers to install Mozilla or Opera or AOL?
Does Apple have a monopoly on "apps"? You can always buy an Android to avoid an iPhone, a Surface to avoid an iPad, a Zune to avoid an iPod (oh, wait...). You can argue that Apple has a monopoly on the Apple iTunes/App stores, but is it an honest argument if you look at the wider industry?
I would argue that size still doesn't mean anything. Apple is huge but they got there because consumers willingly bought their products. There was no geographical monopoly (as utilities have), no IP monopoly (iPod competed with Zune, MBP with a lot of WinTel laptops, iPad with Surface, iPhone with any number of feature Phones, BlackBerries, and later Android), and they didn't pay legislators to build walls that benefitted Apple.
Does Google deserve to be sued for anticompetitive behavior? Perhaps. Does Google deserve to be sued just because it's large? No.
It all depends how you slice and dice, which is the flexibility and the unjust part of anticompetitive lawsuits.
Did MS have a "monopoly" on browsers just by bundling IE with Windows? How much effort would it take for consumers to install Mozilla or Opera or AOL?
Does Apple have a monopoly on "apps"? You can always buy an Android to avoid an iPhone, a Surface to avoid an iPad, a Zune to avoid an iPod (oh, wait...). You can argue that Apple has a monopoly on the Apple iTunes/App stores, but is it an honest argument if you look at the wider industry?
I would argue that size still doesn't mean anything. Apple is huge but they got there because consumers willingly bought their products. There was no geographical monopoly (as utilities have), no IP monopoly (iPod competed with Zune, MBP with a lot of WinTel laptops, iPad with Surface, iPhone with any number of feature Phones, BlackBerries, and later Android), and they didn't pay legislators to build walls that benefitted Apple.
Does Google deserve to be sued for anticompetitive behavior? Perhaps. Does Google deserve to be sued just because it's large? No.