From my test the AMP icon in Google's search result is gone (Chrome, Android, Incognito tab).

Disclaimer: I work for Google but not on AMP product.

Search for Trump on iOS and you'll see an AMP icon.

Is the issue the icon or the carousel being at the top? I just checked and the carousel had both AMP and non-AMP content for me.

If you can make your page load as fast as an AMP page you'll probably get ranked there as well. But that's really not easy to achieve. The reason Google can say they don't prefer AMP is because AMP is extremely fast (esp with high latency)

The First Amendment gives them the legal right to curate results as they wish without interference by the U.S. government. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that other people aren't allowed to get pissed off.

I don't think the letter authors were calling for an Act of Congress. My read is that they were calling attention to the damage that AMP does to the content providers. And perhaps they could have put more emphasis on the fact that it's in Google's long-term interest not to bleed content providers dry.

They seem to suggest that Google's control over their own site's design/function is somehow an affront to their cause, not mention malicious.

They certainly see it as a big enough grievance to include in a manifesto type document which repugnantly entitled.

Free speech cuts both ways.

You seem to suggestthat OP's control over their own site content (ie the manifesto) is somehow an affront to your belief in google's free speech.

You certainly see it as a big enough grievance to write a comment on HN which is repugnantly entitled.

They get to pass comment on google's behaviour (a comment which, incidentaly, a lot of people seem to agree with). You get to pass comment on their behaviour. I get to pass comment on your behaviour.

Holding people and companies to account in a soft manner, without resorting to force (legislation counts as force) is an important aspect of a functioning free society. The freedom of speech is not freedom from criticism but freedom to criticise.

God, I hate this argument with a passion. The First Amendment was a means to and, which was protecting free expression from undue influence of the day's most powerful institutions. While it's technically true that all kinds of censorship and other shady shit from powerful organizations complies with it, I consider that a oversight and a bug. An organization as powerful as Google needs more constraints put on it, whether that's through antitrust or some other mechanism.

Speech is protected.

Anti-competitive business practices are not.

They are certainly entangled in this instance.

It's funny how everyone's a legal scholar these days.