The thing they were fined for was
>[Google] has required manufacturers to pre-install the Google Search app and browser app (Chrome), as a condition for licensing Google's app store (the Play Store);
How is the Play Store related to the Google Seach app or to Chrome? One is an app store, one is a seach bar and one is a browser. They have nothing in common and don't interact in any meaningful way (except perhaps the interaction between the Google Seach app and Chrome, but that relation isn't part of the ruling).
This is clearly Google using the dominance of the Play store to push other, completely unrelated apps.
>zero customers want a vendor to do anything different
The first thing I do with a new phone is to try to get rid of that google search bar on the home screen (I open a browser to seach the web ...), I don't use mobile chrome, and I prefer rooted CyanogenMod / LineageOS over stock Android. So I am clearly impacted by all three offenses Google was fined for. I suspect I am not the only one.
- They're not, and the attempt to claim they are part of a mobile "suite" is the same sort of obfuscation Microsoft used when they argued a web browser (IE) was an essential part of a desktop OS. This ruling seems obvious to me.
How is a web browser not an essential part of a desktop OS.
Literally every single consumer operating system comes bundled with a web browser, and in fact everyone bundles their own
OSX: Safari
ChromeOS: Chrome
Windows: Edge
That's so 1997. I would argue that a desktop OS isn't essential to my web browser. All I want my phone or my desktop computer for is to browse the web (not me but that's true for the vast majority of people). All this nonsense that comes with the OS is peripheral. Not essential. The only thing my phone or desktop needs to do is turn on, connect to the web, and download facebook.com and any other website I want. That's it. That's essential. Network card: essential. Web browser: essential. Any so-called computer without a network card is as good as a brick to me.
The idea of a Web Browser being "essential" to an OS is to mean that the OS itself would not be complete without this specific browser, which is in fact not true. Whatever combination of OS + browser you elect to use, or of you eschew the common OS parts in favor of it being entirely browser based is your choice.
That is the contention when Google, and also when Microsoft, try to claim that their respective browsers are essential to their OSes. (Before anyone tries to call me out, yes, Apple is just as silly with iOS, but at least they attempt to have some very fragile ground to stand on regarding performance)
So the argument isn't that a web browser isn't essential to modern day computing, it's that the OS itself does not need a built in one to be complete, or any specific browser to realize its goal of being an OS.
MS argued that the specific web browser IE was essential and I think that's the type of argument that is problematic, both for MS and Google
Internet Explorer and the Windows shell were the same code. There's a reason why until this day the Windows shell is `explorer.exe` - it and `iexplore.exe` (IE) were the one and the same. You could open a file explorer to C:\ and then type in `msn.com` in the address bar, and the PC wouldn't blink.
The short answer, at the time anyways, was that you could just delete it to no consequence. It was just another program.
Some of the phones do "need" a browser as they provide it as a feature to apps, so things are a bit murkier now.
And there's the WebView component, that's part of the SDK, that's essential, and it can be a dependency, or it can be bundled into the APK. (There's even https://crosswalk-project.org/ that is basically new WebView for old phones - Chromium built for old phones.)
But of course to an Android buyer, it is all a part of the experience with the device. They know what to expect and what is there.
"he same sort of obfuscation Microsoft used when they argued a web browser"
And Microsoft was right. Windows has Explorer or Edge. It still does. The EU giant fine did absolutely nothing but made them realize that cashing in big on American companies is essentially free. Of course I still download Firefox, just as you can do on Android.
The problem is that by not giving the choice makes this anti-competitive behaviour. What’s wrong with giving Samsung the ability to make a deal with Yahoo to install Yahoo as the default in their Android phones?
If they claim it’s all part of their integrated experience, then they should provide the necessary APIs/SDKs for other search providers to integrate properly.
We’ve been over this before, it’s anti-competitive behaviour, and it lacks choice.
Only if the device is advertised as being an Android, which is a trademark that you cannot use without Google’s agreement. You can’t use anything Google related actually, besides AOSP, so I don’t see how Google can make that argument with a straight face.
And on Microsoft... they could easily block any competition just like Apple is doing on iOS. That you are able to install Firefox on it, be thankful to previous antitrust fines they got ;-)
“Related to” does not mean that they are the literally same thing. They are clearly related as a suite of applications which form the core experience of what is called “Android”.
The law doesn’t say that if it is technically possible to unbundle a set of options from a product offering to be sold al la carte that companies must do that.
These are all essential components of one product — a mobile OS. Mixing and matching, for the vast majority of users, is neither practical or expected, and absolutely negatively impacts the brand.
Microsoft should be delighted then that they can force Internet Explorer on everyone again.
> They are clearly related as a suite of applications which form the core experience of what is called “Android”.
That argument doesn't hold for Chrome. The core experience of Android is the AOSP browser (aka Android Browser). Later Google started to use their monopoly to force the inclusion of Chrome alongside Android Browser, followed by the removal of Android Browser in Android 4.4.
And even now, the only reason Chrome is part of the "core android experience" is because Google pushes hard to make it that way. There are plenty of other good mobile browsers.
>These are all essential components of one product — a mobile OS
But Google doesn't licence the OS. They donated the OS to Open Source, and use their licencing agreement for the App store to control unrelated parts of the OS experience
Microsoft does force Internet Explorer cum Edge on everyone. They never stopped. When the EU forced them to offer a trivial "justify a giant fine" selection tool it did essentially nothing in regards to browser share. It keeps getting cited as the precedent, and while it is in the "EU makes some fat bank" way, it did absolutely nothing for consumers. And that's for an OS that was tremendously more entrenched, whereas I recently swapped out my GS8 for an iPhone 8 with nary a hiccup (and as an aside still enjoy all those Google services).
There is so much bullshit happening throughout this discussion.
Elsewhere people are claiming that Chrome became popular because Google pushed it on their homepage, which is just ridiculous, revisionist nonsense. Chrome became popular because it earned word of mouth as a lighter, faster browser. It exploded. The same happened with Firefox. Because the platform was open and allowed you to choose whatever you want to run. Just as I can and do run Firefox on Android.
Further, vendors/carriers only abuse the right to put in alternatives. It is traditionally called crapware.
As is your version of events. As with all extreme points of view, the truth lies somewhere towards the middle.
I'm using Android every day and never once opened Chrome (instead I'm using the Lightning browser) or used the Google app to search (I'm just searching directly in my browser). So IMHO that's definitely NOT the core experience of Android, while the Play Store is.
Of course, saying it's a part of the Android/Google Experience is from the average consumer. You know that you have the Chrome browser if you so choose. Yes, you can go to the Play Store and install Firefox. Unlike on iOS where the browser alternatives are facades.
(Im a Googler, but that's not particularly relevant to this comment)
Also, you could actually uninstall IE. That only uninstalled the shell, not the libraries (as there were dependencies) but it was gone in terms of the application.
The home screen icon is one of those hooks but by far not the only one. If I hide it or never press it, that implies exactly nothing about whether or not code from the app gets executed while I use the phone.
I know ecosystems make corporations a lot of money and some people prefer them. And they can choose an iPhone or Pixel.
Firefox has over a 100 million downloads according to the Play Store, so that argument at least doesn't work for bundling Chrome.
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/263445/global-smartphone...
Well then, that's your choice, and with that you admit to belong to some 0.0001% of Android users who are willing to open up their phones to all kinds of security exploits, and reduce its value to some laughable percentile, as is known, with CyanogenMod / LineageOS most of the good part go to hell, camera goes to hell, performance goes, ... and you get what? Glowing aura of open source user
All that goes to hell because Google prevents almost all first party support for LinageOS (or any other forks), which is why Google gets fined now. In a theoretical world where Google didn't do the things they are fined for, LineageOS might work much better on a wider range of hardware and thus have much more mainstream appeal.
Because BMW don't have market dominance in either the car industry or the entertainment system industry. If they used dominance in one to affect the other, they would be in breach of that legislation.
>This is absolutely not at all clear cut. It is incredibly nuanced
So how do you explain Google's non-compliance when explicitly and clearly informed that they were in breach over two years ago?
If, for example, BMW _did_ become an extremely successful car manufacturer to the point where they were capturing >80% of the market, would they suddenly no longer be allowed to bundle their own entertainment system with their cars?
Of course the size of the company and the market dominance comes into play here. It's not a monopoly if people can go elsewhere to get their engines, it is if there is only one realistic choice of supplier (Android).
Yes, that's exactly what monopoly abuse laws are for.
Fire OS and my personal phone which is running a Google-free version of LineageOS would like to have a word.
> And if we just go around clubbing everything coarsely, why does my BMW have a BMW entertainment system?
BMW doesn't have a dominant market position it could abuse. Neither does Apple or any other company that Google is commonly compared to in these discussions.
Somehow these false-equivalences seem to be most common among people trying to push the "unfair fine" narrative.
On top of that you claim that because there are other companies/products that are in breach of the law - at least according to your misreading of it - this somehow makes the word of the law less clear cut in this case. Which just doesn't make any sense.
Let me throw your own words back at you: "you are not really thinking about it [your arguments] much."
Hilariously, you just made the parent's point for them - you yourself said you aren't running Android but Fire OS or LineageOS. Android, the product, comes with Chrome, Google Search, and the Google Play Store. If you want Android, you have to take all of Android. If you want to run something else, go for it, but then it isn't Android.
Android is a separate software project that is developed separately from Google Play Services. The Android OS works perfectly without those installed.
There's no "Chrome, Google Search, and the Google Play Store" in the Android repository. Especially since Android is open source, and most of the latter APKs are not.
I suggest to actually have a look at the a android project before making claims like these. This page is a good place to start: https://source.android.com/setup/
The Play Store is the one and only problem as the replacements are nowhere near close in functionality or popularity.
Google has worked very hard to integrate their app suite at such a deep level with Android to the point that they can steer what can be done with the OS just by using that one lever.
Anyone paying attention in the past decade will remember plenty of complaints about the GApps infesting Android.
But yes, if just looks at the situation as it is today, they could be excused for thinking that everything is normal.
I don't really mind about the Google Play Services thing (as it probably benefited people overall), but the contracts with OEM's were always wack, and I'm pretty happy that the EU has (eventually) fined them for this literally textbook anti-EU competition law behaviour.
BMW is not forcing BMW to install a BMW entertainment system.
BMW can install whatever entertainment system BMW likes.
Google is forcing other phone makers to install certain Google apps. The issue is not with what Google does for their own products, but what they force other phone makers to do. That is the key point—this ruling wouldn't (or shouldn't) apply to Google's own Pixel products.
Now if Bosch was forcing BMW to install Bosch windscreen wipers as a requirement on any car with Bosch collision avoidance systems, there you might have a valid analogy.
Google also claimed that this ruling would hurt open source projects in favor of “proprietary platforms”, but everything that provides the “Android experience” - Google Play Services and the binary drivers - are closed sourced.
It is incredible seeing Google being seriously attacked on here for have an open source path as well. I feel like this is some sort of alternative universe.
This is incredibly (deliberately?) misrepresentative. They are being punished for having a monopoly and (ab)using that. If Apple/iPhone had an 80% market share in EU the commission would be gunning for them instead, e.g. because of their closed ecosystem preventing competition.
And this deal was approved by the EU and it specifically grants a monopoly to Airbus for European rocket manufacturing and launch.
The point is that the EU doesn’t care that much about monopolies— they care that much about American tech monopolies. It’s economic populism. I am not saying anything about the merits of the Android case, only pointing out that the EU doesn’t pursue EU companies with as much vigor. €5 billion is a significant payday for the EU — especially when that money comes from an American company.
Further, if Apple were to decide, tomorrow, to release iOS as open source, would they also be in violation of the law (possibly depending on their motivation?)
The law often hinges on intent along with action, that's hardly novel.
Exactly. The takeaway from this seems to be to not open up your system a little bit, because then you'll need to go all the way. Whereas e.g. Apple, which built a completely closed phone system from the start, doesn't get any trouble (even when it dominated the smartphone market). Really backwards ruling. And I say this as someone who happily switched to an iPhone to escape Google's data collection.
"Google has used Android as a vehicle to cement the dominance of its search engine. These practices have denied rivals the chance to innovate and compete on the merits. They have denied European consumers the benefits of effective competition in the important mobile sphere," Ms Vestager said.
It's not because Google has open sourced Android (which they _had_ to because of the GPL used by Linux). The fine is for protecting their own marker by blocking others from using that open source software.
I suspect that when a lawyer uses "essential and inseparable" they do not mean the same thing a technologist would mean. The GPL itself doesn't use that language, and anyway it's trivial to argue that a full OS distro isn't "based on" (the language of the GPL) the kernel itself.
Because BMW has not entered an abusive relationship with a dominant player in the car entertainment system market who would only license the popular system to BMW on the condition that 1) BMW won't develop their own version, and 2) will bundle other software packages also developed by the dominant player.
BMW is the manufacturer, not a licensor, so it's a slightly different scenario, but let's say that dealers are somewhat equivalent to manufacturers. You raise a good question or two:
1. Does BMW forbid dealers from replacing the factory entertainment system with an Alpine system? Or do they just assume nobody will, since it's already bundled in the car?
2. What is BMW's share of the automobile market? (i.e. how close to a monopoly are they?)
Offering the open source Gallery app is the "Android experience". Offering Google Photos is not the Android experience, but the "Google experience". It's different.
> zero customers want a vendor to do anything different
Citation needed. I mean I don't want the vendors to add bloatware to a smartphone, just like I don't want Google to add bloatware (like the search bar or the News app). But that doesn't mean I wouldn't like actually innovative features. And even if I as a "stock Android" fan, that doesn't mean everyone is.
They're a part of the same suite of apps that provide the "Android experience" (Google experience, whatever -- the thing that most consumers think of when they consider Android). They manifestly have a profound connection with each other.
And let's be clear here lest there be any confusion -- zero customers want a vendor to do anything different, and the only reason some vendors wanted to is because they could double dip: Pitch the Android experience and get the market inroads, while getting some Bing or whatever payola to "force" that on a consumer.
The same is true of the other claim-
Then they said "You can't use Google Play if you try to help develop any android forks."
Google's argument, whether honest or not, is that if you need a consistent representation of the Android experience that you're selling to consumers. If the GS8 has the full Android experience, but then the GS8P has the Android Fun Store and Bing Search, this can seriously dilute the market opinion of Android and cause consumer confusion.
This is absolutely not at all clear cut. It is incredibly nuanced. And if we just go around clubbing everything coarsely, why does my BMW have a BMW entertainment system? Why couldn't I choose Alpine at the dealer? An entertainment system is not an engine, right? I don't want to go down the road of absurd analogies, but if you're seriously presenting the notion that this is clear cut, you are not really thinking about it much.
As an aside, Google has had the same policies regard their suite of apps since day 1 of Android. Since the very beginning. When iOS absolutely dwarfed it. When Blackberry reigned supreme. When I was hefting around my sad little HTC Dream and listening to the John Gruber's tell us how doomed it was.