Re:The European Commission versus Android
by lern_too_spel on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:07AM
(#17566985)
The majority of Android phones (including all Samsung phones) have other browsers preinstalled.
This graph is telling:
http://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/mobile/worldw...
Subtract the iOS market share from the overall base, and is at 75% market share of remainder. The only strong competitor is UC Browser at 13.3%. This is an AliBaba product localized to mainland China. Remove that from the global market, and we end up with ~90% share for chrome in the rest of the world. That's antitrust territory.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by aembleton on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:52AM
(#17567444)
Restricting to just Europe: http://gs.statcounter.com/browser-market-share/mobile/europe...
IEMobile is ahead of Firefox!
Well, on my LOS+microG device I use Firefox, but my apps use SystemView and that's basically Chrome (which skews these stats). By using Firefox I use two different rendering engines, increasing my attack surface.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by candiodari on Friday July 20, 2018 @09:29AM
(#17574794)
I wonder what the user/developer experience would be on such a device. Worse than Samsung would be my guess (and that's a disaster).
Explain? I haven't used Samsung since SGS3, a flagship device which only got updates for 1 year.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by lern_too_spel on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:45AM
(#17567378)
If other browsers are also included by default, it is not antitrust to include that browser by default too. The only reason the share of Chrome would be interesting for antitrust would be if that share were leveraged to promote a product in another market, which nobody is claiming.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by ocdtrekkie on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:56AM
(#17567485)
Actually that's exactly what the claim is: That Chrome being mandatorily included and set as default is used to promote Google Search unfairly. That's directly in the EU's statement.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by lern_too_spel on Thursday July 19, 2018 @12:56PM
(#17568209)
No, the claim is that they're using Android's dominant position to push Google search and other Google products. Chrome's default in itself is not an issue.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by josteink on Thursday July 19, 2018 @01:03PM
(#17568309)
Also: WebDRM.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by ucaetano on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:44AM
(#17567371)
> This is an AliBaba product localized to mainland China.
Nope, massively popular in India.
Didn't know that, that's interesting. Is it because low-end phones that are popular in India are largely Chinese-origin vendors?
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by mgiannopoulos on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:18AM
(#17567112)
Replace "browser" with "app store" and you arrive where the parent comment was going.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by lern_too_spel on Thursday July 19, 2018 @11:43AM
(#17567362)
The majority of Android phones sold (including Samsung) preinstall other app stores too.
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by HillaryBriss on Thursday July 19, 2018 @12:23PM
(#17567807)
interesting. which app stores are typically installed?
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by lern_too_spel on Thursday July 19, 2018 @12:50PM
(#17568136)
Re:The European Commission versus Android
by beenBoutIT on Thursday July 19, 2018 @02:51PM
(#17569258)
IIRC, these browsers are generally impossible or next to impossible to get rid of.
Relevant from 2014:
https://www.androidcentral.com/theres-reason-youre-seeing-mo...
Well, the bundling has been there since day one so it's not like they are really raising prices. If the EU won't let google make money for android through search, then it seems reasonable to me for them to shift their revenue generation through licensing.
>Second, Google believes that the browser market is still largely uncompetitive, which holds back innovation for users. This is because Internet Explorer is tied to Microsoft's dominant computer operating system, giving it an unfair advantage over other browsers. Compare this to the mobile market, where Microsoft cannot tie Internet Explorer to a dominant operating system, and its browser therefore has a much lower usage.
By the way, I think it's absurd for Google to threaten that they may now charge a license for Android [2]. They're effectively saying that now that they've eliminated all competition over the past 10 years and achieved a dominant share of the market, they're going to raise prices. That's a slam dunk case even in the US's broken antitrust system.
[1] https://publicpolicy.googleblog.com/2009/02/browsers-powered...
[2] https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17585396/google-android-e...