I'm saying Google added search engine choice to Chrome in order to create the illusion of competition in a monopolized market. If Google didn't have monopoly power in the search engine market they never would have added search engine choice to Chrome in the first place for the same reason Starbucks stores don't sell bags of Dunkin' Donuts coffee beans. A rational enterprise in a competitive market doesn't benevolently give market share to a competitor.

Kind of like the cellophane paradox[1] I suppose. From Wikipedia:

> As Richard Posner wrote, "Reasonable interchangeability at the current price but not at a competitive price level, far from demonstrating the absence of monopoly power, might well be a symptom of that power; this elementary point was completely overlooked by the court"

But instead of a price denominated in dollars it's in consumer data I suppose.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellophane_paradox

Hm. If I understand the cellophane paradox, it says that the "substitutes exist" does not imply "there is no monopoly".

That seems different from your argument, which I understand to be "only a monopolist would make it easy for consumers to choose a competitor". But again, the conclusion that Google is a monopolist seems to be baked into this logic -- would you really say Google is not a monopolist if they did not offer search engine choice?

> which I understand to be "only a monopolist would make it easy for consumers to choose a competitor"

No, not "only".

The argument is that while non-monopolists have a motivation to add those choices, monopolists have a motivation too.

Therefore seeing the end result isn't very strong evidence for whether something is a monopoly or not.

I agree with your statement. The comment I was responding to does not:

> If anything this is evidence of Google’s search engine monopoly and Google built the selection feature into Chrome it in furtherance of that monopoly power