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A comment on The First Big Antitrust Trial of the Century Is About to Start. Parent comment

Re:The First Big Antitrust Trial of the Century Is About to ... by huitzitziltzin on Sunday August 06, 2023 @11:31PM (#37029752)
>> The government is claiming that the search market is being monopolized, not by having the best results, but by paying $45 billion dollars/year to various browser suppliers to make Google the default browser. That's the illegal act.

And google is going to say correctly that consumers are free to switch search engines. They are free to enter “bing.com” in google chrome and it will take them right where they want to go: to another search engine!

I note above that I am not sure google’s payments are pro-competitive. They probably aren’t. It’s fair to be uncomfortable with them. But to make an antitrust case on monopolization of search you are going to need more evidence than those payments.

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Re:The First Big Antitrust Trial of the Century Is About to ... by HWR_14 on Monday August 07, 2023 @12:00AM (#37029927)
I don't see the distinction you think is very obvious. Google is paying 3rd parties to bundle GoogleSearch as the default in their browser. That's what the government objects to. I'm fairly sure that violates antitrust rules just as much as bundling a browser with your OS does.
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Re:The First Big Antitrust Trial of the Century Is About to ... by jenadine on Monday August 07, 2023 @12:49AM (#37030279)
> They are free to enter “bing.com”

And people were free to download Netscape.

But the thing is that people don't type "bing.com" nor "google.com" because they just use the browser search bar and don't bother with what search engine is being used.

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