News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bevekspldnw on Friday April 12, 2024 @02:53PM (#40016383)
The link tax is a red herring and a poor understanding on the part of legislators. The real issue is pre-adtech publishers kept 100% of ad revenue and double click now takes a massive cut (which they briefly touch on).

All that cash flowing into MTV is real people’s jobs and livelihood being drained away - it’s also the reason search is entering a utility collapse curve since AI can generate unlimited click bait.

Double click will end up killing google, it’s already too late to go back.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by cherioo on Friday April 12, 2024 @04:06PM (#40017083)
Genuine question, why don’t publishers stop using doubleclick and build their own?
Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by swatcoder on Friday April 12, 2024 @04:45PM (#40017462)
You know that thing where Google tracks every action you take online, and everything you do on your phone, and everywhere you go with your phone, and every calendar detail you enter, and every contact you keep, and every dumb curiosity you think to look up when you're bored or wanting?

Advertisers like that.

It's tough to sell them on something else, and essentially impossible to replicate as is.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bevekspldnw on Friday April 12, 2024 @04:23PM (#40017247)
Google has thoroughly rigged the space, including manipulating bid stream data to underpay publishers while overcharging the advertiser. It’s called Project Bernake which is public now. I have it on reliable sources there is a lot more beyond that.

The search antitrust suit was garbage, but the coming trials in the ad auction suit is going to hurt a lot more. They total lost their way, it’s actually insane when you’ll see what theyve been doing.

Google never stopped “innovating”, they just shifted their innovation to fraud.

https://adtechexplained.com/google-project-bernanke-explaine...

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by araes on Friday April 12, 2024 @05:28PM (#40017885)
Having never read this, current Texas anti-trust lawsuit. [1]

Alleges quite a bit, yet the main four in the article are.

1) Google says it runs a Second Price auction, but really runs a Third Price auction, ignores the 2nd bid, and takes the difference for (shifting purposes). Telling a Publisher they made $8, when they would have made $12.80.

2) Google inflates bids of buyers "to ensure their advertisers beat out bids from competing buying platforms". Artificially making their platform look better economically. Was individual cases, yet now alleged to be a global pool of stolen Publisher money.

3) Gaining access to Publisher's ad-spend behavior with Dynamic Allocation, and then using the info to make sure rival platforms seemed less competitive by manipulating and inflating other bids. Make sure they always seem to lose by $0.01 on every bid.

4) Forcing Publishers to accept Dynamic Allocation by punishing them with the maximum allowed revenue drop for Bernake (40%) while inflating competitors. Notably Machiavellian that there was a known allowed revenue drop. "We're bein nice, we'll only cut you 25%"

On a slightly different topic, made me wonder how many investment firms artificially lower rates on funds to scrape a bit of profit off the top.

[1] https://texasattorneygeneral.gov/sites/default/files/images/... (note, the child-support location is really weird)

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bawolff on Friday April 12, 2024 @06:47PM (#40018450)
> Google has thoroughly rigged the space, including manipulating bid stream data to underpay publishers while overcharging the advertiser

That seems an argument for news publishers rolling their own, not against.

What you are allegeding is nasty, but it should also make it easier to build a coompeting service not harder.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bevekspldnw on Friday April 12, 2024 @07:45PM (#40018816)
I’m not alleging anything, this is internal stuff that came out.

It’s impossible to roll your own for a very long list of reasons that go back to the late 90s.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by PeterisP on Friday April 12, 2024 @06:07PM (#40018181)
All of what you write is in support of the parent post suggestion "why don’t publishers stop using doubleclick and build their own?" - the larger margin Google is taking (no matter how) between advertisers and publishers, the better deal publishers can offer when telling advertisers "come to our platform directly and get the same ad placements much cheaper"..
Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bevekspldnw on Friday April 12, 2024 @07:46PM (#40018823)
Scale.
Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by lupire on Saturday April 13, 2024 @07:56AM (#40022533)
This reads like a young adult discovering the world has become corrupt and wondering why it changed so much since their childhood when everyone's good.

It's not the world/Google that changed.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by riku_iki on Friday April 12, 2024 @04:13PM (#40017156)
network effect for example: lots of advertisers are deeply integrated into google Ads infra.

But there is competition in this space.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by refulgentis on Friday April 12, 2024 @03:04PM (#40016497)
Cheers -- I didn't know that. Interesting parallel to the 30% app store wars: people can argue till they're blue in the face with analogy after analogy, and I can easily talk myself into either perspective being obviously correct...

...at the end of the day, I'd be happy to see a tax pass, some mix of what you put excellently as "real people’s jobs and livelihood being drained away", and I imagine similar to you given your MTV reference, experiencing there wasn't really anything special going on at BigCo. It's plain old economic inefficiency, not poor beleaguered good guy G that's always looking out for news and just trying to organize the world's information.

Re:Google threatens to cut off news after California propose... by bevekspldnw on Friday April 12, 2024 @04:25PM (#40017266)
Yes and GNI was always an attempt by the wolf to curry favor with the sheep, they act like it’s some sort of grant but it’s always been about controlling narrative.

Journalists aren’t dumb either, talk to anybody who directly got one or was involved in the process.