Google Appeals $5 Billion EU Fine In Android Case (wsj.com) 52
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Wall Street Journal: Alphabet's Google on Tuesday said it filed an appeal of the European Union's $4.97 billion antitrust fine (Warning: source may be paywalled; alternative source) for allegedly abusing the dominance of its Android operating system for mobile phones. But Google said it has no plans to ask for so-called interim measures to pause application of the decision. Without further action, Google will have to meet a deadline at the end of October to end the behavior the EU says is anticompetitive or face additional fines of up to 5% of average daily global revenue for each day it doesn't comply. Google had promised that it would appeal the decision when the European Commission, the bloc's antitrust regulator, delivered it in mid-July. The commission said that Google broke the block's competition laws in part by strong-arming phone makers that use its free Android operating system to pre-install its namesake search engine, from which the company makes the bulk of its advertising revenue.
In the Android case, the European Commission has ordered Google to stop making phone manufacturers pre-install its search app and the Chrome web browser if they want to pre-install Google's Play store, which is the main way to download Android apps. The bloc also ordered Google to end restrictions that discourage manufacturers from selling devices that run unofficial versions of Android. It contends both restrictions illegally constrained competing search engines and operating systems. Google has argued that Android, which is free for manufacturers to use, has increased competition among smartphone makers, lowering prices for consumers. The company has said the allegation that it stymied competing apps is false because manufacturers typically install many rival apps on Android devices, and consumers can easily download others.
In the Android case, the European Commission has ordered Google to stop making phone manufacturers pre-install its search app and the Chrome web browser if they want to pre-install Google's Play store, which is the main way to download Android apps. The bloc also ordered Google to end restrictions that discourage manufacturers from selling devices that run unofficial versions of Android. It contends both restrictions illegally constrained competing search engines and operating systems. Google has argued that Android, which is free for manufacturers to use, has increased competition among smartphone makers, lowering prices for consumers. The company has said the allegation that it stymied competing apps is false because manufacturers typically install many rival apps on Android devices, and consumers can easily download others.
Additional requirements when the system is free? (Score:4, Insightful)
The bloc also ordered Google to end restrictions that discourage manufacturers from selling devices that run unofficial versions of Android.
So you make a free, open source system and the antitrust laws bring additional requirements on you? Google may very well say "OK, it's all proprietary from now on, go fuck yourself. No unofficial versions of Android at all, are you happy now?". Why would they have to put up with this absurdity when say Microsoft has never been bothered with it?
Is that what the incompetent bureaucrats are aiming for? After all, even the parliament approved a stupid copyright law recently, the EU is really making some big mistakes these days.
bad mod - (Score:2)
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Money grab. That's what this is.
And because /. is infested with EUSSR socialists, you get downmodded. Just like this post will be.
Let's face it, the EUSSR is nothing more than a open market hating near-communist entity. I welcome the day that Google says: Fuck It, we'll stop doing business in Europe. Watch how those fucked up politicians start whining. As well as the poor fuckers that didn't vote for them (remember, the EU was created against the voters wishes).
Re:Additional requirements when the system is free (Score:5, Informative)
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Google services including the Play Store are not at all open source.
Having attempted to find some of the source code for those Google services, I can also attest they are closed source and not publicly available.
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It is not Microsoft's fault that no computer maker offers a Linux-ready machine, at least not that I've heard rumors of.
Google, on the other hand, specifically tells companies to install this, this and this if they want access to the main feature of the 'free' OS.
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It is not Microsoft's fault that no computer maker offers a Linux-ready machine, at least not that I've heard rumors of.
Willful ignorance is not a good look. No Slashdotter is actually unaware of the fact that there are Linux-specific vendors.
Re:M% anti trust case (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh yes it most certainly is. I'm not sure how their OEM licensing policy works now but at one point they prohibited OEM sellers from selling machines with no OS because they claimed that people would just use that option and pirate Windows. Dell eventually got around that by shipping computers with FreeDOS but for a while it made it difficult for Linux users to avoid paying the "Windows Tax". Microsoft's OEM policy also prevented OEM sellers from selling machines that were configured to dual-boot. That single-handedly killed any chance of success for BeOS and significantly reduced adoption of Linux. Any OEM sellers that violated these terms risked having their ability to sell OEM Windows licenses stripped which would mean that they would have to buy full-priced licenses. That alone would make their machines so expensive it would be almost suicide to even attempt angering the Microsoft gods.
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That single-handedly killed any chance of success for BeOS and significantly reduced adoption of Linux.
BeOS' one and only chance for survival was being picked up by Apple, and then Jobs happened and BeOS died. Hopefully Haiku will resurrect the concept, although it has something like ten times the hardware requirements that BeOS did...
How exctly? (Score:3, Insightful)
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The EU purports to be all powerful, but always needs MORE MONEY!!!111
Yup, Occam's shows this to be the most likely case.
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Americans believe they actually enjoy the constitutional right to be ripped off by large corporations, and so see the EU as evil. Its called "cultural difference".
If the EU was really "all powerful" it would not need more money. As it is, many of us think that Google needs a lot less of our money.
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You are the only one here using the word monopoly. I don't know what you mean with "trust".
When all else fails, read at least the summary. Its right in the first sentence.
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The judgement was that Google was "abusing its dominance", i.e. using the fact that manufacturers really have no other choice than Android for their phones to force them to pre-install Chrome and Google Search.
What are they going to do, install Windows Phone instead?
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Amazon created Fire Phones. In China, there are lots of different Android app stores, so no Play Store is needed. Android (AOSP) is free for manufacturers to use, but in order to use the Android trademark they need to comply with Google's conditions, which include pre-installing certain apps.
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The judgement was that Google was "abusing its dominance", i.e. using the fact that manufacturers really have no other choice than Android for their phones to force them to pre-install Chrome and Google Search.
What are they going to do, install Windows Phone instead?
It's so strange - I have a couple Android devices, and don't often use Chrome, and almost never use Google search.
As for the Google play store, That is Google's, and where anyone sensible would go for wares. I can go to some other places if I wished, but that's probably not terribly smart. Perhaps the EU could open their own play store?
And make no mistake - I don't like Google very much. But none of what they have done in this matter has harmed me in any way. What exactly is the harm?
But 5 Billion
Re:How exctly? (Score:5, Insightful)
The specific issue is the bundling. Manufacturers can install their own app stores, and many do, but they need the Play Store or it's not Android and doesn't get updates from Google. And if they have the Play Store then Google requires them to install Google Search and Chrome and make them the defaults.
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The specific issue is the bundling. Manufacturers can install their own app stores, and many do, but they need the Play Store or it's not Android and doesn't get updates from Google. And if they have the Play Store then Google requires them to install Google Search and Chrome and make them the defaults.
Really? I've got DDG running default on all of my Adroid's browsers. and Play Store still works.
I'm trying to see the specific harm here. None of my present Androids are rooted, so I'm not doing anything technical to run other devices. This seems like a follow the money shtick. Something doesn't add up other than aheavy handed money grab, or perhaps collecting money from a competitor.
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You can change the default... It's just that most people don't. And the issue is that manufacturers don't have a choice, Google has to be to default search engine to get the Play Store.
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Sure, but it's a manual process that they have to do themselves, and then pay for the bandwidth to push out.
If you have the Play Store and Play Store Services running you updates direct from Google and other benefits like anti-virus scanning of installed apps, payment handling for in-app purchases etc.
Amazon is big enough to replicate all that, but many OEMs prefer to just let Google handle it. Which is fine, all that's not fine is that then Google forces them to install Chrome and Search as the defaults.
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The EU has decided that providing those services in exchange for having the Play Store installed is fine, but requiring the bundling of Chrome and Google Search and making them the default is not.
I don't know if they are right, I haven't examined the situation in detail, I'm just explaining it.
Re:How exctly? (Score:5, Informative)
Manufacturers can install their own app stores, and many do, but they need the Play Store or it's not Android and doesn't get updates from Google.
This isn't correct.
Any device that passes the Android Compliance Test Suite (CTS) and complies with the Compliance Definition Document (CDD) is "Android". Also, all Google updates go into AOSP, into both the master branch and backported into the relevant dessert release branches. This is true for all devices that use AOSP, whether CTS/CDD compliant or not.
In order to put the Play Store on their device, device makers have to pass an additional test suite (GTS) and comply with additional contractual agreements, which currently includes the pre-installation of Google apps. That's highly desirable because the Play Store is really important to consumers, but it is not necessary for a device to be "Android", nor to get updates.
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It is odd. I choose GMail and Google Search. As a result I buy an Android phone. It needs a browser.
I used to use Firefox, I moved to Chrome as it was better.
I haven't looked at how easy it would be to switch back (stored passwords etc make chrome easy)
So to me Android+GMail+Google+Chrome isn't too much bundling and FBook (vs G+) and Spotify (vsGoogle Music) and iplayer/netflix/amazon (vs Google video) work perfectly fine - which is more than can be said about Amazon or Apple equivalents.
In summary Chrome s
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I don't think buying an Android phone really forces any other products on you, but Google do make several awesome products, so unsurprisingly Android users use more than 1.
Yeah, I mean on my Android tablets, I have 2 browsers on two of them, and 3 on the other I search with DDG, but keep Google around as well.
I use the play store 90 percent of the time, but if I want ot go somewhere else I do.
The presumed harm versus fine leads me to conclude a simple case of extortion on the EU's part. And I have a bit of a historical record based trust issue with Europe, so sometimes wonder if there are other motivations as well.
Comply, and let things sort themselves out (Score:2)
I bet that even if Google complied fully, that all of the things that the EU commission is complaining about, will still get installed. Manufacturers have a duty to put out a piece of hardware with appropriate software installed that will provide the consumer with the most value and present the least trouble to that consumer. Google search, and chrome, which are everywhere and well supported are a good base to start with.
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Google search, and chrome, which are everywhere and well supported are a good base to start with.
The EU seems to think this is not a coincidence.
But I cannot simply install Google Play Store... (Score:1)
Anyone who has flashed a custom ROM to a phone should know it isn't as simple as installing an apk (Android app file) to add a working Google Play store if it's missing to begin with. Or it hadn't been last I tried this (year or two ago now probably).
Yes, if users can do what a manufacturer didn't after buying the phone then I see less issue with this type of requirement by Google. It'd be interesting if they forced the same thing on users (after fixing the process). I've never seen one app forcibly inst