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I think you're speaking to a point the parent wasn't really making. All they're saying is that being known as the canonical source for a brand gives you a steep discount on bidding for that brand name.

We can quibble about the philosophical role of modern search engines I guess, but the basic idea is just that it should be easy to defensively bid on your own thing.

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It’s not philosophical quibbling: Google does whatever makes them more money.

For all it is, allowing competitors to bid against each other just makes them more money. And the truth is that the customers who would click on a Lyft ad for “uber” query would not care if it was Uber indeed - as otherwise they would be intelligent enough to find Uber as a lower match.

So frankly “being the canonical source for the brand is a steep discount” is not their policy and I don’t really see how that policy is even motivated, financially or in terms of user-friendliness.

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