Behind a Secret Deal Between Google and Facebook
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
Lawmakers are required to pass reasonable laws and regulations, but these are often provide guidelines. Antitrust laws were written in response to specific issues with monopolization, and many Big Tech companies have managed to skirt around them by interpreting its provisions in specific ways.
The accusations seem to come down to: Google sell ads (legal); Google is building a new system for the market to do that in (legal); Google wanted to get Facebook to join (legal); Google offered them preferential treatment to get them (legal); Facebook accepted (legal).
Plenty of this might seem unfair. Or underhand. But those aren't just legal, they're totally standard in all company to company market places. When Dell buy components, they get a better price from Intel than your local shop. They even get first dibs on new components, even if they're paying less for them.
There is only really one claim in here that might rise to the level of illegal, but Google actively denied it was true:
>Perhaps the most serious claim in the draft complaint was that the two companies had predetermined that Facebook would win a fixed percentage of auctions that it bid on.
>“Unbeknown to other market participants, no matter how high others might bid, the parties have agreed that the gavel will come down in Facebook’s favor a set number of times,” the draft complaint said. A Google spokeswoman said Facebook must make the highest bid to win an auction, just like its other exchange and ad network partners.
I'm concerned that we have problems with Big Tech. But people keep grabbing the first idea that comes along: antitrust. Only antitrust won't do what they think it does. I'm not even sure people know what they want at this point...
I'm not clear what part of this causes that. The whole point of this change is to up the price paid to publishers got AND offer more options to ad buyers. That seems like an improvement for everyone.
Google, Facebook, eBay and other big tech companies are very good at walking this line: we control the market but we don't abuse that control.
So either someone has to show abuse or we need to change the law...
Well using your previous example of Intel giving Dell volume discounts versus a small vendor, yes that in itself is legal. But don't forget AMD successfully sued Intel under antitrust laws for giving discounts to major vendors like Dell in exchange for preferential use of Intel chips over other competing chip makers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Micro_Devices,_Inc._v....
This deal between Google and Facebook is strikingly similar. Google is giving preferential treatment to Facebook that it doesn't currently offer to other ad buyers and access to analytical data it also doesn't provide to other ad buyers in exchange for Facebook committing to spend a certain amount of money on Google ads. But more damning, according the article, "the two companies had predetermined that Facebook would win a fixed percentage of auctions that it bid on." This clearly gives Facebook an unfair competitive edge over other advertisers and amounts to quid pro quo, which is illegal, just like the Intel antitrust suit.
Though I loathe concern trolling, on this aspect, I am very guilty.
None of the proposed measures I've read even acknowledge my concerns, much less offer remedies.
I'll share mine if you'll share yours.
I want to foster fairness and competition. The most modest, minimal measures are:
- prohibit self dealing, conflicts of interest
- impose rule of law over de facto marketplaces
- ban competing with one's own clients and partners
That's the very least we can do to oxygenate our economies. I also support far more assertive measures,
- repeated radical cashectomies
- fixed royalty schedule for all patents (taxes by another name)
- restore Eisenhower era corporate tax rates, with generous breaks for R&D and employee profit sharing
-limit comparable compensation (of all kinda) between CEO and janitors to 40:1.
- reassert shareholder rights by banning minority control (eg voting super shares for founders)
That's just my casual list, from the hip. I should probably draft a more comprehensive compilation of all the remedies I've heard proposed.
My concern (sorry to troll!?) is that I feel like some people don't like Google (or FB or amazon or other big tech) because of privacy concerns, some because of social impact (fake news, conspiracies, like antivaxx etc) concerns, some because of worries about media consolidation and power, some because its just cool to be contrarian.
Very few of those people will actually be happier with what is left if we "hit Google with hammers till it falls apart", which seems to be all anyone can think to do.
Coming back to your points, can I ask: what if (hypothetically) we implimented your points and prices went up and jobs were lost? Is that a price worth paying or is this all a means to an end (cheaper stuff and more jobs)?
I don't have a problem with either answer, but the Means To An End approach is how we got here so...
Apologies. I omitted one of the most potent reforms floated by Sen Mark Warner (IIRC) and others: sharply curtailing freemium and ad supported biz models. Facepalm slap. Were I to compile reform proposals, I'd avoid such silly errors.
> jobs were lost
Which jobs are we talking about? Do you anticipant greater job loses than precipitated by Amazon thus far, or by WalMart before them? In your taxonomy, are gig workers included? In which case they are employees, not contractors. So should we start treating them as employees?
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I'm often reminded by Winston Churchill's wisdom advocating the rebuilding of their damaged Parliament exactly as before:
We shape the buildings that then shape us.
Markets, economies, society, beliefs are human things, made by humans, to benefit humans.
We can build the society we want, if only we found the courage.