It's interesting that the argument is "nobody can compete with defaults" when one of the proposed remedies is to break off the part of the company that was too successful at competing with defaults.
- IE was bloated and lazy from being dominant
- Google controlled one of the most visited websites in the world (pre-mobile appification)
- V8 performance boosted the web's then-cutting-edge js features
Those are huge tailwinds.
In contrast to now, where Chrome spends more time trying to deprecate mv2, link user browing to a Google identity, and find a way to recreate tracking cookies.
When's the last time Chrome shipped innovation that made users' lives measurably better? Per tab processes?