Comment by dleary

> ...except Chrome was not and is not an illegal enterprise.

> The charges were against search and ads.

The textbook definition of “monopolistic behavior” is “using your monopoly in one sector to extend your power in another sector”.

It’s not illegal to have a monopoly. That can happen if you are completely innocent, just because no competitors choose to compete with you.

It’s illegal to abuse the power of your monopoly.

What was the biggest browser when Chrome launched? It was Firefox. Where are they now? On death’s door.

What was the biggest commercial browser when Chrome launched? It was Opera. Where are they now? Also on death’s door.

Do you ever remember seeing ads for Chrome in any of Googles other offerings?

A better question would be, “Before 2020 or so, do you think it was possible to use Google Search without having Chrome advertised to you?”

Chrome got special treatment above and beyond anything available to anyone else. Even more than anyone else with an unlimited Google ad budget. It got special placement in the Google search interface. “Try chrome!” On the otherwise bare Google search page. You know, the one that was famously minimalistic and “ad-free”.

Google leveraged its search and ads pseudo-monopolies to help Chrome become its own pseudo+monopoly.

And now that Chrome is its own pseudo-monopoly, what is their behavior?

Well, now, you can’t install (good) ad blockers anymore. Does that benefit users, or is that abusing their browser monopoly to help Google’s other business lines?

And until approximately yesterday, they were saying they were going to disable third party cookies. That’s nice. It probably would help some users. Note that it will definitely hurt Google’s competitors.

And it’s interesting timing, isn’t it? They could have done this, to help users, at any point in the past 15 years, but they only decided to do it recently, when their search and ad businesses are a little shaky compared to where they used to be.

Google absolutely used its search and ad monopolies to build a browser monopoly. And now that they have a browser monopoly, they’re using the power of that monopoly to act in ways contrary to their users interests.