Justice Department sues monopolist Google for violating antitrust laws | Hacker News Reader

Justice Department sues monopolist Google for violating antitrust laws

justice.gov

20 pointshhs9 comments

Active discussion:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24836520

Doesn’t this title presume guilt before being charged with it?

Given the states and Barr, this feels deeply political in nature.

I thought it was weird that the list of states seemed to also be the list of battleground states that Trump needs to win.

It's definitely political in nature in terms of timing, but it's also been a long time coming. The main reason there aren't more left-leaning states on the lawsuit is that they wanted to wait a little longer and build more of a case: https://www.politico.com/news/2020/10/16/justice-department-...

My hope is that DOJ doesn't blow this because they went too early. This is the level of investigation of large tech companies I have wanted for a long time.

It is deeply political! It was filed by the Trump administration's DOJ and 11 states -- and the attorney general of each of those 11 is a Republican.

However...

There's also (supposedly) another lawsuit by a bunch of Democratic states that is in the works (and, of course, several lawmakers from both parties are also on board the "break up Google (and other big tech companies)" train).

If (i.e., when) that happens, the lawsuits will likely be consolidated.

Please note, there’s a 64-page complaint attached.

This had to happen, the other case of monopolizing the Digital Ad industry would also hurt them.

The cynic in me would not be surprised if this resulted in a worse internet.

On the flip side, some of these charges could lead to un-googled Chrome and Android.

But if Microsoft does with Android what they did with Edge/Chromium, then is that really better?

Finally! Break Google up until no single company has more than 30% of the search, mobile OS, maps, or browser market. Dozens of pieces, if necessary.

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