Google gets fined 4.34 billion euros for Android
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Denial
airbud7
yeah Denial, I was being hypothetical....I would never actually do it...
But!
Denial
airbud7
Fox2232
D3M1G0D
I'm guessing Google will need to allow a choice of default search apps and will need to decouple Google services from their apps (as inconvenient as it may be). No way would they consider losing the EU market over this - just an extra headache on their part. It should be noted that you CAN use Android without Google services as Amazon does with their Kindle tablets, but if you want to use Gmail or any Google app then you will necessarily need to use Google services (all or nothing).
This will lead to more fragmentation of the Android platform though, which is one of the primary complaints about Android (vs iOS). Apple tightly integrates everything in the iPhone while Google has been criticized for having too much variety and choice, but apparently the EU seems to think Google doesn't allow enough choice. Funny that.
Of course this isn't the first time the EU has made major rulings against Google (or other tech companies). There was the ruling for "right to forget" (which I think was just a euphemism for hiding your criminal past) as well as the ruling against Microsoft. I didn't really agree with those other rulings and I'm iffy about this fine as well, but that's the way it goes in the EU.
Overall, I think it's a good thing that the EU is taking a strong stance on consumer choice (even if it goes a bit too far sometimes). Up here in Canada we are dominated by the big three telecom companies (collusion is the order of the game), to the point where 10 GB a month plans are wildly popular. I get extremely upset whenever I hear talk about next-gen 5G connectivity (is this what telecom companies are spending my money on while they limit me to a few GB a month?) and I wish the government would take a stronger stance on fair data plans.
Fox2232
Glottiz
Unilythe
Fox2232
circeseye
what the eu is complaining about to me is fine what google is doing....come on have you seen when a provider and such adds their overlays and apps? their horrable and you cant remove them if you dont want them...thats why i like unlocked vanilla android phones...if i dont want google search or chrome browser, i can remove them and add what one i want....
fantaskarsef
If any of the big companies would leave the EU in the meantime, it'd be a PITA for the EU. But in the long run somebody would step up to fill the void, and some rather quickly, as we'd get something made in China or Russia, or the least possible, from the EU ourselves then.
Carfax
As an American that loves Google products (my smartphone is a Pixel 2 XL and I have a Google Home and Google Wifi router) and prefers Android, I have mixed feelings on this. On one hand, I definitely think that large tech companies like Google, Facebook etcetera need to be regulated by governments, because it's been shown time and time again that they will abuse their enormous power. However, this definitely seems like a shakedown to me.
I just don't see the E.U's position as tenable or realistic. Google owns Android, and in the interest of making their products more profitable, unified, SAFE (can you imagine an Android app store not run by Google?), as well as more useful to consumers, they should be allowed to bundle their own tech into these products and make them the default. The alternative does not help consumers in the slightest, and would only serve to fragment Android even more than it already is.
Also there are choices, regardless of whether consumers know about them or not. I don't have to use Google search, or Chrome on my Pixel 2 XL despite that it's manufactured by Google. I do have to use the Google play store however, but like I mentioned before, it's best for there to be a single app store that is run by a single agency, rather than multiples ones in the interest of safety. Having multiple app stores would be an open season for criminal programmers to write even more malware than they are already doing, as it would make regulation more difficult.
Denial
I just want to make something clear.. you can't uninstall google chrome or search from Android. People keep saying "you can remove it" - you can remove the shortcut and disable the app but you can't uninstall either. In fact Google's blog post just hilariously posted a video of them saying "look how easy it is to remove" then proceeds to just delete the shortcut to the app. It's honestly kind of insulting they posted that.
Because Android has 75% marketshare in the EU and the argument is that they are using their marketshare to keep competing services out.
Carfax
waltc3
Glottiz
Truder
airbud7
BlueRay
Meanwhile is completely fine when those corporations avoid paying their taxes in the EU while making billions and billions of profits by abusing their monopoly and data-mining everything they can.
Please give me a break. Some of you behave like total fanboys.
I guess the anti-EU agenda is hot right now.