I'd like to recap the issue here:<p>An Australian law was based on the premise that it was unfair for Google to reap benefits from sending traffic to AU media sites. The law also forced search engines to firehose user data (w/o implementing privacy protections [1]) to Australian media interests (eg: Rupert Murdoch).<p>Google said, "Ok. We'll comply with the law, forgo those benefits and stop sending traffic." Oddly, this did not satisfy the interests behind the law.<p>Microsoft stepped in and said "We're totally down with this law" - including, apparently, the egregious gift of user data to AU media interests.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200817/22554345133/google-warns-australians-that-governments-plan-to-tax-google-to-give-money-to-newspapers-will-harm-search-youtube.shtml" rel="nofollow">https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20200817/22554345133/googl...</a>
Some pretend Microsoft has turned into this benevolent corporation lately with their "Microsoft <heart> Linux" and adopting Android and Chrome. Well all those were done because they'd lost market share in servers, mobile OS and desktop browsers despite being the dominant player and forcing their offerings the whole time.<p>Microsoft used to run smear campaigns (remember Scroogled?) when they hired Hillary Clinton's strategist. This last case shows they don't even care if it means everyone can be sued for not paying for a hyperlink. Say whatever you want about AMP or Google reader or whatnot but when was the last time Google spent their money on smear campaign and negative ads on a rival?<p>Microsoft's corporate tactics have remained the same.
Microsoft acted pretty sleazy (IMHO) on the Australian law situation but it's rich for Google to attack them since they caved first and paid. I'm all for taxing companies (tech or otherwise) in sensible ways but the Australian news law was far from sensible.<p>Not to mention AMP and whatnot.
If you haven’t read the blog post already, give it a minute: <a href="https://blog.google/products/news/google-commitment-supporting-journalism/" rel="nofollow">https://blog.google/products/news/google-commitment-supporti...</a>. It’s a mudslinging embarrassment.<p>I’m not a huge fan of the new rules, but it’s clear that they’ve scared Google to the point where their PR department is unable to moderate themselves anymore, a trend I’ve noticed with every large tech company when placed in a difficult position. Until you see more companies doing this I think it’s mostly safe to assume that any regulations you’re applying to them are toothless and just a cost of doing business.
Google, the company that actively tries to make YouTube not work on any Amazon device simple because Amazon is a competitor, is complaining about someone breaking the open web? Google refused to build an app for Amazon devices and even when Amazon had a working app that was essentially a browser that visited YouTube on their Alexa devices with screens, YouTube changed their website for the sole purpose of breaking it on Amazon devices. Google has no right to complain here.
'slam' is such a weird verb for this sort of thing, and it only seems to turn up in headlines. It is supposed to be a wrestling metaphor? Its such an odd mental image.
Both companies have tried to or successful broken "the way the open web works" time and time again and both of them <i>should</i> stop.<p>Will they? Of course not.
That's a rather funny claim coming from google, considering we are now back in the same situation as we were 20 year ago, when people were designing websites to work 'best' on microsoft's IE browser. Now a lot of things are being designed to work 'best' on Chrome.<p>At least Microsoft has the benefit of the institutional knowledge of having once been as dominant as Google is now.
Tangential, but am I the only one who thinks that Google News is <i>really</i> bad nowadays? It used to be my main source of news, but I can't stand it anymore. It's clear that it's trying to drive engagement by offering links more likely to be clicked. My custom topics are hidden away, stuff I don't want to read about is brought to the top... just overall bad in every way.
This I don't understand. Why Google only has to pay for news content? Why only big news corporations get rewarded but a guy with a blog won't be?
The Verge sounds very Pro-Microsoft<p>They used the same techniques for Stadia, they bashed it while praising Xbox Cloud<p>The same with Team vs Zoom<p>And the same with AWS/GCE vs Azure<p>Hmm
The Australian situation has created an incentive for tech companies to consider getting into news-content production, a sector that was previously not-lucrative.<p>Find a struggling newspaper to purchase for a song. That gets you a masthead and a basic editorial pipeline. Then, use strong salary packages to raid the content talent from the existing participants. Alphabet could do this with pocket change.<p>This is similar to the play the media titans use to capture sports broadcast rights - World Series Cricket in the 70s, SuperLeague in the 90s.
> Google has launched a scathing attack on Microsoft today, accusing it of trying “to break the way the open web works in an effort to undercut a rival.”<p>That is some pathological levels of projection.
“The Kettles are now making self-serving claims and are even willing to break the way the open web works in an effort to undercut a rival,” says Mr Pot.
> In the middle of all of this, Microsoft was very public about its support of Australia’s new law, and it even teamed up with European publishers to call for online platforms to reach deals to pay news outlets for content. Google isn’t happy about Microsoft getting involved and this is the first big public spat we’ve seen since the Scroogled era.
Pot calls kettle black.<p>Google has probably done more of this single handedly since the advent of Chrome than Microsoft has.<p>Not that I’m absolving MS of any wrongdoing either, but google has definitely been far more malicious, and for them to pretend otherwise is unscrupulous at best.
> News organizations have ad inventory to sell, but they can no longer sell directly to those who want to place ads,” says Microsoft president Brad Smith. “Instead, for all practical purposes they must use Google’s tools, operate on Google’s ad exchanges, contribute data to Google’s operations, and pay Google money. All this impacts the ability of news organizations to benefit economically even from advertising on their own sites.”<p>I’m not too versed in the Australia news thing, but is this statement true?
I'm in no way defending the Australian legislation but It's absurd to me that Google and recently Facebook have positioned themselves as defenders of "the open web." Google with their AMP, Project Dragonfly and Chrome dominance and FB with their walled garden seem to reach for the "open web" argument whenever something threatens their status quo.