DOJ says Google must sell Chrome to crack open its search monopoly

Discussion (1189 points, 2 days ago, 1407 comments) <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=42177767">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=42177767</a>

&gt; and it left the door open to requiring the company to spin out Android, too.<p>Hell yes. Next YouTube!

Never understood why the government seems to have such a hard-on against Google.<p>Somehow, Apple &#x2F; Microsoft &#x2F; Amazon &#x2F; … skate by without getting the same beat-down.

I&#x27;m surprised to see so much confusion here. Google pays some kind of &quot;market rate&quot; to Apple to be default search engine on iOS, this change&#x27;ll first and foremost result in them paying similarly to be default in Chrome.<p>Hopefully through that Google will end up with less influence to force anti-consumer decisions, like the recent adblock downgrades, on Chrome.<p>Fair enough, right? Of course all this is assuming decent oversight by DOJ, not allowing the sale to someone with monopolistic incentives of their own, e.g. Microsoft.

Just thinking: So, Google makes life easier for users by creating Chrome and getting us respite from IE. When they moved the web really forward and way faster than others (Edge&#x2F;Opera switched to Chromium too) - the DOJ wants them to give it away. It&#x27;s like raising an exceptional child only to be asked to be adopted when they grow to be an adult.

Honestly, what would selling Chrome do for Google&#x27;s search monopoly? I actually agree with a lot of the things the DOJ is requesting in there, but the Chrome part is a bit baffling to me and seems to come more from a &quot;hell yeah break &#x27;em up&quot; vibe than actual remedy.<p>The best argument I could make is that owning chrome allows you to see the searches people make on Google in the address bar (and if you were unscrupulous, on Google&#x27;s Search page as well)? Maybe that&#x27;s strong enough?<p>I&#x27;m genuinely concerned as a lover of the web that this will slow the innovation we&#x27;ve seen in the space to a crawl. The web has grown so much since the bad old days in no small part due to Chrome. I wonder if Google&#x27;s vested interest in growing the web (since as when the web grows, so does search and ads usage) would result in them investing in Firefox instead, but I strongly doubt it (at least, not to the same level).

Who does this REALLY benefit? I am concerned this will hurt the US Tech industry more than it helps in the current economic climate.

[dupe]<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=42201261">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=42201261</a>

The DOJ is &#x27;considering&#x27; forcing a sale, but final judgement will happen in early to mid 2025.

Surprised this didn&#x27;t reach the top of HN earlier.<p>This is outrageous from the DOJ, hopefully Google can appeal. Given how the Google ecosystem works together, I don&#x27;t see how this doesn&#x27;t hurt consumers in the end.<p>It&#x27;s a huge blow to open source in practice. It means the government doesn&#x27;t accept the business strategy of making excellent open source software as a complement to main business aims.

Why just Chrome? Why Not Android too?

Who do you sell _Google_ Chrome to? This seems ill-advised. Who could possibly run it? Oracle? Broadcom? Is Elon Musk going to buy it and then we&#x27;ll have X Browser?<p>None of these options seem likely to create anything better than what we have now.<p>On the upshot, Firefox is going to see a resurgence. Hey, maybe Mozilla buys it?