In an Open Letter To EU's Competition Commissioner, 14 European Shopping Comparison Services Say Google is Not Making the Search For Products Fairer (bbc.com) 113
Google is not complying with European demands that it must make the search for products fairer, rivals say. In an open letter to the EU's Competition Commissioner on Thursday, they wrote: We are writing to you as leading European comparison shopping services (CSSs) to express our collective view that Google's "compliance mechanism" in the Google Search (Comparison Shopping) case does not comply with the European Commission's June 2017 Prohibition Decision. It has now been more than a year since Google introduced its auction-based "remedy", and the harm to competition, consumers and innovation caused by Google's illegal conduct has continued unabated. We therefore respectfully urge you to commence non-compliance proceedings against Google. BBC offers some background: In June 2017, European competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager ruled that Google had abused its power by promoting its own shopping service at the top of search results, and demanded that it provide equal treatment to rival comparison sites in future. She issued a record fine of $2.7bn -- the largest penalty the European Commission has ever imposed. She also demanded that Google end its anti-competitive practices within 90 days or face further costs. Google is still appealing against the fine, but has come up with a system that it says makes shopping fairer. It changed the shopping box, which is displayed at the top of search results, so that it is no longer populated with just Google Shopping ad results, but gives space to other shopping comparison services, who can bid for advertising slots.
Re:Contradictory goals (Score:5, Informative)
The shopping stuff isn't part of the search results, it's an advertising box at the top that used to display results from Google Shopping. Now it also displays results from other shopping sites.
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I don't know about your browser but on mine it's one of a group of links at the top after a search.
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Yeah, that's Google Shopping. But normally there is also a box below the menu bar and above the search results with shopping links.
Obviously if you have an ad blocker you won't see it.
Do the complaining sites link to Google? (Score:2)
I'm curious if the sites demanding the government force Google to link to them, for fairness, also are fair in that their search links to Google.
That would be fair, right? If I demand your search has to link to me, obviously I make my search link back to you, right?
Re:Do the complaining sites link to Google? (Score:5, Informative)
No, they are just asking that Google doesn't illegally discriminate against them. The EU found evidence that Google was down-ranking competing sites to page 4 or beyond, while ensuring that its own very similar site appeared at the top of page one.
What page do they put Google on? (Score:2)
In their search results, on what page do they put the links to Google?
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Link at the top of every page, and in the ad box.
I don't see it (Score:3)
I'm happy to finding thrm anywhere on any of the sites from companies who are complaining. I don't see a link to Google at the top of any of these pages.
http://www.foundem.co.uk/searc... [foundem.co.uk]
https://www.redbrain.com/ [redbrain.com]
https://pricespy.co.uk/search?... [pricespy.co.uk]
The only mention I see of Google is that Redbrain promises advertisers that they can manipulate Google search results for them.
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. I don't see a link to Google at the top of any of these pages.
So? How's that relevant. None of those companies are abusing a monopoly in a different area to push more business towards themselves.
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...sorting them not by relevancy but by how much they paid Google.
So much for "the most relevant, not the most fair".
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Relevant results are landing pages that provide high utility, functionality, and are trustworthy for the majority of users entering said query for the users location.
It's really not complicated. Ads are plainly marked. If the service doesn't provide useful results, you are free to use other indexes. Contrary to popular belief, if Google didn't exist the majority of the network would still be (and is) indexed, one way or another. Google IS NOT the network, just the crutch Joe Sixpack has become depen
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A monopoly implies that there's no alternative resources for consumers. The playfield is populated with players with equal funding/resources. If and when consumers find better value elsewhere, they will gain users. Currently we see consumers using Google. If you don't like it, do better than them. Otherwise STFU and man up, this world rewards those that do better than others for a reason.
Just because someone plays better ball than everyone, doesn't mean there's not equal opportunity for an even bett
??? What is wrong with Google's solution (Score:2)
Re:??? What is wrong with Google's solution (Score:4, Interesting)
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Are you asking what's wrong if your search results are ordered by "paid most to Google" instead of relevancy?
Build your own ? (Score:3, Interesting)
Can't say I like the way google has been going lately but Google's business is part helping people find things, part pointing them at particular things, why in hell anyone would think they should be forced to host their competitors in their place of business is a complete mystery.
Should they give free adds to Amazon ? After all Amazon serves as a shopping service ? What about Ebay ?
The EU has always been horribly obvious about being bought and paid for by European aristocrats, the ancien regime that never really went away, this is just a further attempt by them to shakedown a deep pocket.
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why in hell anyone would think they should be forced to host their competitors in their place of business is a complete mystery.
Because that's what the law says ?
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Obviously, Google has to bid on it as well.
This would be fair if Google Shopping was its own company, completely independent from Google Search. I don't know if that's the case.
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Obviously, Google has to bid on it as well.
This would be fair if Google Shopping was its own company, completely independent from Google Search. I don't know if that's the case.
How would making it a separate company change anything?
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Then Google Shopping would need to balance the value of the promotion against cost of the space and decide if it's worth the expense. A serious business decision. The money's not getting back to them unless they can make them back in increased sales. Can they? Is their site's offer strong enough the spot will be worth paying more than competitors are willing to pay? Managers lose jobs for decisions like that: ad expense higher than ad returns.
Currently the space can be taken by manager's fiat: "We bid a bil
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I would like to think that they are isolated from each other, but with the google CEO, we will have to see.
It is kind of sad. Google has gone from do no evil (and they were actually good about that, IMHO), to lets be like MS and IBM. Hopefu
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They went public, so now the unwritten motto is "do whatever necessary to increase the stock price"
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"That is, the first row is for whomever wants to bid top price."
That's complete bullship. If you are referring to the ads that are plainly marked, well yes their placement is there because of compensation. As far ranking past ads, it's done by the algorithm. The algorithm attempts to provide the most useful, relevant and high quality result for every query and is constantly being updated.
Besides, they're a company not a utility. As far as a company is concerned, they pretty much do better than most
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These companies are complaining that they don't receive free advertising for their 'comparison' services which make all of their revenues via affiliate kickbacks. Maybe there is a reason why people don't use these competing services, ie they don't offer the lowest prices. So their 'remedy' is for Google to spend its resources promoting their service -- which is just a program which generates a website with the affiliate kickbacks embedded in the links.
That's a great business! Can't fail to make money since
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That's not law that's persecution under the color of law.
Re:Build your own ? (Score:5, Informative)
The EU's explanation of the ruling is quite enlightening: http://europa.eu/rapid/press-r... [europa.eu]
Imagine, you want to look for a product online. You type the product into the Google search engine. What you will see right at the top of the page is a box with Google Shopping's results, with pictures and a selection of deals from different retailers. They are placed above the results that Google's generic search algorithms consider most relevant.
At the same time, Google has demoted rival comparison shopping services in its search results. The evidence shows that even the most highly ranked rival appears on average only on page four of Google's search results. Others appear even further down.
(emphasis mine)
Google abused its position as the dominant search engine by artificially down-ranking rivals and giving its own service top billing. In the EU this is illegal as it leads to massive monopolies and a lack of fair competition.
Note that the solution proposed by Google and accepted by the EU is to auction slots in the special shopping area at the top of the search results page, not to offer anything for free.
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Imagine, you want to look for a product online. You type the Foundem into the Google search engine. What you'll right at the top of the page is a link to Foundem's comparison shopping engine. Click on that link and you be taken to a shopping engine completely devoid of Google content.
Maybe if these sites made an effort to marketing themselves people would use them.
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Google has very nice options for paid advertising. Maybe foundem should advertise itself instead of demanding free marketing.
My company has to pay for advertising, no one gives it to us for free. Why is foundem special?
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You do realize that the compromise reached was to auction off these spots, not give them away free.
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Read the article. Foundem is complaining that it does not want to spend money for the auctions and want the EU to change the terms so that the spots are free.
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Read the article?
Anyways my apologies for maintaining the tradition of being wrong by not reading the article. The auctioning seems best as long as Google isn't allowed to bid.
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So to use the train analogy, you think it is ok for Google to build and maintain the tracks and then be prevented from running trains on them? With rules like that Google is not going to build any more tracks.
And that may be the outcome here, the EU may succeed in incentivising Google to shut down both Google Shopping and Google News in the EU. What the EU is missing here is that if they force Google to shut down Google Shopping they've pretty much handed the market over to Amazon. But that's ok, they don
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So to use the train analogy, you think it is ok for Google to build and maintain the tracks and then be prevented from running trains on them? With rules like that Google is not going to build any more tracks.
The problem is that Google can bid a billion dollars as they're paying themselves. Not sure how the bidding could be made fair.
Another idea is that Google, as the owner of the tracks, gets to use them but there is a randomization process to make sure that Google doesn't always get the prime times, or the top of the page in search terms. Something like the top 4 bidders and Google get randomized, or just Google is randomized, for the 5 placements. Perhaps these numbers need tuning.
It's a problem, especially
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The Foundem comparison engine is just a bot. The owners go around getting affiliate kickback deals from the various vendors, then they generate a site containing those links.The reason people don't flock to it is because it doesn't produce actual good deals. This is not a website that can exist without a constant, expensive push marketing campaign.
Now enter Microsoft. Microsoft is trying to disrupt Google search. Microsoft put a huge amount of legal backing behind Foundem's complaint to the EU. The EU decla
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Seems to me the ultimate problem is the limited available space. 14 comparison shopping sites all want that space. There's only, what, 5 slots in that all-important shopping bar at the top of the page? There's simply no way even a majority of them are going to get a spot on it in a given search. There is no solution to this problem that will satisfy these comparison shopping services, since Google would have to ruin the search experience by adding a godawful wall of shopping results before you even get to s
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That's why Google created an auction, same as they use for other advertising space. And also stopped down-ranking comparison sites in search results.
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Auctioning slots does no good when Google is one of the bidders. Google can just bid $1 trillion for each slot. Since it's Google paying Google, their net cost is zero no matter what they bid. (Actually, if you take opportunity cost into account, their net cost is whatever the next highest bid was, since they are foregoing t
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In the EU this is illegal
It's illegal in the States too, it's just that no one gives a crap over there. No sorry that was wrong. People do give a crap. They cry foul, and socialism, and scream for small government every time the idea of regulating the free market (a market where monopolies are the only stable condition) gets raised.
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Abused ?
I suppose by that logic Macy's abused its position in Herald Square. Nevermind Gimbels was across the street, or Harrods is abusing its position
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What is the value to the consumer of these shopping aggregation sites?
Why would I, as someone searching for product, EVER WANT TO BE SENT TO THEM?
These sites are a scourge on the internet and the sooner they all die, the better.
Re:Build your own ? (Score:4, Informative)
Well, in general no, but when you get into 'monopoly' law then it can become a yes.
This is not a new area of law here. Whenever you have a monopoly, you need to handle it to have an open market. They had a lot of caselaw back in the day on rail road monopolies. Would you want a rail road operator preventing certain goods from being shipped? If I'm a railway company and I also own an apply farm, is it right for me to not ship apples from other companies? That's an abuse of monopoly. Network system, especially infrastructure are especially prone to such abuse.
Build your own railroad is not a 'good' answer to apple farmers.
Digital networks/monopolies are more interesting because it is theoretically easier to build a competing product, but in practice it's very similar to railroads. It's not hard to build a google competitor, but it is much harder to get all the users google has.
If google, being the top search engine is classified as being in a monopoly position, then it is reasonable to have measures in place to make sure they don't unfairly mistreat competitors or trump up their own services too much.
The details can work themselves out in the courts and lawyers, but it's a pretty reasonable ask.
Re:Build your own ? (Score:4, Insightful)
Foundem is not an apple farmer it is a competing railroad. They are demanding that since they don't have tracks and Google does then their trains should get to run on Google's tracks for free. Google is willing to allow Foundem trains on its tracks but says they have to pay for the privilege since it is not free to build and maintain tracks.
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Google agreed to auction off the right to use its rails as there is only room for so many. They also agreed not to put the other rail companies terminals in the back of beyond but to fairly go by usage.
No free rides, just no abuse of the monopoly of having the only tracks in an area.
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Read the article, Foundem is complaining that Google's prices are too high and it should be able to ride the rails for free.
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I believe I just answered you in another thread. Expecting us to read the article, what next.
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Google is willing to allow Foundem trains on its tracks but says they have to pay for the privilege since it is not free to build and maintain tracks.
Not quite. Google is willing to allow anyone on its tracks on a fair and non-discriminatory basis providing they don't directly take from Google's resources, and decide due to competition that Foundem trains would need to pay for the privilage.
Back a long time ago Google's search results were the product of a great algorithm, and if they still were just an algorithm then there wouldn't be a problem. The problem now is that it's not an algorithm. It's a curated result with specific competitors punished regar
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why in hell anyone would think they should be forced to host their competitors in their place of business is a complete mystery.
Because society belongs to all of us real people, not to Google. We paid the taxes to fund its services and contribute to its defense. Although, companies like Google have shirked their tax responsibilities so arguably they should have even less say in our society because they haven't paid their fair share towards its maintenance. However, to answer your question, Google can be forced to follow our rules by force of our laws which are backed up by our police and ultimately by our armies. In short, by force
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Because we don't allow them to both help you search for goods *and* sell them to you. It's anti-competitive.
One likely result based on history is that you (Crashmarik) will get results which result in you paying a higher price for those goods than if you got fair search results.
In "high moat" businesses, it also allows them to drive competitors out of business, buy them up, and then charge much higher prices once they have no competition.
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Because we don't allow them to both help you search for goods *and* sell them to you. It's anti-competitive.
Someone should talk to Amazon about this.
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...why in hell anyone would think they should be forced to host their competitors in their place of business is a complete mystery.
Perhaps a 'search engine' shouldn't be competing with their clients.
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It depends upon how Google promotes searches. If Google promotes, search Google for the paid results Google is willing to allow you versus search the internet for what you are looking for using Google, one would be true and one would be fraud, Google is obviously choosing the fraud route. Google should be required to public disclose their search as tainted, controlled and misleading and that you use it at your own risk or they can be honest, simply disclose the search algorythms and disclose how they affect
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why in hell anyone would think they should be forced to host their competitors in their place of business is a complete mystery.
Because that is by definition an antitrust issue when you're in a position of market dominance.
Should they give free adds to Amazon ?
No one is asking for this. What they are asking for is level playing fields. You may not like it but the reality is even in your own country it's illegal to use a strong position of power to further your own products over the competition.
The EU has always been horribly obvious about being bought and paid for by European aristocrats
If that is your definition of actually enforcing the anti-trust laws that are on the books of most countries and in the USA completely ignored for corporate interests then I say f
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Because that is by definition an antitrust issue when you're in a position of market dominance.
Would that be Amazon or Walmart that you actually mean ?
Should they give free adds to Amazon ?
No one is asking for this. What they are asking for is level playing fields
Read the complaint that's exactly what they are asking for.
The EU has always been horribly obvious about being bought and paid for by European aristocrats
If that is your definition of actually enforcing the anti-trust laws that are on the books
Yeah you need to talk to BASF about that. Hope you don't mind high food prices or energy prices, or high taxes
But that's probably why the EU is holding together so well.
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Read the complaint that's exactly what they are asking for.
No they are not. Try reading it again. All they are saying is that what Google did in response to the previous request doesn't actually meet the intent of the original ruling and then they lay out reasons why.
Yeah you need to talk to BASF about that.
Gladly. Let me know what I should talk to them about.
Hope you don't mind high food prices or energy prices, or high taxes
I really don't. My food is far higher quality and healthier than in the USA and Beef aside most of the meals we eat are actually cheaper too. Energy prices are high but we don't pay much for them as a result of the average EU home using less than hal
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This isn't even about Amazon or Target or shops like this. This ruling is about SHOPPING AGGREGATORS.
There are a bunch of sketchy shopping aggregators sites. Their entire business model is to trick you into visiting them and searching via their site, instead of the actual retailer, so that they can get referral commissions.
Google is gradually putting these sketchy sites out of business by cutting them out of the picture, and this is a GOOD THING FOR CONSUMERS. The world will be a better place if they all di
Why would we expect anything different? (Score:2)
Google's "compliance mechanism" in the Google Search (Comparison Shopping) case does not comply with the European Commission's June 2017 Prohibition Decision.
Is there a reason why we would expect those fellas to say anything different or in support of Google? They need to hammer and keep hammering hard till some court smacks them down.
This was predicted long ago: (Score:4, Interesting)
"We expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers." -- Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, 1998.
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I think you're misunderstanding Sergei & Larry here.
It is the EU ruling that is acting in favour of advertisers. Google Shopping is the one acting more on the consumer side.
Google Shopping shows you products that match exactly what you are looking for and lets you buy them from whoever you want with the lowest price - IE, best interest of the consumer.
The EU ruling says that Google can not act in best interest of consumers, and must instead allow sub-optimal results to also be returned from other sketc
Wat (Score:1)
Aliexpress for cheap stuff I don't need real soon, Ebay for used stuff, local stores for stuff that's a ripoff to get shipped, Amazon for everything else. People use google's shopping results?
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I use google shopping results when I'm shopping for wacky crap that I'm not having luck finding on amazon or eBay. (Aliexpress is a last resort for me, mostly since their site is so crap but also because nothing is warehoused in the USA.) Also you forgot newegg for computer parts :p
It's actually been a huge help in finding tools in particular...
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Do you mean googling a product, or specifically using their "Shopping" feature? I google products all the time, hell, it's more reliable than Amazon's internal search. I've NEVER had a useful hit from their shopping service though.
Aliexpress I used to have similar feelings about, but the trick is, you buy from then when you know you're after something that's dominated by scammers and review buyers anyway. If Amazon can't be arsed to enforce honesty, I might as well go to China for what I want.
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I agree that this is a huge uproar about a service that is in decline. As soon as Amazon gets established in the EU no one is going to care about Google Shopping anymore in the EU.
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Because when you're cool, the sun shine on you twenty four hours a day!
Seems they should be pleased (Score:2)
The answer (Score:3)
Seems so simple, and if fair, Google should be out of business very quickly. Perhaps even blocked in the EU.
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Seems so simple, and if fair, Google should be out of business very quickly.
It's a great idea. First we need to start by regulating Google to make competition possible.
Or do you think competition is the natural state of a free market? If so then you should go find your economics professor and give him a right old kick in the balls for leading you so astray.
The USA knows what is fair as well. They just chose to ignore it in favour of that sweet sweet brib... errr campaign donations. Or did you not know that the EU ruling is actually a law in the USA as well? If so you have a lot mor
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Seems so simple, and if fair, Google should be out of business very quickly.
It's a great idea. First we need to start by regulating Google to make competition possible.
Google ia a company based in the evil USA. We are constantly haraunged about how inferior we are compared to Europeans. Next up, it would seem that our betters would easily be able to put Google right out of business.
The first thing is to use the EU's willingness to have a lot of Government intervention, provide a superior search experience, and subsidize the bejabbers out of a search engine and shopping experience. When Google cannot compete with the Government subsidized prices, they will either adapt,
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Google ia a company based in the evil USA.
The USA* is not evil. You people do stupid shit and smart shit, so does every country in the world. If you think that this side of the Atlantic says the USA* is universally evil then you haven't been paying attention.
We are constantly haraunged about how inferior we are compared to Europeans.
If that is what you understand out of all comparison between the USA* and Europe then I would suggest you start with the comment that you people in the USA* are inferior at understanding English.
Next up, it would seem that our betters would easily be able to put Google right out of business.
And inferior at understanding economics and business.
The first thing is to use the EU's willingness to have a lot of Government intervention, provide a superior search experience, and subsidize the bejabbers out of a search engine and shopping experience. When Google cannot compete with the Government subsidized prices, they will either adapt, or die.
And you don't seem to understand the difference
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And inferior at understanding economics and business.
So edumacate me. Seems a little odd we are so inferior about business and economics
And you don't seem to understand the difference between Socialism and the EU.
Explain why the extent of your business acumen appears limited to taxing and fines.
What exactly have you created lately? because it appears that you function much much better as a parasite. A superior parasite that is.
Or use Yandex. Tell the Russians how they have to run things. They will no doubt do your bidding.
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You missed the comment at the bottom. The USA isn't inferior, I'm calling out your specific understanding. For example the endless conflation of a free market and a perfect market. Every time you talk about one you actually talk about the other defined in the text book.
Even in this very thread the two are confused. For example the ability to create a competitive product or service depends on a perfect market. A perfect market can not exist without heavy government regulation in a capitalistic system. A capi
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You missed the comment at the bottom. The USA isn't inferior, I'm calling out your specific understanding.
I actually do get it. the EU cannot compete, they cannot create. Parasites.
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Why? Yandex aren't doing anti-competitive practices pushing their products through their monopoly (at least not in countries where antitrust laws exist). And there's also no reason not to use Google search.
I missed that part. Using Yandex instead of Google should be the moral choice for the EU. If you use Google, you support Google.
I don't support Google. I have all of their scripts blocked on all my machines. I use DDG as a search engine. In every possible way, I avoid using Google.
There is some disconnect here, perhaps some cultural divide, where to me, avoiding the poison is the best way to get rid of the poison. Wheras there are some others who believe that continuing to drink the poison while yelli
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I actually do get it. the EU cannot compete, they cannot create. Parasites.
You clearly don't get it, but then it's hard to describe to you your poor reading comprehension skills through a medium that requires you to read.
Using Yandex instead of Google should be the moral choice for the EU.
That is the most retarded thing I've read on Slashdot. And I browse at -1.
If you use Google, you support Google.
We do support Google. That is the thing you don't get. We all support Google. We will continue to support Google while we protect ourselves from very VERY specific illegal activities they conduct. The response to that is not to dump Google. If you think it is then you have fundamentally fail
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We do support Google. That is the thing you don't get. We all support Google. We will continue to support Google while we protect ourselves from very VERY specific illegal activities they conduct. The response to that is not to dump Google. If you think it is then you have fundamentally failed to understand my entire post.
So let me get this straight - you just wrote that you support criminals. Seriously - you call my writing retarded?
Very specifically, I do now understand some aspercts of Europe that explains their very interesting history.
I belive that we have taken this about as far as I care to, because you support criminals, you are a criminal.
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So let me get this straight - you just wrote that you support criminals. Seriously - you call my writing retarded?
No I didn't call you retarded. I said you don't know how to parse an English sentence. Something you clearly still don't know how to do since you seem to think Google is this singular take all or leave all thing.
I belive that we have taken this about as far as I care to, because you support criminals, you are a criminal.
You're retarded.