Judge Mehta's decision in the Google antitrust case is so bad I think he should be prevented from working in the law in any capacity. He just threw off his clear responsibilities and let an illegal monopoly maintain its illegal monopoly and continue harming everyone, based on "reasoning" that a child could debunk. It's embarrassing, it's cowardly, it's self-contradictory, it's lawless, it violates precedent, and it will harm countless people and businesses in the tech sector. A staggering achievement really. It even violates Supreme Court precedent, which dictates that judges must apply remedies that end illegal monopolies (and, I believe, confiscate the illegal gains, though I am less clear on whether that's Supreme Court precedent).<br><br>Here's an except from <a href="https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/a-judge-lets-google-get-away-with" rel="nofollow">a post</a> on Matt Stoller's BIG newsletter, which is very good on the subject of antitrust:<br><p>The last meaningful reference point for an antitrust remedy is the Microsoft case. In that one, the break-up was overturned, and a weak interoperability mandate was imposed. But the real penalty to Microsoft was embarrassment and fear within the executive suite; no longer would the company crush its rivals, from then on, lawyers would cautiously oversee product design. That’s not ideal, Microsoft should have just been broken up and set free to compete. But a chastened leadership did have the effect of not killing the next generation of companies, who ended up creating Web 2.0. That’s deterrence, which is one goal of antitrust remedies.<br><br>This remedy, by contrast, is obviously going to fail. And the main reason is that, unlike Microsoft, Google’s leadership is utterly unchastened. Google CEO Sundar Pichai and chief legal officer Kent Walker will get bonuses for what they did. They see this conflict as one in which they fought bitterly, and kept at it, and shredded documents, and the result was… victory. They will have no compunction continuing to engage in unlawful behavior. After all, what’s the worst that could happen? Would a rival or the government really go before a weak judge who doesn’t want conflict, and convince him to act? I don’t think so. In other words, this decision isn’t just bad, it’s virtually a statement that crime pays.<br></p>(emphasis mine)<br><br>Stoller recently wrote a post titled "Why Is Google Still in One Piece? The Terminating a Monopoly Problem" with the subtitle: "Google has lost three separate antitrust cases, and more are on the way. Why does this company still exist in one piece? It shouldn't, but we're still dealing with the hangover of the 1990s."<br><br>The problems with the tech sector go all the way to the tippy top.<br><br><a href="/tags/google/" rel="tag">#Google</a> <a href="/tags/monopoly/" rel="tag">#monopoly</a> <a href="/tags/illegalmonopoly/" rel="tag">#IllegalMonopoly</a> <a href="/tags/antitrust/" rel="tag">#antitrust</a> <a href="/tags/dev/" rel="tag">#dev</a> <a href="/tags/tech/" rel="tag">#tech</a> <a href="/tags/gemini/" rel="tag">#Gemini</a> <a href="/tags/android/" rel="tag">#android</a> <a href="/tags/chrome/" rel="tag">#Chrome</a><br>
Edited 214d ago
<p>The Department of Justice and Texas software-maker RealPage announced this week that they have reached a settlement in a case involving price-fixing allegations in some of the nation’s largest rental markets.</p><p><a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/doj-realpage-settlement-rental-price-fixing-case?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="www.propublica.org/article/doj-realpage-settlement-rental-price-fixing-case?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">www.propublica.org/article/doj</span><span class="invisible">-realpage-settlement-rental-price-fixing-case?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post</span></a></p><p><a href="/tags/news/" rel="tag">#News</a> <a href="/tags/doj/" rel="tag">#DOJ</a> <a href="/tags/rent/" rel="tag">#Rent</a> <a href="/tags/law/" rel="tag">#Law</a> <a href="/tags/antitrust/" rel="tag">#Antitrust</a> <a href="/tags/technology/" rel="tag">#Technology</a> <a href="/tags/tech/" rel="tag">#Tech</a> <a href="/tags/software/" rel="tag">#Software</a></p>
Just a reminder that Google is an illegal monopolist, having lost three distinct antitrust cases.<br><br>It looks likely that Google will be treated the way Microsoft was in their famous antitrust loss in the late 1990s, and not be broken up in any significant way. Google absolutely should be broken up, just like AT&T and Standard Oil (and countless other large US monopolists) were before it. Google's wealth and power derives from illegal behavior; this is not in question anymore. Why should they be permitted to keep what courts have decided they stole? 100 years of antitrust law and precedent says that it should not be permitted to keep the spoils of its illegal behavior.<br><br>It sounds to me like the hesitation to break up Google is largely ideological on the part of the judges and lawyers involved. The failure to break up Microsoft after its antitrust loss is arguably one of the main reasons the US economy is such a monopolized, consolidated mess today, and why so many things are "enshittifying". Breaking up Google and changing that pattern would obviously not cure all ills, but it'd almost surely make a number of things in the economy better for a whole lot of people.<br><br>In any case, one thing we can all do is look at Google as a bad actor, a law-breaking entity whose power is illegitimate.<br><br><a href="https://www.thebignewsletter.com/p/why-is-google-still-in-one-piece" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="www.thebignewsletter.com/p/why-is-google-still-in-one-piece"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">www.thebignewsletter.com/p/why</span><span class="invisible">-is-google-still-in-one-piece</span></a><br><br><a href="/tags/google/" rel="tag">#Google</a> <a href="/tags/microsoft/" rel="tag">#Microsoft</a> <a href="/tags/antitrust/" rel="tag">#antitrust</a> <a href="/tags/monopoly/" rel="tag">#monopoly</a> <a href="/tags/useconomy/" rel="tag">#USEconomy</a> <a href="/tags/neoliberalism/" rel="tag">#neoliberalism</a><br>
<p>Enshittification, o livro (Cory Doctorow) - Resenha </p><p><a href="https://curadoria.bearblog.dev/enshittification-o-livro-cory-doctorow/" rel="nofollow" class="ellipsis" title="curadoria.bearblog.dev/enshittification-o-livro-cory-doctorow/"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">curadoria.bearblog.dev/enshitt</span><span class="invisible">ification-o-livro-cory-doctorow/</span></a></p><p><a href="/tags/enshittification/" rel="tag">#Enshittification</a> <a href="/tags/corydoctorow/" rel="tag">#CoryDoctorow</a> <a href="/tags/livros/" rel="tag">#livros</a> <a href="/tags/books/" rel="tag">#books</a> <a href="/tags/bookreview/" rel="tag">#BookReview</a> <a href="/tags/indieweb/" rel="tag">#IndieWeb</a> <a href="/tags/smallweb/" rel="tag">#SmallWeb</a> <a href="/tags/surfandoweb/" rel="tag">#SurfandoWeb</a> <a href="/tags/blogsbr/" rel="tag">#BlogsBR</a> @blogsbr <a href="/tags/blog/" rel="tag">#blog</a> <a href="/tags/tecnofeudalismo/" rel="tag">#Tecnofeudalismo</a> <a href="/tags/technofeudalism/" rel="tag">#Technofeudalism</a> <a href="/tags/technofeudalism/" rel="tag">#Technofeudalism</a> <a href="/tags/yanisvaroufakis/" rel="tag">#YanisVaroufakis</a> <a href="/tags/rentismo/" rel="tag">#Rentismo</a> <a href="/tags/bigtechs/" rel="tag">#BigTechs</a> <a href="/tags/antitrust/" rel="tag">#Antitrust</a> <a href="/tags/curadoriadainternet/" rel="tag">#CuradoriaDaInternet</a></p>
<p>My previous bio:<br>From <a href="/tags/northshore/" rel="tag">#northshore</a> Massachusetts relocated to northeastern <a href="/tags/vermont/" rel="tag">#Vermont</a> and not just an aggregation of hashtags but: <a href="/tags/antifascismisproper/" rel="tag">#antifascismIsProper</a> <a href="/tags/vegetarian/" rel="tag">#vegetarian</a> <a href="/tags/ubi/" rel="tag">#UBI</a> <a href="/tags/punk/" rel="tag">#punk</a> <a href="/tags/punchanazi/" rel="tag">#punchanazi</a> <a href="/tags/antitrust/" rel="tag">#antitrust</a> <a href="/tags/records/" rel="tag">#records</a> <a href="/tags/nek/" rel="tag">#NEK</a> <a href="/tags/climate/" rel="tag">#climate</a> <a href="/tags/spiritualjazz/" rel="tag">#spiritualjazz</a> <a href="/tags/decolonization/" rel="tag">#decolonization</a> <a href="/tags/movies/" rel="tag">#movies</a> <a href="/tags/scotusexpansion/" rel="tag">#SCOTUSexpansion</a> <a href="/tags/atheist/" rel="tag">#atheist</a> <a href="/tags/rescue/" rel="tag">#rescue</a> <a href="/tags/dogs/" rel="tag">#dogs</a> <a href="/tags/art/" rel="tag">#art</a> <a href="/tags/antifascism/" rel="tag">#antifascism</a> <a href="/tags/photography/" rel="tag">#photography</a> <a href="/tags/audio/" rel="tag">#audio</a> <a href="/tags/privacy/" rel="tag">#privacy</a> <a href="/tags/bread/" rel="tag">#bread</a> <a href="/tags/puppets/" rel="tag">#puppets</a> <a href="/tags/p2p/" rel="tag">#p2p</a> <a href="/tags/security/" rel="tag">#security</a> <a href="/tags/transparency/" rel="tag">#transparency</a> <a href="/tags/accountability/" rel="tag">#accountability</a> <a href="/tags/intersectionalism/" rel="tag">#intersectionalism</a> <a href="/tags/sober/" rel="tag">#sober</a> <a href="/tags/farmsanctuary/" rel="tag">#farmSanctuary</a> <a href="/tags/resistzionism/" rel="tag">#resistZionism</a><br>I tend to mute or remove followers with neither posts nor bio, and those containing financial-support or revenue-promotion links</p>
