Goo—-gle – Could it actually split up?
The most meaningful AI trend of the last few months is the increased focus on AI and data from legislators and governments. Nick has pointed out several of these in his recent post, so I won’t go over them again.
The Big Story – A Business Park in Virginia
However, potentially the most impactful of all of these is the one that is getting the least attention in the mainstream press. That’s partly because it’s all quite technical and the action is fairly low-key. It’s taking place in a business park on the outskirts of Washington DC. It doesn’t have the glamour of, say, AI in Hollywood or social media bosses arrested in Paris. But because it has the most riding on it, the Google Antitrust trial is the most important. Because Google could lose.
The trial arguments took place over a three week hearing in September. The trial is now adjourned until closing arguments at the end of November. Ironically, perhaps, this will be on Manic Monday, the Monday after Thanksgiving and Black Friday. But we now have a decent idea about the arguments presented. For which we should thank an expert reporter, Ari Paparo, who has written up the actions day by day).
The Technical Details
The US Department of Justice has brought the case. As I say, this gets very technical very quickly, but in summary, the DoJ’s argument is that Google is a monopoly in search. That’s because, they say, it’s so difficult to switch away from Google’s Ad Management platform (called DFP). In addition, the DoJ says, Google has deliberately tied this to other parts of the platform, principally the ad exchange, to lock clients in. Google’s argument is that the market as a whole is competitive. Broadly speaking, and as outlined by Ari Paparo, the DoJ appears to have a reasonable case, at least for some key areas.
Of course, we won’t find out what all of this means until after Thanksgiving. And, of course, until after a US General Election, which is taking up all the headlines. But it’s possible that Google could lose. This could mean that it would be forced to break some of the links between its ad platforms and services. This could extend to Google Analytics as well. So it’s worth watching out for. Watch this space.
For a very helpful breakdown of the details of the trial, the arguments and possible ramifications by Ari Paparo, click here.