this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2024
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Note: Original report by Bloomberg, article by Reuters proxied by Neuters to bypass paywall.

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

If this happens, I'd be interested in seeing how this effects ChromeOS. I don't use it but my mom does.

Also, if you're confused as to why ChromeOS would be effected, while it's based on Gentoo Linux, ChromeOS uses a modified version of Chrome as it's Desktop Environment.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago

Yes I would like to know what that means for ChromeOS and Chromebooks. If the new "Chrome" company got ChromeOS also that would be huge. But if that is not a requirement Google could just put another Chromium browser in ChromeOS. They could also continue to sell Chromebooks but based on a ChromiumOS fork.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Its based on debian now :(

Depending on what version

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

According to Wikipedia, it's still based on Gentoo, it just uses Debian for running Linux applications in Crostini.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 hours ago

Oh go figure, my bad :P

[–] [email protected] 69 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

Google will bribe trump and this'll be undone immediately

[–] [email protected] 15 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago)

That would be the logical thing according to common sense and probably according to pichai a few weeks ago, but trump just nominated an anti big tech and musk friend to the FCC. musk is behind almost everybody in ai and autonomous cars so he'll definitely push to hamper all competitors.

Sure, we don't know how far would they go or how long will musk keep having white house influence and I personally think breaking up google is now off the table, but I don't think they will get off the hook too easily.

So surely a very big bribe.

[–] [email protected] 49 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

Google is such a good company, one the best. Everybody says it. I was just talking to John Google the other day, and he tells me, no really he did, he tells me we're going to do amazing things together. Oogles of googles. That's what we'll sell. Everybody will know about google by this time next year. It's true.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 hour ago

........I mean, you do you buddy.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

You forgot the unrelated rant in the middle about toasters being too dark these days or some shit.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 50 minutes ago* (last edited 49 minutes ago)

He also didn't say his name three times in 10 seconds. Then sort of fade off and vaguely look off into the distance.

They said to me Donald, Donald, they said Donald, they do amazing things, real bigly things, my father, my father, said to me Donald, they do big things Google land. Really good things.......... Yeah.......... Big things...........................

[–] [email protected] 15 points 6 hours ago

God damnit.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 5 hours ago

LoL they won't, even if they buy it for 1 trillion dollar

[–] [email protected] 87 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

Lit. It's a good ask although it's not clear what separation means here. Not going to hold my breath, the big corpos seem to usually win these kind of games.

[–] [email protected] 46 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Chrome is now owned by a separate conpany with the same major stock holders.

[–] [email protected] 30 points 8 hours ago

It's like they're a company pretending to be another company, disguised as another company. Tropic Thunder all the way down.

[–] [email protected] 49 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

Chrome is now owned by a company, owned by a company, owned by another company, that is owned by Google.

[–] [email protected] 41 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

And even in the case where there is actual separation, and competition, it will only be temporary!

see history of telco consolidation after a monopoly breakup in 1984

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 hours ago

Why doesn’t this have sprint?

[–] [email protected] 38 points 9 hours ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 14 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

If you're talking about edge browser, edge is chrome.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Ew. So if someone likes their girlfriend to tie them up and edge them, that means they enjoy a breach of privacy, and getting google involved?

[–] [email protected] 10 points 7 hours ago

Google does like to watch.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 2 hours ago (3 children)

[Google controls how people view the internet]

This doesn't quite make sense. How does Chrome "control how people view the internet"? Isn't html/css the main thing that controls how people view the internet?

[ and what ads they see in part through its Chrome browser, which typically uses Google search,]

But it is trivial to change your default search agent right?

Is this move something we should view as a good thing, and if so, then why?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 6 minutes ago

Chrome has a massive market share and Google abuses that market share by breaking web standards, and pushing people towards Chrome because "the competition doesn't work".

They act in bad faith and abuse their position to more deeply entrench their position in anticompetitive monopolistic ways.

That's the Crux of it.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

Essentially, everything is Chrome, Firefox or Safari.

Brave, Edge etc are chrome.

Most people are using chrome.

Google controlling chrome controls what the vast majority of people use to see the internet, and then they change chrome to make it harder for you to block ads that they want to show.

There's no reason for chrome to break ad blockers unless it's owned by an ad company.

Edit: Google done some other shady things by owning it in the past as well.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 hour ago

Steam, Spotify, Discord. Whoops, all Chromium.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 hours ago

Breaking up monopolies is a good thing, and Google arguably holds too much power. Chromium is being used in 70% of browsers, and the decision how to implement and develop web standards are all in the hand of one for profit company, which had little interest in keeping things open and accessible (and private).

A quote from this Register article sums it up nicely:

What we are forced to assume in turn is that Chrome is built by the professional developers working for an ad agency with the primary goal of building a web browser that serves the needs of other professional developers working for the ad agency's prospective clients.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

What if Linux foundation buys Chrome?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 7 hours ago

They already have Servo.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 hours ago (4 children)

What's to stop them just making another browser?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

What’s to stop them just making another browser?

Nothing. Chromium is open source. So they could just fork it and declare a new "official" google browser and it would be a lot like Chrome.

I'm not sure why the govt thinks forcing google to give up a particular fork/branch of an open source browser is all that meaningful. It might make more sense if Chrome was a closed source one of a kind browser.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 hours ago

I’ve worked in the aftermath of DoJ agreements like this one. The DoJ is not stupid (or at least didn’t used to be) and will have stipulations about removing Google employees from governance/write permissions to the project, with follow up check-ins every few months to make sure any shenanigans aren’t occurring.

..none of that matters though now that the DoJ is going to be dissolved.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

That's exactly what I was thinking. It also makes Chrome essentially worthless to anyone except Google.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

Maybe as a whole package, but node.js servers are ubiquitous and have a ton of stakeholders that have nothing to do with web browsers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

What does Chrome have to do with a node.js server?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 hours ago

Same JS engine, same maintainers, same iron-grip control by Google.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 7 hours ago (1 children)

Not needed. Internet Explorer existed for years after the 90s. It wasn't killed by the courts. It was killed by the fact that it's only function was to install a better browser on first boot.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

I think you are severely underestimating how many people don’t even understand the difference between windows, explorer, a web browser and even the Internet itself during the 90’s well into the 2000’s even 2010’s.

That’s who kept IE alive

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 hours ago

No offense but it was the US Government. Most of their websites were coded for it, and quite a few of them didn't work properly or reliably in other browsers as a result. This was true up until it was sunsetted and they were forced to update to edge and some of the websites still haven't been properly moved over to chromium. When the pandemic hit and the Armed forces had to setup remote work for thousands of people Microsoft basically built them a fork of Teams. The US Government is kind of running hand in hand with Microsoft on a lot of stuff if you just hazard a cursory look.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 hours ago (2 children)

With blackjack and hookers?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 hours ago

I'm 40% internet browser.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 6 hours ago

They didn't make the first one! They got it from Apple, who themselves got it from KDE.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 7 hours ago

HA!

What a joke.

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