back to article Splitting off Google Shopping wouldn't fix the pay-to-play problem

As the European Commission mulls Google's own remedy to its anti-competitive behaviour on the web, the former startup behind the original complaint has warned of possible consequences. Foundem was destroyed by Google's promotion of its own Google Shopping – which doesn't offer customers the best deal, but is another pay-for- …

  1. m0rt

    ""We believe that advertising and editorial should be split. We do the best job we can with computers and such to give you the best search result content. We don't do pay for placement," said Page.

    Sounds like another era."

    And this is what happens. Money starts to influence all decision makers, the one at the top end up in a protected circle of people who both feed and reflect back the ethos that generally colours all positions of wealth and power.

    All political ideals are lost. Lost touch with any kind of 'doing good' you thought you were achieving as an excuse for chasing after money.

    So you become the big, faceless corporate powerhouse that you at one time despised. Well done, Google, you have hit the heady heights of IBM, HP, Microsoft et al and you can now see what awaits you. You will become irrelevant as you lose more and more touch as you try to control more and more. Sure you have years of your dotage left, but as long as you keep worshipping at your own alter, you will kind of end up as one of Pratchett's small gods. Belief in something that no longer exists. Just a shell. A body on life support, al the signs are there except that which makes it a person.

    Don't worry, though, Facebook is fast on your heels.

    You can't stop the signal.

    Shit. This is what happens when I comment before two cups of coffee...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      ""We believe that advertising and editorial should be split. We do the best job we can with computers and such to give you the best search result content. We don't do pay for placement," said Page.

      Sounds like another era."

      It's the same era. The shopping results are ads, and don't claim to be anything else. I hear a lot of people complaining about ads, or installing ad blockers, but I don't think anybody is complaining that Google should not be allowed to put ads, even at the top of their results.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        The thing is

        The whole point of Alphabet's share structure, where the founders have "super" shares with 10 votes each versus the other shares with one vote each, was to insure they did the right thing instead of the most profitable thing. They both have more money than they could ever spend in a dozen lifetimes, so if they really didn't want Google to chase profits at the expense of "don't be evil" they could direct management to do so and all the rest of the shareholders combined couldn't stop them.

        Most companies don't have this advantage, but I guess it turned out to be an advantage worth more in theory than in reality.

      2. Frederic - AMC

        " It's the same era. The shopping results are ads,..." from Anonymous Coward

        yes Google has the rights to put ads , but now he wants the other price comparison engines in Europe to buy dds too : that is the problem. Google has shut down the real price comparison engines in his general index and now he wants them to buy Ads .... The most unbiaised price comparison engines can not compete because their business model is not Google Shopping biaised business model .

        Mister Page should put his word in action

        "" The shopping results are ads,. and don't claim to be anything else " It s not so simple Mr Coward, the majority of the users doens nt really know what the Shopping Results are made off: ask anyone who is not specialist.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Elephant in the room ?

    Two bald men fighting over a comb ?

    Deckchairs on then Titanic ?

    &c.

    The real problem is not the players in the market - nor the market itself. It's the relentless, interminable, deleterious swelling of the underlying data. Which is driving the signal-to-noise ratio down to such a small amount as to be useless. And any service which tries to "refine" the searching of that data is - ironically - just adding to the problem.

    Without a radical real-world solution, the online world is going to slowly grind to a halt, as we are subsumed in pages of 10 clickbait hacks.

    I appreciate the egalitarian philosophy which still pervades cyberspace. But I can't see any other option than have to start charging people for quality results. Where "quality" is not just a list of the top 5 sites that crowbarred a search term into their website despite having no value to offer the world whatsoever.

    1. jmch Silver badge

      Re: Elephant in the room ?

      "any other option than have to start charging people for quality results"

      Except that people are so used to the free services such as search that I do not believe that a paid search service will in the short-medium term reach the critical mass required to be sustainable. And that brings us back to reality, that search engine revenues come from advertisers, and therefore search results will be driven not by what the consumers want to see, but by what the adslingers want them to see.

      It will require a wholesale cultural change on the internet where people accept paying for even basic online services, and I'm not sure that would ever happen except in very niche areas eg scientific papers

      1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

        Re: Elephant in the room ?

        jmch,

        Price comparison search is an easy area to monetise. Give a list of prices from various sites, and have a paid for link to them - which can cover the costs. Obviously general search is less easy to monetise - as not all clicks have a financial value.

        But things can change quickly. "Fake News" is the perfect opportunity for the more trusted media organisations to start saying to their customers that advertising doesn't pay the bills, and we're going to need more money from you. I think the customers may be receptive.

        Some of the US media were talking about a rise in online subs since the election of Trump. Part of that may be people who don't like him now getting engaged in politics, and so wanting to read about how awful he is. But I suspect another part may be that people are starting to realise that professional journalists have their uses.

        1. nijam Silver badge

          Re: Elephant in the room ?

          Price comparison search sites are notorious for concealing which of the suppliers being compared actually owns the site. Many suppliers won't let comparison sites access their data, which is a bad sign about both parties, in my view.

          So monetise away, they're only ever going to be of marginal interest to me.

    2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

      Re: Elephant in the room ?

      Well that's where trust comes in.

      For example, when hiring a local plumber I don't just wander into the street and shout, "any plumbers!" Why would you expect any better results with the online equivalent? You normally ask around among friends and acquaintances until you find someone you know some history on.

      Similarly, when online shopping, I don't just buy off any link. I use retailers that I've heard of or previously used, or if it's a new one make sure my first purchase is small. Plus do a few basics like checking the website has a contact address and phone number. If buying something big you can look online for problems, check their Companies House listing, search for complaints/reviews.

      If I want news, I don't trust stuff on websites I've never heard of. And I place more trust in sites that have editorial teams and do boring stuff like fact-checking. Some of those can be free, or start off that way - take the example of MoneySavingExpert.com - where a passionate guy set up a site in his area of expertise in his spare time.

      Specialist search engines can also be useful. In a limited subject area it's possible to pick the sites that searches are based on manually, so you're working from a curated list - something that's obviously impossible for general search. So, for example, you might have a specialist camera price comparison and reviews search engine.

  3. RyokuMas
    Devil

    A Cease and Desist solution would mean that results from bona fide vertical search companies would appear in the search results. Foundem says Google is lobbying furiously to avoid this.

    If what Foundem claim is true, then this proves beyond any doubt that Google has abandoned all pretences of being about providing the best search results in favour of showing what they want us to see ie: what will make them the most money.

    ... round we go again. Let's just hope that the courts have enough power and sense to stamp on this and bring Google to heel.

    1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

      I think it's a bit more complicated than that. I think Google still believe they're in the business of providing the best search results, just that they want to keep the advertising monopoly they've built. So if some search-related thing becomes profitable, they'd like to hoover up that cash as well.

      Plus, to be fair to them, there's a lot of shit search out there too. Try looking for a hotel's own website, and probably the first few links will be hotel search/booking sites.

      So I think Google want all the cash, and all the control. Obviously this is in pursuit of getting filthy rich, but there's nothing intrinsically wrong with that. It does display a certain arrogance, but then they do have quite a bit to be arrogant about. It also shows a complete lack of respect for competition law, but then we know from experience that they have no respect for privacy law either.

      I imagine Google's wet dream is that you could do a search for hotels with a pool in Mediterranean seaside cities in the first week of October costing less than £350 - that also have flights available for under £200. But we still seem to be quite a long way from that kind of intelligent and very complex search.

      1. ArrZarr Silver badge

        Actually, no. Google's wet dream is to know a person well enough that when somebody searches for "Hotels" or "Holidays", that they know the implicit part of the question is "hotels with a pool in Mediterranean seaside cities in the first week of October costing less than £350 - that also have flights available for under £200."

        I honestly don't think that Google sell the data they collect about people, they just collect the data to make the most relevant results possible for you, increasing the chance that you'll click on their results and cementing in your mind that they are better for your search related needs than anybody else.

  4. tiggity Silver badge

    Not really

    "Real price comparison engines present the item with the lowest price"

    Not convinced by the FoundEm argument

    Many comparison sites only tend to include links to companies where they get affiliate cash (price comparison site free to use so make their cash via relationships with sites to which users are directed - in the way I could make a tiny amount of cash via Amazon affiliate links if a friend buys a book using affiliate url I provide).

    It's not in the price comparison sites interests to have results (especially if they are the cheapest) that they can not "monetize" in some way (some, but not all, comparison sites also have ads).

    Plus it ignores data that cannot be indexed - e.g. Sites not in a relationship with a comparison site may make efforts to stop their content being easily scraped

    Final nail iin the coffin of taht argument is some companies do not have prices available online directly, you need to request a specific quote (from my experience some white goods companies, UK insurer Direct Line)

    1. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge

      Re: Not really

      It's not price comparison sites' fault if companies make direct efforts to hide their prices. As a general rule, it also tends to be the more expensive ones that do that - because why would you hide your prices if you were cheaper? So they can still be useful. Imperfect information is better than no information - and just knowing what prices exist in the marketplace is helpful when talking to the companies that hide prices.

      Any comparison site who wants to be in the market for a long time will hopefully want a decent reputation, meaning that they're probably going to have to build that rep by showing all results, affiliate link or not. Then use their leverage in the market when they do have volume to persuade sites to give them affiliate links. Anyone willing to pay online advertisers for clicks ought to be willing to pay affiliate links on price comparison sites, where a sale is more likely. It is a problem, but again imperfect information is better than none. And if you know the sites that are cheap but don't pay affiliate links, you can go directly to them to compare.

      Your argument seems to be that because it's unlikely a price comparison site can ever be perfect, none should ever exist. And that's just silly.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Not really

      I have yet to find a use for price comparison sites. In my experience they never have any real details that allow for any realistic comparison of the abilities of the goods and sites they are touting for - price is not the only item, availability and delivery are very important as well.

    3. Richard Jones 1
      FAIL

      Re: Not really

      If I am looking for something I really make that really do not want an endless list of comparison sites listing nothing I want. I try to use thought process based filter to cut out lists of lists pushers. When tired a mistaken click can send me through the wardrobe into their never-find-anything-hell. I tried to look at Foundem, remind me what was the point of it? I found it the was like the illegitimate one night stand lovechild between useless and hopeless.

      If I want a price comparison site I would try asking for a list of them, but probably not in this lifetime. Just try using one to find an energy supplier...

      In any case, most times there is more to life than a dumb price comparison list where prices omit the needed features like, being what you actually need, availability, suitability and so on.

  5. mark l 2 Silver badge

    Price comparison sites for things like insurance are useful, I remember the days of getting out the yellow pages and putting aside an afternoon to ring around for quotes. Now you can get similar results in minutes using a price comparison site.

    When Google shopping used to be Froogle it was a useful service as it cost nothing for retailers to list their products in there, but now they have basically made it another version of adwords you will only find the cheapest products that the retailer has chosen to pay to have it listed.

  6. Gordon Pryra

    Still not sure how Google is at fault.

    People go to google.com or whatever and receive a list of results from a search.

    The website is owned by Google and they provide the indexing services that return the results.

    Foundem or whatever are complaining that they are not appearing in the list? Then maybe they should make foundem.com and run their own search engine in order to level the playing field?

    Every time i see a company complaining about Google dominance I take a look at that company's website/service and its generally crap.

    I CHOOSE to go to Google because their service is good, I don't go to bing etc

    Should Google therefore be penalised in order to force me to go to bing? (or whatever shitty search engine is trying to take some of the advertising revenue out there?)

    1. Anonymous Bullard

      Re: Still not sure how Google is at fault.

      The trouble with Google is they're a victim of their own success.

      Their products, on the whole, are usually miles ahead of the rest - in terms of usability and price.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Still not sure how Google is at fault.

        Don't forget that in the past Microsoft were backing foundem as a way of getting at Google

  7. WibbleMe

    For once I am supporting the big buy Google, having written scripts for and used the smaller comparison sites for clients it seems that are woefully over priced compared to google, perhaps this could be their problem more than they realise.

    Content is king if your store has crap, it is crap.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Exactly. They failed because they're shit.

      Of course they want Google to cease. It's their #1 competitor.

  8. ratfox

    "Splitting not a solution"

    First, I'm thinking that there are still price comparison engines in Europe, which unlike FoundEm managed to survive these past years, and some of them are trying the solution offered by Google. FoundEm, however, has no interest whatsoever in Google's solution being successful. They want it to fail, to augment their chances in a future lawsuit based on the EC decision. They're not really an impartial observer.

    Second, I might be wrong, but if Google does split off the shopping property and considers it as a separate company, that means they stop doing anything anticompetitive. FoundEm's argument is that it would still be a crap product, but Google is allowed to make a crap product. Like putting ads on any website makes the website worse, but most websites have ads.

    I read somewhere that if the EC does not accept Google's solution after six months, they will fine them retroactively €15M per day since September. That would more than double the original fine of €2.4B. I can only assume Google is feeling confident?

  9. Daggerchild Silver badge

    Wait a sec...

    Is Google the only one putting solutions on the table here? None of the critics, competitors or the EU have anything workable? Have they defined any properties a solution must have?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Wait a sec...

      Exactly.

      If you're dishing out the biggest fine in human history, you must have a pretty good idea of what is black and what is white.

      In what jurisdiction on the planet is the criminal asked to define his recompense?!?

  10. Paul Shirley

    option 5 missing

    So the correct option: only ever show comparison sites if the user searches for comparison sites, is MIA.

    If you're going to annoy companies you ought to go balls deep on it, annoy every site equally including Google. Exactly what Foundem doesn't want, because they'll never get genuine high ranking in any search term. Well maybe a search for 'bad comparison site' ;)

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