Google To Charge Smartphone Makers For Google Play in Europe (reuters.com) 149
Google will charge smartphone makers a licensing fee for using its popular Google Play app store and also allow them to use rival versions of its Android mobile operating system to comply with an EU antitrust order, it said Tuesday. From a report: Google, an Alphabet subsidiary, announced the changes on Tuesday, three months after the European Commission handed it a landmark 4.34 billion euro ($5 billion) fine for using its popular Android mobile operating system to hinder rivals. The company said the licensing fees will offset revenue lost as a result of its compliance efforts. "Since the pre-installation of Google Search and Chrome together with our other apps helped us fund the development and free distribution of Android, we will introduce a new paid licensing agreement for smartphones and tablets shipped into the EEA," Hiroshi Lockheimer, senior vice president for platforms and ecosystems, said in a blog. In a blog post, Lockheimer wrote: Second, device manufacturers will be able to license the Google mobile application suite separately from the Google Search App or the Chrome browser. Since the pre-installation of Google Search and Chrome together with our other apps helped us fund the development and free distribution of Android, we will introduce a new paid licensing agreement for smartphones and tablets shipped into the EEA. Android will remain free and open source.
Third, we will offer separate licenses to the Google Search app and to Chrome.
We'll also offer new commercial agreements to partners for the non-exclusive pre-installation and placement of Google Search and Chrome. As before, competing apps may be pre-installed alongside ours. These new licensing options will come into effect on October 29, 2018, for all new smartphones and tablets launched in the EEA.
We'll also offer new commercial agreements to partners for the non-exclusive pre-installation and placement of Google Search and Chrome. As before, competing apps may be pre-installed alongside ours. These new licensing options will come into effect on October 29, 2018, for all new smartphones and tablets launched in the EEA.
Re: (Score:2)
What's wrong with them doing this?
They outlined the reasons and they make sense.
What do people expect? (Score:5, Insightful)
For big companies such large fines rarely if ever get paid, if they do there are tricks to get the people who fined them to pay them for it.
Sure for a normal guy like me a fine of $100,000 would be enough to set me back and lower my standard of living for a long time. But I wouldn't have much recourse, After the verdict is finalized. I either pay a fine or go to jail.
However for a company like Google, 5 billion dollars would hurt them a little bit, however they have resources to work around it. Turing a free service to a paid service. Knowing that they are a monopoly because there isn't much competition will just mean they will get paid for a service they use to offer for free.
Re: (Score:2)
For big companies such large fines rarely if ever get paid
Wishful thinking. Historically, Microsoft never avoided paying its fines on either side of the Atlantic, just to name one.
if they do there are tricks to get the people who fined them to pay them for it.
That's the way it's supposed to work, It's called the "free market".
Re: (Score:2)
Wishful thinking. Historically, Microsoft never avoided paying its fines on either side of the Atlantic, just to name one.
Intel still hasnt paid $1B fine for bribing retailers to not stock AMD parts.
Re: (Score:2)
Intel paid much more than $1 billion to AMD, what are you going on about?
Re: (Score:2)
https://www.overclock3d.net/ne... [overclock3d.net]
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/0... [nytimes.com]
10 years of appeals and brib^^^lobbying
Re: (Score:2)
Yes, sent back to a lower court, but Intel has not escaped, and they run the risk of ending up with an even higher award. Meanwhile, I do believe the money is held in escrow, did not check that though.
Break up Alphabet (Score:2)
It's time for President Trump to get out his trust-busting stick and break up Alphabet.
Alphabet has grown too big and has too much market power. It has repeatedly shown itself ready to abuse its power to stifle competition, and to censor the free expression that's necessary for a healthy democracy.
Android - separate company
Chrome - separate company
Gmail - separate company
Search - separate company
Surveillance / "advertising" - separate company
Re: (Score:2)
The Play store might be a near monopoly now, but if Google asks for too much money I bet it will see some competition as phone manufacturers might decide to just put another app store on the phone.
Re: (Score:2)
Firstly, how much 5 billion dollars hurts Google is rather missing the point. Punishment is not a major factor, the money is designed to deter them from ignoring the ruling and paying the fine and to compensate the other companies that were affected by their behaviour.
Also we can see from the example of Microsoft that in fact they did pay the fine and didn't raise their retail prices to compensate or anything like that. If they had it would probably had been punished anyway.
In this case the amount Google ch
Re: (Score:2)
And to make sure they make the proper donations to politicians going forward. EU politicians and not just those of the obsolescent nation-states. This was their error over the past 10 years.
Uhhhhhh if one was a cynic suggesting "follow the money", that is.
Re: (Score:2)
and to also recover the $5 billion from Europe
Re: (Score:2)
You mean the EU would reverse their decision and prosecute them again for the same thing they're already made a judgement on?
Sounds like something that wouldn't be allowed.
Works for me (Score:5, Interesting)
It might be less. You can be Microsoft will be happy to pay a handset manufacturer to make Bing the default. That said, I can run alternatives to google services on my phone and, well, I don't. Not because I can't but because their software tends to be the best, at least for low end phones like my old LG Note.
Re: (Score:2)
Why would you pay more for an Android phone? If anything you will pay less, because the money the manufacturer gets for making say Bing the default search engine and Firefox the default browser will be more than Google charges.
If Google charges more than they can make bundling other stuff the EU will just hit them with more fines for trying to use pricing to maintain their anti-competitive system.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You won't be forced to use Bing, it will just be the default. You can then change it to anything you like.
Let's see what the charge for using Play is.
Re: (Score:2)
The Android name is trademarked, they'd need to call it something else.
You'd also have no legal way of using the Play store either.
You'll have to use proprietary apps for basic features, like text messaging, trusting that they will be kept up to date by yet another proprietary update mechanism.
Re: (Score:2)
The can further enforce the litigation by forcing the allowance for users to install software on their phone from what ever repository they like and force Google in incorporate that feature into Android and also force access to root for the user.
They whole they are making us charge, a lie, they want the money and those prices will go up and up and up. An open access Linux phone platform, will be far more sensible for most companies and users. Android is reaching it's use by date, simple reality, from here
Does that mean I can get chromefree android phone? (Score:2)
Literally, topic. I don't like chrome on android because it has no add-ons that I feel are necessary for browsing. It would also be nice to be able to remove gmail for an actually decent POP3/IMAP email client. Pretty much the only things I use from google are maps and play store, and I'd love for play store de facto monopoly to go away. And as for maps, here maps are on par or better than google's around here.
It wouldn't hurt if they also removed all the tracking, but I don't dare even dream about that. Tr
Re: (Score:2)
I thought the AOSP provided a generic POP3/IMAP mail client and (now) no browser? At least it was this way the last time I was playing with it, around Android 4.3 or 5.
Re: (Score:2)
I have 8.1. barebones android phone (nokia) and it has no email client other than gmail that I could find when I got it. The only installed browser was chrome.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Nokia phone's primary selling feature is that they're selling a pure android. It has zero customizations of any kind.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Thanks for the info. I'm wiser on the topic now. I'll see if I can find an apk of this thing.
Re: (Score:2)
They advertise their phones come with Android One, which is Google's customised version of Android.
Android One brings a Google designed software experience to a new range of Nokia smartphones. Get everything you want and nothing you don’t with a streamlined, easy to use interface and a curated set of pre-installed apps,
"nothing you don't", as determined by Google.
Re: (Score:2)
That is the new versions. I have the first gen, which are just pure android. The only customization is the nokia's warranty app which lets you check if your warranty is still on and some technical details about the phone.
Everything else is stock android. It didn't even have a video player or audio player bundled. Just the standard google play package on top of aosp.
Re: (Score:2)
Then obviously Nokia made customisations.
Re: (Score:2)
Samsung Android phones allow you to completely disable Chrome. Samsung Internet provides content blocking, privacy, etc. and the Samsung mail client supports standard mail servers (I use it with my dovecot server).
EEA (Score:5, Informative)
EEA stands for European Economic Area, in case anyone [else] is curious.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:1)
Also, EU does not have the same countries in it. So there's a charge for those wishing to use the store even if the ruling doesn't apply to the countries they are operating in. Thus it's just a new nickel-and-diming wheeze "justified" by Google for having to not be evil.
Re: (Score:3)
Because they can't do otherwise. It's a single market. You can take smartphones from any EEA countries and sell them in any other EEA country.
EEA basically means the EU without the voting rights, anyways.
Comment removed (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
Actually I think you described the difference without realizing it right there. Apple is a computer maker that makes proprietary s/w as "part of it" - and google is a s/w company foraging into h/w (poorly..) trying to arm-twist 3rd party vendors.
Re: (Score:2)
corruption?
Re: (Score:2)
corruption?
Understanding. In this case understanding of what "antitrust" actually is.
Re: Wuddabout Apple? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
If you do not want to use the Apple AppStore, you can CHOOSE to buy another phone - no problem.
Apple also has a business model also does not conflict with 3rd party web browsers. It also does not restrict choice to one AppStore.
The Apple business model also does not prevent competing 3rd party apps. For example, Pandora is available on the iPhone, despite the existence of AppleMusic.
So try again.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Err.. Apple does restrict 3rd party browsers. Every iOS browser has to use Apple's Safari for rendering, despite having their own backend. So iOS Chrome, Edge, etc. are just fronts of Safari.
That's a far more severe restriction than Google has ever had, despite Chrome being very useful to Google's business model.
Re: (Score:2)
Err.. Apple does restrict 3rd party browsers.
Yours and the GP's point are irrelevant. It's their device and enjoys a minority position in the market.
On the other hand a Samsung Galaxy S is NOT Google's device in which case they are not able to restrict any deals Samsung make with Microsoft or whoever else without falling afoul of antitrust laws.
Re: (Score:2)
If a manufacturer does not want to abide by Google's rules, they don't have to use their software - no problem.
Before the last time Nokia went tits-up, they were using Microsoft's OS on their phones. Absolutely no influence from Google. Before that their smartphones used their own software.
Before Palm went under (and has now risen again in name only) they used their own OS too.
Companies like HTC, iMate, etc. all used Windows Phone and Windows Mobile on their old smartphones. No one sued Microsoft for includ
Re: (Score:2)
If a manufacturer does not want to abide by Google's rules, they don't have to use their software - no problem.
Yes problem. Google's rules extend beyond the line of their sale. Google has a market share of considerable power which means that manufacturers are forced towards adopting Google's rules or provide a device that doesn't meet a customer's requirements.
This is the fundamental piece of anti-trust legislation: Having power over company's decisions, and using that power anti-competitively. A vendor can't opt out of the former.
No one sued Microsoft for including Internet Explorer in Windows Mobile
It didn't come with strings attached that had nothing to do with Internet Explorer.
Re: (Score:2)
It didn't stop Amazon using Android as a based for it's Kindle Fire.
Re: (Score:2)
Is that the Kindle Fire sold first and foremost under the brand for reading Amazon content, marketed for use with Amazon content, actually locked down to Amazon content, doesn't have access to the Play Store or Google services, and effectively makes it about equal to Windows RT in terms of what consumers expect and what is delivered?
You spoke to my point perfectly. You just described the "success" of a product that would absolutely fail being marketed as an Android Phone, ... Or an Android device in general
Re: (Score:2)
You demonstrated you're an idiot.
Re: (Score:2)
Oooh burn. Honestly I expected another round of silly arguments from you. I'm kind of upset you folded so easily. I mean predictable since you don't appear to have a clue what the words anti-competitive actually mean in an article about anti-competitive practices, but really man... I'm disappointed.
Re: Wuddabout Apple? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
So... the way for Google to appease the EU's regulators is to become more of a locked down,
No. The way Google appeases the EU regulators is to monetise their product properly (i.e. charge a fee) rather than add anti-competitive strings (lock out participation of other vendors from the default configuration).
Re: (Score:2)
1) Apple doesn't command a significant share of the market. Particularly in Europe.
2) Apple makes a single product with many parts. The OS happens to be one part.
I'm sure point 2 would be more or less moot if point 1 weren't true, but the fact is that it is. Apple commands most of the profits in the industry, but there's still a lot of competition, and Apple isn't able to leverage any monopoly power to quash competitors. IANAL, but I would suspect that without being able to show that Apple is a monopoly pow
Re: (Score:2)
3) Apple gets away with it for now.
It doesn't take a genius to see that EU will force Apple to open its app market sooner or later.
Re: (Score:2)
... To me, Apple is more guilty of antitrust than Google.
What am I missing?
IANAL, but if I were to hazard a guess: Perhaps, in order to pressure Apple over this issue, the EU would need a competitor to come forward with a lawsuit. There are no legitimate* competitors to Apple's App Store; therefore, there can be no lawsuit.
* The "alternative" sources which could ostensibly compete with Apple's App Store generally find themselves far too reliant upon "ethically challenging" behaviors in order to even exist... such as relying upon jailbreaking in order to get their wares onto an iPh
Re: (Score:2)
Your theory only covers app store competitors. Any application vendor has standing to sue. For example, the Android Fortnite client drama could play out again on Apple. But what makes you think that the EU can't act unless a competitor comes forward?
Re: (Score:2)
I am sure the EU will want more money quite soon, so keep your fingers crossed.
Re: (Score:2)
http://ec.europa.eu/competitio... [europa.eu]
Re: (Score:2)
The fact that Apple only has 15% of the market while Google basically owns the rest of it?
American antitrust law concerns itself with "market power", which is not defined in terms of the fraction a market a vendor controls, but rather, whether the vendor is able to exert control over prices and other factors in its market. Which Apple certainly does. However, we are not talking America here, we are talking EU, which has much more freedom to act in whatever way they deem beneficial to their citizens.
Re: (Score:2)
Nothing.
Re: (Score:2)
That is because you don't understand antitrust. Anti-trust is about using your position of power to be anti-competitive against others. One example of anti-trust is taking a highly popular product that is used on a wide variety of hardware, and adding restrictions to that product that artificially limit the business a company chooses to make with another. For example permitting the use of Google Play only when a vendor doesn't ship a competitors product (Bing search engine).
Apple on the other hand is not be
Sounds like Google is offended (Score:4, Interesting)
Seems to me that Google is basically saying, "You don't like free?!? FINE! -- then we'll just charge you for everything!" and then sticking their middle finger up at the EU courts.
I mean, I'm not saying that Google is right necessarily... but that's certainly how their response reads, to my mind.
Re: Sounds like Google is offended (Score:2, Insightful)
And it is absolutely the correct response.
Make it free everywhere but Europe. They can pay for it, since free is considered such a bad deal.
Re: (Score:2)
Apple has been competing just fine as it was - making billions and billions of dollars per quarter.
Re: (Score:2)
It's a practical certainty that other nations will follow the EU's lead, eventually even including USA. It's just too good for the consumer.
Re: (Score:1)
Maybe computer manufacturers should be required to sell computers without memory or hard drives, so that people who don't want them can get the computer without them, and buy such things from other vendors.
Apple USED to sell computers this way. I got the VERY LAST unit you could buy without RAM or a Hard Drive, in 1990. I got a Mac IIci in a 0/0 configuration and saved a shit ton of money buying my 170MB HD and 8MB of RAM from a mail-order place.
Bad analogy guy, is that you? (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
"You don't like free?!? FINE! -- then we'll just charge you for everything!" and then sticking their middle finger up at the EU courts.
Yeah, because it was free because Google has a big heart. Don't be so naive.
If charging handset makers for Google Play Services was more preferable to Google from a business standpoint, they'd do it everywhere. Big businesses are a lot more rational than your mental anthropomorphization of them is.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, because it was free because Google has a big heart. Don't be so naive. ...
Who said I was being naive? I am fully aware that the "free" model has served Google extremely well; I wish I could say that that's one of the reasons that I use an iPhone -- but the reality is, even as an iPhone user, Google still has access to craptons of my personal data; realistically, it might possibly be only marginally better than being an Android user, in that regard.
No; I was merely presenting the more human translation of the obviously indignant lawyer-speak in their response. (And yes: I fully ex
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Why shouldn't this be their response? I mean, I'm no fan of evil, censoring megacorporations like Google. However, the EU has a bad track record of going after American companies while protecting their own. They had to expect a reaction.
The problem with evil vs. evil is that evil always wins. :(
Re: (Score:2)
and then sticking their middle finger up at the EU courts.
No they are not sticking anything. They are complying with the court requirements which was to stop an anticompetitive behaviour. As this anticompetitive behaviour was worth money to Google they just said they will comply and stop the practice and instead monetise their product in a different and far more traditional way: Ask for a fee.
Re: (Score:2)
That's not true. The EU would happily allow this outcome because then Microsoft and other search engine providers and mobile browser programmers would be able to offer phone manufacturers money for installation. Or, perhaps, Amazon would finally be able to get its app store onto the market.
Awful and stupid (Score:3)
This is both awful and stupid. The point of fines is not to have someone else pay them for you. It's punishment for an unfair advantage you created for yourself. This fine should come out of those profits.
But charging a fee for access to the Google Play Store is probably going to mean that we're going to have to get our apps at a Samsung store from now on, and that would definitely be terrible for everybody involved.
A better option would be an open store that sold the best and most popular Android apps, but with a better percentage of the revenue going to the app makers. That would give users less crap to wade through, it would give app makers a bigger share of the profit, and the app store itself could mostly leech off the work that Google has already done. A win for everybody except Google.
I think it would honestly be better for Google to just take the loss instead of ruining their business out of a misguided attempt to dodge this fine.
Re:Awful and stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
I'd rather pay for services with money than with my privacy. Now at least I have the choice.
Re: (Score:2)
No you don't. This has nothing to do with your privacy and everything to do with manufacturers not restricting B2B transactions with other vendors. You're not getting your privacy back, you're getting the option to buy a phone with Google Play + Bing Search or some other formerly banned combination.
Re: (Score:2)
Why should I suffer for the EUs shortsightedness?
Enforcing antitrust laws is shortsighted? You really MUST be an Alphabet shareholder. Are you also on their board?
Re: (Score:2)
What makes you think it wasn't the intended outcome?
This is what the EU wants. Google can charge a reasonable fee, companies can choose to pay it and offset the cost by bundling their own choice of browser/search engine as default, or they can bundle the Google ones.
There is now competition in the market. Prices will be pushed downwards as Google has to compete with other browser/search vendors to be the default, and other companies have a chance to compete effectively and grow in the EU.
It's a little bit b
Re:Awful and stupid (Score:4, Insightful)
But charging a fee for access to the Google Play Store is probably going to mean that we're going to have to get our apps at a Samsung store from now on, and that would definitely be terrible for everybody involved.
Why? Other phone makers might go for any store, from Google's own to Samsung's to Amazon's to F-Droid. That kind of forced competition is good. It encourages app developers to actually provide their apps in multiple stores, thus reducing the need for Google's.
And if users are worried about losing their app investment if they change stores, well, just give preference to apps that allow the pro version of their apps to be activated irrespective of the store they were bought in. For example, by providing a key screen with a code that can be copied and applied to the free version downloaded from another store to turn it into the pro one, or something along those lines.
Nothing is really being lost with this change.
Re: (Score:2)
Alternatively that would be the big plus of the Google Store. You should be able to access it on all devices whereas the Samsung, LG, HTC, Moto stores are likely to only work on their devices so if I want full app access, I'd want to use Google's store over anyone elses.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
This is both awful and stupid. The point of fines is not to have someone else pay them for you.
Google is not charging to pay off the fine. Google is charging due to the loss of income from the anti-competitive practice they have been forced to stop. In any normal world this is exactly how a product works to begin with: You want to use it, pay a fee.
Not: "You want to use it, well let me give you a list of all these things not related to my product that you will not be allowed to do."
Re: (Score:2)
I point to the trade war with China, which American consumers are paying the tariffs for. Sometimes the goal can cost something to achieve. Surely if the Play Store is worth something then that opens the market up to competition?
Unrelated Samsung announcement (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
You're writing this as if it is some kind of retribution instead of the exact frigging point of the ruling. It's completely related news.
European smartphone makers? (Score:2)
Or makers who sell smartphone in Europe?
When something is free, you are the product (Score:2)
I understand Brexit now (Score:2)
Seriously? You have an open source operating system that you can use for free. You also have extra closed source components that you can use for free, you just have to decide one way or the other. No wonder there is nothing resembling Sillicon Valley in Europe.
Sounds like a win for the people (Score:2)
Google was keeping it for free in exchange of not allowing competition. Now, not only Google is forbidden of stopping competition, but it also decided to give them a push the other way.
With this, hopefully, smartphone makers will start giving the consumers a choice between the Goggle version and the Free version.
Seems a bit high (Score:2)
$40 Google royalty per phone seems a bit high, I can't see EU consumers being happy about it. After all, Google really should be paying manufacturers to install its software because that is how Google tracks people and makes enormous amounts of money from advertising. So it seems likely to me that Google will find itself the target of further antitrust action if they hold to their current course. This leak might be effectively just a negotiating tactic, or it just might be pure stupidity. Hard to tell at th
Re: So many crazy Euro-Rules (Score:2)
And yet, they (and Australia) will bitch about higher prices for the same thing elsewhere (presumably PPP adjusted, but may not), to cover the higher costs of selling items, which the govt mandated warranties, return policies, employee benefits, etc.
Re: (Score:2)
Hilariously those lead to WORSE warranties in the EU compared to the US. I regularly run into products where manufacturers offer 3-10 years warranty in the US but only the mandatory 2 in the EU.
This is a common "unintended consequence" of government mandates. It is illegal for companies to explicitly collude on prices, wages, and warranties. But if the government sets a mandate, then they can all use that as an implicit collusion level.
Re: (Score:1)
EU enforces a guarantee (not warranty) on most sold products which does protect the customer for 2 years. If the company sells a shitty/faulty product, I, as a customer, can rely on this mechanism to get a replacement or repair without any additional expenses from my part. Additionally, the customer has the right to rely on the seller to make a claim, which makes is much easier than dealing with the manufacturer, which of course is also possible. It is fairly easy to also enforce this mechanism if needed.
A
Re: (Score:3)
Until you actually need those warranties. Then you realize it is only valid if you currently live in the US. You have to pay for shipping and handling out of your own pocket. And if they refuse to pay out, there is not much you can do.